Pre-Season Preview: Borussia Dortmund

Dort­mund Head Into Next Sea­son With Attack­ing Prowess.

Dort­mund man­ager Jur­gen Klopp achieved his great­est suc­cess last sea­son when he lifted the club to an impres­sive 5th place which would secure Europa League foot­ball for the com­ing sea­son. Although Klopp is rel­a­tively inex­pe­ri­enced, his enthu­si­asm and thirst for suc­cess will spur his side on to greater suc­cess. Klopp has quite a squad at his dis­posal this sea­son with Borus­sia Dort­mund, but it will be down to his abil­ity to put all of those work­ing parts together and cre­ate a force that will com­pete for Europa League qual­i­fi­ca­tion on a domes­tic front and the Europa League title on a Euro­pean front that will deter­mine how suc­cess­ful Dort­mund are to be this season.

Key Play­ers

It’s fair to say that Borus­sia Dort­mund have a lot less sta­bil­ity defen­sively than they do in attack. One defender who does stand out though, despite his age, is Neven Sub­otic. Sub­otic played most of his youth foot­ball in the United States after his fam­ily moved there when he was 10. Sub­otic when on to be capped for both the U-17 and U-21 lev­els for the United States, but when the call came from Ser­bia, he opted to play for his home nation at the senior national level. His posi­tional sense and aer­ial abil­ity will be key for Dort­mund this sea­son, and he will look to con­tinue to impress and ful­fill his poten­tial with Dortmund.

Up top, Borus­sia Dortmund’s strength can really be seen. With the likes of Nel­son Valdez, Lucas Bar­rios, and Mohamed Zidan, Borus­sia Dortmund’s front-line is one that can really carve out oppor­tu­ni­ties and out-score oppo­nents. Although, none of them would be scor­ing the goals they did if it weren’t for the sup­port they get from the mid­field. The man in the mid­dle that cre­ates Dortmund’s attack­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties is prob­a­bly more impor­tant to Dort­mund than the strik­ers them­selves. That man, is Nuri Sahin. The young mid­fielder has come out in the press already this pre-season and has declared that he con­sid­ers him­self equal to Bas­t­ian Schwe­in­steiger. Cer­tainly, he will look to spring­board an already impres­sive start to his career on the Europa League stage this sea­son. Nuri Sahin’s cre­ativ­ity and box-to-box qual­i­ties make him an asset to his team.

New­com­ers

It doesn’t look like Dort­mund have made any very impres­sive sign­ings this sum­mer, but what has to be praised is their abil­ity to bring through incred­i­ble youth prospects. A mid­fielder like Sven Ben­der seems to be next on the list of admirable Ger­man mid­field stal­warts. Sven Ben­der, and his twin-brother Lars Ben­der who plays at Bayer Lev­erkusen, will both look to make a mark in the Bun­desliga this sea­son. Both broth­ers were a part of the U-19 Ger­man side that won the Euro­pean U-19 Cham­pi­onship in 2008. Now, at 21 years old, they will look to be reg­u­lar con­trib­u­tors for their respec­tive clubs. Sven will most likely be kept under the wing of Dort­mund cap­tain Sebas­t­ian Kehl, and look to improve his game under Kehl’s guidance.

Expec­ta­tions

It is unlikely that — because of Dortmund’s rather rick­ety defense — they will be able to con­tinue to push for Europa League qual­i­fi­ca­tion this sea­son. After Ham­burg and Wolfs­burg have both done their best to strengthen their squads for the upcom­ing sea­son, it is unlikely that Dort­mund will be able to hold their place in the top six. An 8th placed fin­ish may be all we see from Dort­mund this season.