Before the quarter-final second leg of the Champions League on Tuesday (9:00 p.m.) against FC Barcelona, the message near Borussia Dortmund is clear: After the 0: 4 debacle in the first leg a week ago, priority has the start-up in the Bundesliga.
“We already know that in terms of importance, the Bundesliga is in the foreground”sports director Sebastian Kehl confirmed in view of the clear superiority of the Catalans the previous week. This is probably why coach Niko Kovac gives his captain Emre Can Can as a frequent player now. Can only train individually on Monday.
“We spared him today because he has had muscular problems in the adductor area for weeks”said Kovac. “It may be that he doesn’t open tomorrow.” Even though the second reliable central defender fails for months in Nico Schlotterbeck.
Kovac: “There are always miracles”
Schlotterbeck paid his teammates on Monday morning to visit a motivation on the training area. However, it is very questionable whether this was the crucial impulse for a recurrent European Cup chase against a Spanish team after 1994 (La Coruña), 2013 (Málaga) and 2024 (Atlético Madrid). “There are always miracles”Kovac said rather jokingly than with conviction.
“Come on would probably be the biggest football miracle in the history of Borussia Dortmund“said sports director Lars Ricken. Barça’s superiority in the first leg was too great, the burden of the result from the previous week is too great. “A 0: 4 against Barcelona is not a particularly good starting situation”also known sports director Kehl.
So if you had hoped for research tones including summoning of a football miracle, you were disappointed. Only from midfielder Felix Nmecha could be heard more brave statements at the obligatory press conference: “We know that it will not be easy, but everything is possible with our fans. We have to have this belief”according to NMECHA, who is fit again after weeks of injury and represents a starting eleven alternative.
Sportschau Champions League Live, April 15th, 2025 8:50 p.m.
BVB wants to “show a different face”
For Dortmund, it is primarily a matter of not presenting yourself again as in Barcelona and as a previous year’s finalist at least with dignity. “We want to win the game. How high you have to see. But we definitely want to show a different face than in the first leg”said Kovac.
The BVB coach had sacrificed the system with the defense chain that had previously been successfully implemented in the league. As before often in the season, the team with the chain of four did not cope at all. After Kovac vehemently defended this in Barcelona, he said now: “I also knew that it didn’t work out in Barcelona.”
Break of three without Emre Can
Already at the 2-2 on Saturday evening at FC Bayern, Kovac had returned to the triple chain. And so it will probably stay on Tuesday. “The team did it properly. That also makes sense for tomorrow”said Kovac. “The decision to play again was a really good one”also said Kehl.
Above all, it was one to which the BVB coach was apparently pushed by the team. The leaders in the team pleaded in a round with the coach after the debacle in Barcelona and before the game against Bayern to play again with the chain of three.
Probably not in the CL second leg: BVB captain Emre Can
“I talked to my leaders and also asked them how to assess the situation. […] Rather see in the triple chain “said Kovac, who now has the problem to reorganize the defense without a can.
Our sources:
- German press agency
- Press conference Borussia Dortmund on April 14, 2025
