New season, but same old problems for Borussia Dortmund
Edin Terzic's side huffed and puffed againts a resiliant FC Köln side on matchday 1, ahead of what could prove to be a tricky Bundesliga season.
If anyone in a yellow shirt deserved anything out of Borussia Dortmund’s season opener at home to Köln, it was Donyell Malen.
On a day on which Dortmund were slow, laborious, sloppy and lacking in offensive ideas for long periods, the Dutchman alone offered brief flashes of quality with his combative pressing, injections of pace and, finally in the 88th minute, the only goal of the game.
Julian Brandt’s corner was helped on by debutant Felix Nmecha to Malen who, falling backwards at the back post, managed to loop the ball into the net by deflecting it off his own standing leg.
Ironically, Malen wasn’t even supposed to have been on the pitch. Ten minutes earlier, Edin Terzic had been planning on replacing him with Jamie Bynoe-Gittens as part of a double substitution. But when right-back Julian Ryerson signalled that he’d picked up a knock and needed to come off, Terzic instead turned to the more experienced Thorgan Hazard.
“I was sorry for Jamie – we’d all hoped that he could have given us something extra offensively,” he explained. “But such is football, and the player who stayed on ended up scoring the goal.” It was a goal which gave Dortmund a 1-0 win and three points, and left Köln with none – but which didn’t come close to telling the full story, although it was a familiar one for the Black and Yellows.
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