Erling Håland, who? This is Bradley Fink’s world that we’re just living in.

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Borussia Dortmund U17

B-Junioren Bundesliga West, NRW-Ligapokal B-Junioren

The U17s won their last game of the U17 NRW Ligapokal against 1. FC Köln on August 21^st 2-0. The goals came from Rafael Lubach and Jaden Korzynietz. With this win, they’re top of their group and will be competing in the semifinals next Saturday, tentatively.

The reason for that is the U17 National Teams have appointments from September 1^st through 9^th and lots of Dortmund players are invited. The DFB U17 team nominated Jaden Korzynietz und Rafael Lubach. The DFB U16 team nominated Yannick Numbisie, Luke Rahmann, Gökdeniz Gürpüz, Charles Herrmann, Almugera Kabar, und Raul König. Kjell Wätjen may also be nominated.

Borussia Dortmund U19

A-Junioren Bundesliga West, NRW-Ligapokal A-Junioren, DFB Junioren Pokal

The last group match in the NRW-Ligapokal was a back-and-forth affair. Our U19s went up against the Bayer 04 Leverkusen U19s on August 22^nd and won 5-3. Bradley Fink followed up his five-goal appearance with a tidy hattrick (19’, 33’, 90’). The other two goals were scored by Dennis Lütke Frie (6’) and Samuel Bamba (23’). Why was it back-and-forth? Well, the goals against were scored in minutes 9’, 21’, and 90’⁺³. Defense was lacking at the start.

The starting lineup was: Marian Kirsch – Lion Semić, Faroukou Cissé, Colin Kleine-Bekel, Tom Rothe – Dennis Lütke-Frie, Göktan Gürpüz (82’ Tekin Gencoglu), Vasco Walz, Samuel Bamba (70’ Isaak Nwachukwu) – Bradley Fink, Julian Rijkhoff (57’ Bekir El-Zein)

The bad news from this game: Göktan Gürpüz suffered a head laceration (80’). Hopefully everything is okay and he won’t be out for too long.

The U19s will play in the semifinal on September 5^th. The opponent is most likely FC Schalke 04. This however is also tentative to change, as there are U19 and U18 National Team games set for September 1^st through 6^th.

The players nominated are: DFB-U19 – Lion Semić, Göktan Gürpüz, and Dennis Lütke-Frie; Switzerland-U19 – Bradley Fink; DFB-U18 – Marian Kirsch, Samuel Bamba, Faroukou Cissé, and Tom Rothe. Vasco Walz is on the reserve list for DFB-U18. It can be assumed Julian Rijkhoff will be nominated for the Netherlands.

Borussia Dortmund II (U23)

3. Liga

It’s was back to the Rote Erde on August 21^st when they faced 1. FC Saarbrücken. The game shaped up to be a fun one, and the first half was definitely one of the more entertaining 0-0 games. The second half, not so much.

Steffen Tigges, Antonios Papadopoulos, and Ansgar Knauff all returned from their “loan” to the senior club. Niklas Dams was also back into the starting 11 after serving his suspension. Even with Marco Hober, Moritz Broschinski, and Florian Krebs out injured, this is as close to a full lineup that Enrico Maaßen has had to work with this season.

And on that note, the starting lineup had a fair amount of shakeup. Kolbeinn Finnsson, Ole Pohlmann, Berkan Taz, and Timo Bornemann all came out, while Dams, Papadopoulos, Knauff, and Tigges came in.

The game started off hot when Richmond Tachie made a nice move to feed Tigges, whose shot hit the post square on (2’). The beginning phase also showed what should be expected of this game: chippy and about one foul per minute of game play. For the first 15 minutes, it felt like the possession was 75% Dortmund II. Saarbrücken did have a great chance when Luca Unbehaun dribbled the ball in his own box and nearly fumbled it (14’).

Many of the great chances were started through the middle by Franz Pfanne’s calming presence. Dortmund II had some more good looks with Tigges (21’) and Marco Pašalić (24’).

On the left side, Knauff vs Dominik Ernst was a great duel to watch. Neither was a fan of the other. After Knauff tried to run around the outside past Ernst, the latter got a little mad and laid a big tackle. That was the first of seven yellow cards.

On the right side, Nick Galle had managed to figure out how to keep Pašalić quiet, and so for probably the first time this season, most of the forward pressure did not come over the right.

In the 31^st minute, BVB should have had a penalty kick, as Saarbrücken committed a handball in the box after a Tachie shot.

Overall, the first half was high event in the number of shots that came from both sides. The second half got way more boring as fouls prevailed. One of the last offensive actions in this game came from Pašalić in the 49^th minute when he dribbled past two Saarbrückener, but couldn’t get past the third.

Tachie got a yellow card for elbowing and very nearly got a second yellow two minutes later (54’), but luckily the referee showed some mercy. The next chapter in the Pašalić vs Galle book, was when the latter shoved the former into the next Landkreis. Both got a yellow card (61’).

There was a break in the fouls for a few air-mailed Dortmund shots (Tachie (60’) and Tigges (68’)), and some very close misses (Tachie (68’), Tigges (71’), and Knauff off a Tobias Raschl masterclass dribble (85’)).

Maaßen made his first subs in the 69^th (nice.) minute, when he took Tachie and Pašalić off. Pohlmann and Taz took their spots, respectively. Taz received a yellow three minutes later for kicking the ball away after the whistle.

One last shot attempt from Taz landed on top of the goal (92’). The game finished 0-0. This was one the U23s probably should have won, but Saarbrücken did not make it easy. The highlight for me of this game was probably when the Saarbrücken coach got mad at the linesman and the latter completely sassed him back.

Stefan Drljača, Kolbeinn Finnsson, Albin Thaqi, Abdoulaye Kamara, Cebrails Makreckis, Timo Bornemann, and Ted Tattermusch sat on the bench.

Borussia Dortmund Frauen

Frauen Kreisliga

The women had a mid-week friendly at VfL Kamen on August 18^th. It was a successful 3-0 win. Dortmund got off to a good start and pressured early. The first goal came in the sixth minute from none other than Ann-Katrin Lau. The entire game basically took place in the Kamen half. For how new this team is, the combination game and the one-two passes are looking like they’re in mid-season form.

The second Dortmund goal came off a direct freekick in the 35^th minute from Vanessa Heim. Almost everything was coming through the right side, mostly due to the great work of Lisa Klemann. This continued through to the second half, and really only stopped when she was subbed off due to a non-contact injury in the 56^th minute. Hannah Goosmann put the lid on it with her ice-cold finish in the 68^th minute to score the 3-0.

They finished the short training camp with a friendly on August 22^nd against SVW Ahnatal. BVB won this handedly with 5-0. The goals came from Kimberly Becker (21’), Goosmann (22’), Laura Höhl (56’, 91’), and Annika Herbig (91’). Klemann started this game, so looks to be no injury concern there.

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Looking Ahead

Borussia Dortmund U17

The kids will possibly play in the NRW-Ligapokal semifinal on Saturday, August 28^th against either Bayer 04 Leverkusen or Fortuna Düsseldorf.

Borussia Dortmund U19

The U19s will play in the DFB Junioren Pokal on August 29^th at FC Viktoria 1889 Berlin.

Borussia Dortmund II

The first English-week of the season has arrived: Wednesday, August 25^th at VfL Osnabrück and Sunday, August 29^th at home against MSV Duisburg.

Osnabrück are one of the newly relegated teams. They are in 14^th place with four points (1W-1D-2L) and a 3:4 (-1) goal differential. Duisburg sit 11^th with six points (2-0-2) and a 5:4 (+1) goal differential.

Dortmund II fell back into third. They have eight points (2-2-0) and a 8:4 (+4) goal differential. 1. FC Magdeburg is first with 10 points and FC Viktoria 1889 Berlin are second with nine points.

Borussia Dortmund Frauen

The next friendly is on August 28^th at Sportfreunde Siegen II.

Sources: kicker.de, fussball.de, bvb.de