Borussia Dortmund: Has Club Become Most Popular For Youngsters?

With the signing of Alexander Isak over more prestigious competition, has Borussia Dortmund become the preferred destination for the top young players around the world?

I think a good deal of the optimism that is generated from the Isak move is that he was in “advanced discussions” with Real Madrid. Borussia Dortmund beat Real Madrid to a hot shot prospect!

Even five years ago this moment seemed out of touch. That hot shot young player would have gone to Bayern Munich, some club in the Premier League, Barca, Real Madrid or at the time one of a few clubs in Italy.

Clearly, that isn’t the case anymore as Borussia Dortmund have become a well-oiled machine in creating transfers for promising prospects. This graphic probably says it all.

The future is bright 👀[via @br_uk] pic.twitter.com/TrnVM8rynO
— BVB English (@BVB_English) January 23, 2017

That graphic doesn’t include players over 20, but BVB also has their fair share of low 20s developing stars including Matthias Ginter (23), Raphael Guerreiro (22), Mario Gotze (24), and more in the youth ranks (U-19s won the West division a year ago and advanced out of their UEFA Youth League group, U-17s have won West division past three seasons).

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There is little doubt that Borussia Dortmund has a terrific young collection of players and many of them were bought at relatively low prices. Of the players in that graphic, only Isak cost 10m or more and some reports have his fee at 9.5m.

Creating an environment to allow for players to improve has been a major key in signing not only Isak, but I would suspect many of the other emerging players in the squad. Real Madrid just had a very real case study of what might have happened to Isak had he went there with Martin Odegaard, who couldn’t find the field. Other major clubs have similar blockages of the path to the first team. Chelsea might be the most prevalent English example as they have a squad out on loan that would be good enough to avoid relegation in the Premier League. Manchester City has one of the most talented youngsters in the league in Kelechi Iheanacho and he hardly ever plays.

Smaller clubs like Everton have no problem finding minutes for their youngsters (Tom Davies) and clubs in say the Eredivisie or Ligue 1 have developing prospects build into their financial plan. Borussia Dortmund, on the other hand, has found a blend of being highly competitive in both domestic competition and European competition while using young players and those more established.

That is likely due to the strength of players like Ousmane Dembele and Christian Pulisic and how they can compete against the Real Madrid’s of the world. But credit for that also has to be attributed to the training staff at Borussia Dortmund. Without a measured approach to their development, (which by the way also includes first team minutes huge for transfer talk), these prospects would either flounder on the bench or more harmful damage the club’s chances to win.

Next: Borussia Dortmund sign Alexander Isak

Using friendlies, including the winter friendlies and matches against lesser opposition, BVB can slowly allow their players to gain first-team experience before throwing them to the wolves. I also believe that players benefit from the fact that they won’t be cut out of the picture at the first bad match. Perhaps that is why Dembele and Pulisic are willing to take on so many opponents and have become so successful at it.

This blend of slowing increasing playing time, allowing players to learn from mistakes, and superior development during training allows for sub 20-year-old players to choose them over more glitzy destinations. Isak is the most recent and obvious example, but I would expect the trend to continue and for Borussia Dortmund to really build a sustainable pipeline. Look out Europe.

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