BVB have been plagued by injury worries throughout the season so far. “But up to this point we have been able to compensate for that very neatly,” coach Marco Rose praised his team on Friday. Improvement is in sight after the international break.
It’s been an annoying game of change that Borussia Dortmund have had to deal with so far this season: When one player returns from a break, another signs off. This was the case last Tuesday in the Champions League match against Sporting Lisbon (1:0), when Mahmoud Dahoud had to be substituted after only eight minutes due to injury – and Julian Brandt, who had just recovered from a muscle injury, had to play much longer than previously planned.
Dahoud will also be absent on Saturday when BVB face FC Augsburg in front of almost 40,000 spectators in the Bundesliga. The midfielder suffered a knee ligament strain against Lisbon – and was still lucky. The injury is painful, but does not force him to take too long a break. In the second half of October, Dahoud, who would have been absent against Augsburg anyway due to his traffic light card from the Gladbach game (0:1), should be fit for action again. Erling Haaland and Giovanni Reyna are expected back a little earlier, Emre Can is even an option again at the weekend. In Dortmund, they hope to have got over the worst by then. Especially as Dan-Axel Zagadou and Soumaily Coulibaly will also be available in the foreseeable future.
Brandt first candidate for Dahoud spot
“We have been able to compensate for the absences very neatly up to this point,” said BVB coach Marco Rose on Friday, who has so far at no time lamented publicly about the many injury absences of his players. Instead, he praised the substitutes – again now ahead of the Augsburg game. “The guys who came in are doing well.” He said that was especially true of the substitutions in the games themselves. “They do our game good,” Rose said, referring to the recent games against Lisbon and Gladbach. “That’s when we really built up pressure at the back or got some relief in. “
Rose’s sentences were a compliment to the addresses of Brandt, Marius Wolf, Reinier and Nico Schulz – who could possibly be used for longer periods on Saturday. That applies to Brandt anyway, whom Rose once again praised as a “good guy” and “outstanding footballer” before the Augsburg game, but also charged him with sustainability in his form development. As against Lisbon, he should have the best chance of taking Dahoud’s place in the starting eleven.
Rose wants to protect Moukoko “to a certain extent “
Rose also had some warm words for talented striker Youssoufa Moukoko, who recently reached his current limits at Gladbach and did not feature against Lisbon. He said the 16-year-old was “outstanding” in dealing with what had been pressing on him for a long time, but he too would need “sustainability” and a “certain amount of patience”. “We are happy that he is with us. We see his great talent and we will continue to promote and challenge him,” Rose said, “but we also have to protect him a bit and find the right balance.”
Admittedly, this applies not only to Moukoko at the moment, but also to many other professionals in Dortmund’s squad. Not necessarily because of their age, but because of their high workload. The international break, during which Dortmund are planning a test match together with their U23s in order to get some of the returning players back into the rhythm of the game, may seem to come in handy. But whether it is really a blessing for Rose and his team, Rose did not want to answer on Friday because of the recent experiences with injuries: “I can only say that afterwards.