07.03.2010

Dortmund 3-0 Borussia

Gladbach were already a goal down to Borussia Dortmund by half-time. And after the interval Mohamed Zidan settled the game in favour of the home side.

Michael Frontzeck opted to name an unchanged side for the trip to Dortmund. This he was able to do because the injuries to Marco Reus and Raul Bobadilla proved not serious enough to rule them out. Thorben Marx remains the only player unavailable to the Borussia boss from his nominal first-team lineup. Dortmund coach Jürgen Klopp was forced to draft Felipe Santana into central defence in place of Mats Hummels, who broke his jaw against Schalke last Friday. Sebastian Kehl also returned to the side after a nine-month layoff.

Dortmund take early lead

After four defeats in five the home side sought to put pressure on the Gladbach goal right from the start. A solid Borussia unit adopted a cautious approach in the early stages, resulting in no chances for either side. But this strategy came unstuck after just 13 minutes when Mohamed Zidan forced his way past Tobias Levels on the Dortmund left and slipped a low cross to Kevin Grosskreutz, who though Borussia had defenders to spare beat Roel Brouwers to the ball to open the scoring.

The goal, of course, meant that Borussia had to jettison their cautious approach. Amid the now falling snow they responded with some raids of their own. Midway through the half, however, their efforts either seemed to lack the conviction or they were thwarted by a Dortmund defender. The home side did not exactly produce a flurry of attacking football either, but when they did string two or three quick passes together they were always a threat. In the 35th minute Logan Bailly had to be at full stretch to prevent Marcel Schmelzer from adding a second. Three minutes later Borussia finally produced a determined attack when Marcel Meeuwis knocked a lovely pass to Raul Bobadilla in the penalty area, but faced with two defenders he was unable to get a shot in.Zidan then tested Bailly on 42, but the Gladbach custodian gathered the ball safely despite being well out of his goal. And so the teams went in 1-0 at half-time.

Zidan adds a second

After the restart the game seemed to go into something of a lull until Zidan decided to take matters into his own hands on 54. The Africa Cup winner danced past as many as three Gladbach defenders before dispatching an unstoppable left-foot curler past Bailly into the top corner from some 20 metres out. Naturally that made Borussia's task even tougher, but four minutes later Roberto Colautti at least had an effort on goal. Bailly was then called upon to prevent Barrios from adding Dortmund's third from a free-kick. In a bid to add some fresh attacking impetus Michael Frontzeck introduced Rob Friend and Karim Matmour, who immediately combined to launch a counterthrust, though Friend was offside from the Algeria international's pass.Before Borussia could increase their efforts going forward, however, Zidan settled the game for Dortmund, finishing off a counterattack by calmly converting a Barrios pass to make it 3-0 in the 70th minute. On the positive side the Foals continued to go forward in a bid to get at least one goal back. With ten minutes left Friend had another opportunity from a Marcel Meeuwis pass. But ultimately Michael Frontzeck's side were to be denied even this minor success.

At the end of the 90 minutes Borussia had to accept defeat in Dortmund despite the presence of 8,000 travelling fans.

Dortmund: Weidenfeller - Owomoyela, Subotic, Santana, Schmelzer - Kehl, Sahin - Baszczykowski (Dede 75'), Zidan (Hajnal 77'), Grosskreutz (Koch 85') - Barrios

Borussia: Bailly - Levels, Brouwers, Dante, Daems - Meeuwis, Bradley (Matmour 63') - Reus (Jantschke 75'), Arango - Bobadilla, Colautti (Friend 63')

Goals: 1-0 Grosskreutz (13'), 2-0 Zidan (54'), 3-0 Zidan (70')

Yellow cards: Bradley, Dante

Attendance: 79,800

Referee: Michael Weiner