Sokratis Out Three Weeks

The injury bug bit Dortmund late on in their 1-0 win against Bayer Leverkusen on Sunday when Sokratis Papastathopoulos had to be subbed off in the 77^th. Today the club announced that Sokratis had picked up a hamstring injury and would be out for three weeks.

Sokratis and the rest of the Dortmund backline had a solid game, absorbing pressure from a Leverkusen team with some of the most dangerous attackers in the Bundesliga. The Greek international hurt himself while retreating to cover Karim Bellarabi as Leverkusen attempted to play a long ball into the BVB penalty box. Sokratis immediately realized something was wrong and signaled to the bench for a substitution.

Neven Subotić, who has clearly been the third choice center back this season, replaced Sokratis and helped Dortmund preserve their clean sheet to see out what was a nervy victory on the road.

Dortmund have been relatively lucky with injuries this season, especially when compared to last year. Still the injury comes at a bad time for Thomas Tuchel as his star center back will miss some key games.

Muskelfaserriss im Adduktorenbereich: Sokratis Papastathopoulos fällt drei Wochen aus. Gute Besserung, Papa! pic.twitter.com/6hC1kv6Ujo

— Borussia Dortmund (@BVB) February 22, 2016

A three-week absence will see Papastathopoulous miss the Porto, Hoffenheim, Darmstadt, Bayern, and Mainz matches. If BVB are able to progress in the Europa League, Sokratis will also likely miss the first leg of their tie in the next round.

The 27-year-old defender, who signed from Werder Bremen in 2013, has really come into his own this season and is now arguably Dortmund's best defender. Sokratis was rewarded for his form this season when his contract was recently extended until 2019.

Subotić is a very experienced defender but has only made seven appearances in all competitions for BVB this season. Hopefully Sokratis can recover quickly and be available for the end of the Bundesliga season and possible runs in the DFB-Pokal and the Europa League.