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Dortmund was far from their best but it was still enough to get the win against a third division side and to qualify for the semi-final. Now Der Klassiker awaits the black and yellows as they will try to beat the Bavarians on their home turf just as they did two years ago.
COACH:
Thomas Tuchel: 7
Tuchel did not rotate as much as expected and lined-up a team that was very close to our best eleven. It did not show at first but Lotte was motivated and the pitch was awful and did the team no favors. The switch from the 3-4-3 to the 4-2-3-1 for this game was probably due to the opponent. In the end Dortmund did enough to go through and showed a decent performance.
STARTING XI:
Roman Bürki: 7
Bürki did not have to do much but he was there when needed. At the beginning of the game he saved a very good Lotte chance, after that he had quiet day.
Marcel Schmelzer: 7
He scored! The last time he did that was in the 13/14 Bundesliga season, to be exact on September 21st 2013 against Nürnberg.
Other than that our captain played defensively solid but he's still in over his head once he has to contribute to our build-up.
Matthias Ginter: 5
Ginter did not make any egregious mistakes but he's still not very good as a center-back. He makes mistakes on defense and he has a few bad passes every game which is deadly at the center of the defense.
Marc Bartra: 8
Another solid performance from the Spaniard. In Sokratis's absence he's the one who keeps this defense together.
Lukasz Pisczcek: 6
He played?
Gonzalo Castro: 5
He's no Weigl. Castro started in place of the injured Weigl and I can't shake the feeling that wither Merino or Sahin would've been better at the position. He does not have Weigl's vision, composure and passing accuracy to replace him.
Raphael Guerreiro: 7
The Portuguese international tried to be the box-to-box midfielder that we need him to be and he was good against Lotte. He had some good ideas but he lost possession a couple times, he can not do that against better opposition.
Ousmane Dembélé: 7
"Ous" had another Dr.Jekyll and Mr.Hyde kind of performance. He lost a lot of balls and was inaccurate with his passes just to have one moment of brilliance where he ran across the entire field and set-up Pulisic's goal.
Christian Pulisic: 7
Pulisic was mostly invisible, especially in the first half but he was there when the team needed him to be. He scored the crucial 1-0 after Dembélé's good run, even though the pass from the Frenchman was not perfect, Pulisic kept calm and converted.
Shinji Kagawa: 8 MOTM
Shinji has proven in the last couple games that he deserves to start more games. He gave Dortmund's game structure and creativity. With all the young guys around the team needs someone with experience to dictate the tempo of the game, especially with Weigl out and he did that today.
André Schürrle: 6
BVB's record signing scored but he did not do much besides that. He was not involved in the game at all and he still does not seem to fit into this squad.
SUBSTITUTIONS:
Mikel Merino, Emre Mor, Alexander Isak: NR
None of the subs played enough to leave a lasting impression. However Merino should probably be the one to replace Weigl when he's injured, not Castro. Mor is extremely talented but he never looks to pass and instead chooses to run into a wall of defenders instead. Pulisic and Dembélé are ahead of him on the depth chart and deservedly so.