In England, what a supposedly top team is really capable of is measured by the question of whether it can perform at its best on a “cold, rainy night in Stoke”. Stoke, a city in the Midlands, serves as an interchangeable example of an outsider who causes the favored football team an unpleasant evening through determined stubbornness – and as soon as you reach your own limits, the hostile rainy weather does the rest.
Seen this way, Kiel could easily establish itself as the German Stoke. On Tuesday evening it was again really uncomfortable in the coastal town, a stiff breeze was blowing and there was a film of moisture in the air that only exists in the north of the republic. Under such conditions, football only brings joy to incorrigible fans. And the Borussia Dortmund team, so much can be said, is not one of them: they lost 2:4 at Holstein Kiel and in this game at best demonstrated their own incorrigibility, but no top team virtues.
After a wave of flu and injuries, Schlotterbeck and Emre Can moved back into central defense in Kiel, while Ramy Bensebaini recovered in time on the left side of the defense – attacker Donyell Malen, however, didn’t even come along because his long-awaited move to Aston Villa had been announced in the meantime. for a reported 25 million euros.
Defensive stability, it quickly became clear, could not be achieved through a few personnel changes. Kiel was disgusting in the best possible way, so much so that it would have made the unknown inventor of the Stoke analogy proud. BVB’s performance, on the other hand, would be described very favorably as “wishy-washy” or “dodgy”. The simplest passes got stuck in the bumpy turf, lax body tension, great confusion on players’ faces, and whatever coach Nuri Sahin had scribbled on the tactics board in the dressing room: his players either had to play with their cell phones during his explanations or do everything on time for kick-off have repressed. Poof – everything gone. In any case, what the Dortmunders fabricated up there in Schleswig-Holstein can hardly be explained in any other way.
After all: BVB comes back into the game in the second half
How the evening would play out was already apparent in the fifth minute, when Kiel’s Shuto Machino passed the ball to the fast Finn Porath at the center line and he was allowed to race unchallenged towards the Dortmund goal. Porath missed the huge opportunity. But the Kiel player who was roaming around in Dortmund’s supposed territory didn’t even have to be called Porath; he could just as easily go by the name Phil Harres, Alexander Bernhardsson or Lasse Rosenboom.
The scene seemed to repeat itself constantly in the first half: Dortmund wasted the ball, the well-positioned and brave Kiel team switched quickly – and somewhere behind the yellow-black chain of errors a largely alone Holstein player appeared who took his chance or just not. Therefore, at this point only those attacks after which the ball was ultimately placed in Gregor Kobel’s goal: Machino, preceded by a loss of the ball by Julian Brandt (27th minute). Harres headed after Can couldn’t quite get into the aerial duel (32′). And Bernhardsson, who was able to comfortably push the ball over the line after a cross pass from Harres (45th). Can you say it like that? Yes, you can: From Kiel’s perspective, the 3-0 score at half-time was still one or two goals too low.
At least BVB weren’t completely frightened of themselves, because after the restart they continued in a much more upright posture. Sahin brought Waldemar Anton and Maximilian Beyer into the game for Ryerson and Bensebaini, which helped to plug the porous defense and build up at least medium-long pressure phases. Giovanni Reyna, who came on a little later, also scored to make it 1:3, although Kiel goalkeeper Weiner didn’t cut a good figure in this scene (71′). And Jamie Gittens only made it 2-3 because his shot was deflected decisively (77′). The game, which BVB had stayed out of for an entire half, actually threatened to end when Holstein midfielder Lewis Holtby had to leave the field with a red card for serious foul play – but because Fiete Arp also scored in stoppage time to make it 4-2 , this cold, rainy night ultimately produced a deserved winner: Kiel.
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