Borussia Dortmund vs VFB Stuttgart: Key Takeaways

Dortmund find the cohesion and synergy on the pitch to finally look like an organized team:

In many ways, Borussia Dortmund’s performance against Stuttgart was refreshing not only from the standpoint that the game was high scoring ( which in itself has been a rarity this season), but also from the standpoint that they looked like a cohesive unit in doing so. The goals and Dortmund’s success in part came from their individual talent, but largely came down to the fact that they looked comfortable enough on and off the ball to play to each other’s strengths to get the job done.

Over the course of last season and much of this season, Dortmund have managed to win games but they often didn’t look good or comfortable doing it. They have had to rely much on individual brilliance but they have found it difficult to come together as a unit and play in a way that highlight’s each other’s strengths. In this weekend’s game, they did just that.

When looking at how the game took its course, much of Dortmund’s passes were purposeful and had direction. The person in possession of the ball had options to connect with because players were making runs into space or creating the space for others to run onto the ball. Chances were created not from haphazard attempts to put the ball into the box but passes and crosses that had intention behind them.

This is a very clear turning point for Dortmund’s season because they showed a side of them that if we are being honest, we hadn’t seen much of since the season began. Jude Bellingham is the perfect embodiment of this synergy with the way he pulled the strings all match. The English international scored twice, won 60% of his challenges, had an 86% pass success percentage and ran a total of 10.5 kilometers. He was certainly not the only player to put in a shift, but his performance is a shining example of what Dortmund did right in this game – putting energy into the game and maintaining a high work ethic to not only score but be everywhere on the pitch so that he was available to help his teammates.

Final thoughts:

While Dortmund’s result against Stuttgart is of course an exciting one, Die Schwarzgelben still have a tough few weeks ahead of them. The Black and Yellows will look to seal their place in the knockout stages of the Champions League by putting in strong performances against Manchester City and FC Copenhagen. They will also come up against Eintracht Frankfurt, VFL Wolfsburg and Borussia Mönchengladbach in the league, all of which will be must win games of they wish to keep pace and make ground on the leading pack.

if Dortmund are able to retain their momentum from this win and implement what they were able to do right in this fixture, then the club have a good chance of coming away with some good results against the aforementioned opposition. Coming up against Manchester City will of course be a tough fixture, but Dortmund will be at home and have already shown that they are capable of putting up a fight in the reverse fixture. Aside from this clash, Dortmund have the chance to seal crucial points and perhaps really maintain a consistent run going forward.