Bundesliga review: Freiburg 1-2 Dortmund

Continuing our quest for the title of Herbstmeiser (the relatively meaningless autumn champion) Dortmund defeated Freiburg with 2 goals to 1.

It was a turbulent match which saw a very unstructured game in the first minutes. Both teams lost the ball very easily and most of the action took place in midfield. With progression of the first half, Dortmund managed to increase the pressure on Freiburg, however most of the shots were from long- distance as Dortmund found it difficult to break through a defensively deep- standing team like Freiburg.

However, Freiburg did not just defend but was able to initiate good attacks of their own (special mention for Papis Demba Cisse) and Dortmund’s defense did show occasional weaknesses. Particularly Roman Weidenfeller did not have his best day and this seemed to infect the rest of the backline. In the 26th minute Freiburg was awarded a freekick of questionable legitimacy but the resulting melee in front of the goal resulted in Subotic’s clearance hitting Hummels who deflected the ball into his own goal.

After that Dortmund struggled to get back into the game for a long time, the structure in attack that the team had had over the last few games was missing and Dortmund found it impossible to break down the Freiburg defense. Freiburg continued to put pressure on the BVB defence via high crosses and had several good chances to increase their at that point not undeserved lead.

However, the second half saw a different BVB. The passing was much improved and the early pressure nearly payed off when a goal from Barrios was ruled out after the referee had judged him to have fouled the Freiburg keeper. It was nearly all Dortmund now and the team created one chance after the other. All that pressure finally paid off when the substituted Robert Lewandowski scored the equaliser in the 75th minute after a cross by Schmelzer. Freiburg then scored an owngoal by Mujdza, after a cross by Piszczek (whom I’m starting to like more from game to game). Kuba still had a great chance to increase the scoreline when he missed an open goal in the 86th minute, but luckily it did not matter and Dortmund managed to close out the game.

Overall, the win was deserved due to a much better display by Dortmund in the second half. However, the team showed that there still are frailities especially in defense. Anyway, thats all for now, so cheers and until the next time!

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Category: Team News