2026/2027 season

Bundesliga

Team page
Bundesliga · Team page
Borussia Dortmund
Head coach: Niko Kovač · 3-4-3
Rank
2nd
Pts
14
P
6
Form
🟢 Good

The essentials at a glance

The summary of this page: estimated level of play, form trend and qualitative verdict. For the details, head to the other tabs.

Editors' ratings
6/10
Attack
10/10
Defence
7/10
Form
8/10
Confidence / mood
Current risk:Medium

2nd with 14 pts from 6 matches: 4 wins, 2 draws, 0 defeats.

11 goals scored, 4 conceded.

Mikel Merino openly looked back at the attack on Borussia Dortmund's player bus. On 11 April 2017, three explosives were detonated at the bus, which was on its way to the stadium for a Champions League-duel with AS Monaco.

Voetbalprimeur · 18 Oct 2026 · machine-translated

Also in the third game after the international break Borussia Dortmund remains without victory, and again without hits. The performance at Union Berlin did not meet the requirements, this also applied to Jobe Bellingham.

Sportschau · 18 Oct 2026 · machine-translated

Viktor Gyokeres wants to leave Arsenal, Xabi Alonso eyes Barcelona duo and Liverpool target Dortmund's Felix Nmecha.

BBC Sport · 17 Oct 2026

Bavarian in the head with Dortmund in Bundesliga, Luis Enrique hooks the summit in Ligue 1

Tuttosport · 17 Oct 2026 · machine-translated

How the team has played recently

Match-by-match results, record and rhythm of the current season.

Latest matches
Dvs 1. FC Union Berlin (A) · 0-0
Dvs SV Werder Bremen (H) · 2-2
Wvs VfB Stuttgart (A) · 1-0
Wvs SC Paderborn 07 (H) · 3-0
Wvs TSG 1899 Hoffenheim (A) · 3-2
WWWWDD
11 scored / 4 conceded over 6 matches played
Rest: 1 day since the last match · 2 matches played in the last 15 days
Home form
2W - 1D - 0L
Away form
2W - 1D - 0L
Statistics

Computed from this season's scores, every time the page is shown.

Goals scored per match
1.8
Goals conceded per match
0.8
At home
5 scored · 2 conceded in 2 matches
Away
4 scored · 2 conceded in 3 matches
Over 2.5 goals
3 of 5
Both teams score
2 of 5
Clean sheets
3 of 5
Failed to score
1 of 5
Cumulative points vs league average

Not enough matchdays recorded yet for this curve — history builds up with every standings refresh.

How Borussia Dortmund play

System, playing identity, and what sets the team apart at both ends of the pitch.

Playing identity
Preferred system
3-4-3
Philosophy
Defensive-control football first: a compact mid-block that steers the opposition towards the flanks, ball recovery then quick transition — an approach that observers describe as pragmatic rather than spectacular.
Attacking strengths
70 Bundesliga goals scored in 2025-26 on the way to 2nd place; a controlled opener with a 2-0 win over HSV (Guirassy 9', Konstantelias 45+1'), Kovač afterwards stressing the volume of chances created.
Defensive solidity
Best defence in the Bundesliga in 2025-26 with 34 goals conceded (against 51 the previous season); clean sheet in the 2026-27 opener despite finishing the match with ten men.
Pressing
Compact mid-height pressing, geared more towards closing passing lanes than towards very high aggression; against HSV, however, the first half was described as suffocating pressing.
Transitions
Quick attacking transitions after winning the ball, with Guirassy as the focal point; in defensive transition, the line is still considered vulnerable to counter-attacks despite the statistical progress.
StrengthA solid defensive base and Gregor Kobel in goal, a deep and versatile midfield (Nmecha, Bellingham, Sabitzer, Veerman), an openly embraced rejuvenation strategy with the new sporting director Nils-Ole Book.
WeaknessVery heavy reliance on Serhou Guirassy up front, a heavy injury list through the centre (Can, Schlotterbeck, now Konstantelias), and a lack of entertainment criticised by part of the fanbase.

The mood around the club, and who is missing

Internal climate, relationship with the supporters, and known absences before the next match.

Mood
Squad confidence
Good, sustained by two clean-sheet wins in the league and then the cup. The 5-0 at HEBC Hamburg above all let Niko Kovač rotate and take a look at his bench, with a brace from Samuele Inácio and a goal from Fabio Silva. The mood remains conditional, though, on a very full treatment room, where Ostrzinski, Kaba and Lerma join the long-term absences of Konstantelias, Can and Schlotterbeck. The good news comes from Carney Chukwuemeka's return and Nico Schlotterbeck's first sessions with a ball.
Coach / players / board relationship
Niko Kovač and his board showed they could react quickly: the loan of Ethan Nwaneri, secured from Arsenal in the closing minutes of the window, was presented by the head coach as a direct response to Giannis Konstantelias's injury, in a profile the club had tracked for some time. On outgoings, the board held firm in rejecting Newcastle United's approach for Felix Nmecha, including a swap involving Nick Woltemade, and Marcel Sabitzer stayed despite interest. No public disagreement between the staff and the executives is reported.
Mood with the supporters
The cup trip to the Volksparkstadion produced a fine image: HEBC Hamburg's coach Philipp Obloch noted that “the Yellow Wall brought the atmosphere, and the Purple Wall lit it up too”. Niko Kovač himself spoke of “the cup as we love it”. At home, the club has opened ticket sales for the visit of Villarreal in the Champions League. The underlying demand remains high: the Yellow Wall expects more than pragmatism and has not yet had a chance to judge the team on a big occasion.
Pressure on the head coach
Moderate. Two wins and a cup qualification have eased the pressure, and Kovač has obvious mitigating circumstances given the number of unavailable players. He also publicly defended Samuele Inácio after his sending-off against HSV. The trip to Hoffenheim, on Saturday 5 September at 15:30, will be played without the 18-year-old winger, suspended for two matchdays.
Club objectives
No official numerical objective: Lars Ricken refuses to “declare for the title”. The verified facts are a commitment on three fronts, with a second place last season, a cup run revived in the second round and a now-known Champions League league phase: Inter Milan, Real Betis, Villarreal and AEK Athens at the Signal Iduna Park, Arsenal, Aston Villa, Bodø/Glimt and Sabah away, from 8 September to 27 January.
Recent internal tensions
No visible internal conflict. The two points of friction are sporting and disciplinary: the pile-up of unavailable players, which forced the club to sign in a hurry, and the two-match ban imposed on Samuele Inácio by the federation's sporting tribunal, whose principle Niko Kovač disputes on the grounds of the player's age.
Absences
InjuredGiannis Konstantelias — Rupture of the anterior cruciate ligament in the left knee against Hamburg: a long-term absence, which forced the club to react in the market by signing Ethan Nwaneri.
SuspendedSamuele Inácio — A two-match ban handed down by the German federation's sporting tribunal after his red card against HSV: he will miss Hoffenheim and Paderborn. He was, however, allowed to play in the cup, where he scored twice.
InjuredNico Schlotterbeck — Ankle injury sustained during the World Cup. Back on the pitch for individual sessions with a ball since the start of September, without duels and with no return date given.
InjuredEmre Can — Cruciate ligament rupture, absence assessed at around six months by LigaInsider.
InjuredSilas Ostrzinski — Long-term injury: more than three months out recorded by LigaInsider.
InjuredMussa Kaba — Out for around five months, gradually building back up according to LigaInsider.
InjuredJustin Lerma — Muscle injury, absence estimated at around a week.
BackCarney Chukwuemeka — Recovered from the muscle problems that kept him out of matchday 1; available for the squad again.

Before kick-off

What to know before the next match: statistical form, qualitative analysis, and a computed estimate of the 1/X/2 probabilities.

Next match

Borussia Dortmund — Eintracht Frankfurt

At homeSaturday 24 October at 18:30Matchday 7
In 6 days. Kick-off time confirmed by the league. Paris time · football-data.org fixtures.

Prediction, odds and form of both teams →

What the press says

No preview found for this fixture. The press mostly covers the big games, and usually the day before.

Prediction
EstimateBorussia Dortmund — Eintracht Frankfurt
69 %
1 · Borussia Dortmund
16 %
X · draw
15 %
2 · Eintracht Frankfurt
In-house calculation, from this page's standings data alone: 6 matches played by Borussia Dortmund, 6 matches by Eintracht Frankfurt. Confidence: medium
The formula, in plain words — with this match's figures
  1. League average. 193 goals scored over 104 team-matches played (18 teams taken into account), i.e. μ = 1.86 goal scored per team per match. This is the reference point: everything that follows is expressed relative to it.
  2. Attacking and defensive strengths. Goals scored (or conceded) per match, divided by μ. 1.00 = exactly average; in defence, above 1.00 means “concedes more than average”.
    TeamGoalsRawKept
    Borussia Dortmund — attack11 in 6 matches0.990.99
    Borussia Dortmund — defence4 in 6 matches0.360.68
    Eintracht Frankfurt — attack10 in 6 matches0.900.95
    Eintracht Frankfurt — defence16 in 6 matches1.441.22
    The “Kept” column is the result of shrinkage towards the mean: weight = P / (P + 6), i.e. 0.50 for Borussia Dortmund and 0.50 for Eintracht Frankfurt. The rest of the weight goes to the league average. This is what stops a lone 5-0 from producing an attack at 3.3 times the average — and hence a 95% probability.
  3. Home advantage (γ). Measured on the league itself: 2.23 goal scored on average by the host against 1.48 by the visitor, over the 44 fixtures present in each team's last 5 matches. Raw ratio 1.51; shrunk towards 1 (weight 0.42, on the log of the ratio) then capped at 1.25 → γ = 1.19. Shrinkage goes towards 1, i.e. no advantage at all: while the sample is small, the model does not assert a home advantage it cannot measure.
  4. Venue correction, specific to each team. Drawn from the home/away split: points per match at the venue concerned are compared to points per match over all fixtures, with stronger shrinkage (weight = P / (P + 8)) and a bound of ±12%.
    Borussia Dortmund at home: 2.33 pts/match versus 2.33 overall over 3 matches → ×1.000
    Eintracht Frankfurt away: 1.33 pts/match versus 1.33 overall over 3 matches → ×1.000
  5. Expected goals. One side's attack is set against the other's defence. γ applies to the host only: applying it the other way round too would count the home advantage twice.
    λBorussia Dortmund = 1.86 × 0.99 × 1.22 × 1.19 × 1.000 = 2.67
    λEintracht Frankfurt = 1.86 × 0.95 × 0.68 × 1.000 = 1.20
  6. Poisson grid. Probability of every exact score from 0-0 to 8-8, assuming the two goal totals are independent, then adding up the cells: home win 68.7%, draw 16.5%, away win 14.9% — displayed rounded to whole numbers so that they add up to exactly 100. Most likely exact score in the grid: 2-1 (only 8.9%, which says enough about how unpredictable an exact score is).
Limits of this model — they are not anecdotal.
  • It only knows goals and a venue. Neither absences, suspensions, line-ups, fatigue, stakes, weather nor club context enter the calculation — while the other tabs of this page show that they matter.
  • The assumption that the two goal totals are independent is false in reality: it slightly underestimates tight scores, hence the draw.
  • γ is measured over a rolling window (each team's last 5 matches), not over the whole season.
  • The shrinkage constants (6, 60, 8) and the bounds are choices, not measurements. They were tuned to be cautious early in the season; they were not calibrated on a results history, as none is available here.
  • No after-the-fact evaluation has been made: at this stage, nobody knows whether this model is better or worse calibrated than another.
What other sources say
No external source has been collected for this match. That is the normal state: readings are taken by hand, and an empty box is better than an unverified figure.
This block shows probability estimates, not predictions, and carries no advisory value. The in-house estimate is the result of a formula applied to a small sample; the figures from external sources are reproduced as they were collected, without their method having been verified.

The full squad

The professional squad by position, captain marked with an armband.

Goalkeepers
  • Gregor Kobel
  • Alexander Meyer
  • Diant Ramaj
  • Patrick Drewes
  • Silas Ostrzinski
Defenders
  • Waldemar Anton
  • Ramy Bensebaini
  • Joane Gadou
  • Daniel Svensson
  • Julian Ryerson
  • Kauã Prates
  • Filippo Mané
  • Luca Reggiani
  • Almugera Kabar
  • Emre CanC
  • Nico Schlotterbeck
Midfielders
  • Jobe Bellingham
  • Felix Nmecha
  • Konstantinos Karetsas
  • Marcel Sabitzer
  • Joey Veerman
  • Giannis Konstantelias
  • Carney Chukwuemeka
  • Justin Lerma
  • Mussa Kaba
Forwards
  • Serhou Guirassy
  • Maximilian Beier
  • Fábio Silva
  • Samuele Inácio
  • Mathis Albert
This team's current captain could not be confirmed with certainty at the last check — no armband is shown above until the information is reliable.
Squad last verified on 31 Aug 2026 — source: fussballdaten.de (2026/27 squad) cross-checked with bundesliga.com (2026/27 captains, 18/08/2026) and the Dortmund - HSV match sheet of 29/08 on weltfussball.de.

What has been said recently

Chronological feed of verified information about the club.

rss18 Oct 2026
Ethan Nwaneri shown red card by mistake as Arsenal loanee's Dortmund struggles continue
Source: Mirror Football
rss17 Oct 2026
Hattrick de Luis Díaz at Bayern's goal, who catches Dortmund at the top
Source: Notícias ao Minuto — Desporto
rss17 Oct 2026
“It looks very bitter,” says the BVB defender about the injury of his colleague
Source: Welt Sport
rss13 Oct 2026
Official: Borussia Dortmund renews contract with Niko Kovac
Source: Notícias ao Minuto — Desporto
rss18 Oct 2026
Merino openly about bombing on Dortmund bus: Lucky I'm still alive
Source: Voetbalprimeur
rss17 Oct 2026
Not even Fabio Silva helped. Dortmund stalls and may fall from the lead
Source: Notícias ao Minuto — Desporto
Head coach3 Sep 2026
Niko Kovač has opened the door to his young players, naming Mathis Albert and Samuele Inácio after their cup performances. Circumstances push him that way: Konstantelias is out long term, Inácio is suspended and Ethan Nwaneri's work permit had not yet been confirmed.
Source: Fussballdaten
Injury2 Sep 2026
Nico Schlotterbeck is back on the training pitch and is now doing individual sessions with a ball, around two and a half months after the serious ankle injury sustained during the World Cup. The 26-year-old defender remains a long way from full training, however: duels are not yet part of his programme and no return date has been set. He had himself described his rehabilitation as “a long process” to be assessed “day by day”.
Source: LigaInsider
Head coach2 Sep 2026
Niko Kovač looked back on the arrival of Ethan Nwaneri, loaned from Arsenal at short notice after Giannis Konstantelias's injury: “It had not worked out at the time. After Konstantelias's unfortunate injury, we had to react.” The head coach set out the profile sought — “someone in that position who can win his duels, quick and strong at dribbling” — before owning the level of expectation: “We have brought in a very good young player for the season, and I hope he can meet all our expectations. I am convinced he will.”
Source: Bulinews
Club2 Sep 2026
According to Sport Bild, Newcastle United made a concrete request for Felix Nmecha late in the window, offering Nick Woltemade — eventually loaned to Juventus — plus several million euros. Borussia Dortmund refused quickly: the Germany international midfielder is regarded as central to the season's project and the club had no intention of parting with him.
Source: Get German Football News
Result1 Sep 2026
BVB booked their place in the second round of the DFB-Pokal by thrashing HEBC Hamburg 5-0 at the Volksparkstadion. After half an hour of adjustment against the lower-division side, Dortmund made the difference before the break: a Janek Wrede own goal (33), a Daniel Svensson strike (36) and then a Samuele Inácio brace (41 and 45+2). Fabio Silva added a fifth in the second half (59).
Source: news.de
Head coach1 Sep 2026
Niko Kovač savoured the setting as much as the result: “Today we experienced the cup as we love it — which is what makes this competition beautiful!” Marcel Sabitzer put it more soberly: “We did our job. Towards the end it was under control.” Waldemar Anton stressed how important the occasion was for the group. HEBC coach Philipp Obloch praised the atmosphere in both ends, and his goalkeeper Jannik Schoon acknowledged that “it is hard to defend for more than thirty minutes against Dortmund”.
Source: Bundesliga.com
Transfers1 Sep 2026
A few minutes before the window closed, BVB confirmed a season-long loan for Ethan Nwaneri from Arsenal with no purchase option, Dortmund covering his wages in full. Niko Kovač praised “a very good footballer” able to make up for Konstantelias's pace and agility.
Source: Sport1
Suspension31 Aug 2026
The German federation's sporting tribunal has suspended Samuele Inácio for two Bundesliga matches, following the red card he received in the 77th minute against Hamburger SV, given by referee Felix Zwayer for violent play. The 18-year-old winger will therefore miss the fixtures against Hoffenheim and then SC Paderborn 07. The sanction is final. Niko Kovač had defended his player: “The lad is 18. Nothing serious happened here.”
Source: LigaInsider
Club31 Aug 2026
Gregor Kobel did not travel to Hamburg for the first round of the cup, a deliberate rest reported by the Ruhr Nachrichten so that he could go into the following Bundesliga matchday fresh; Alexander Meyer replaced him in goal. The same source reports the return of Carney Chukwuemeka, recovered from the muscle problems that had kept him out of matchday 1.
Source: LigaInsider
Injury30 Aug 2026
Giannis Konstantelias has ruptured the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee, sustained in the 52nd minute against Hamburg, a few minutes after his first goal in the black and yellow shirt. He will be out for several months. Lars Ricken reacted: “This news hits us very hard, because Giannis showed very quickly why we regard him as an excellent player for Dortmund.”
Source: Site officiel du Borussia Dortmund
News last verified on 18 Oct 2026. Sources: sports press (L'Équipe, Le Parisien, Foot Mercato, regional press…) and official club websites — see the link on each item.
Editorial content (playing style, mood, absences, external prediction sources) last verified on 3 Sep 2026. The standings/form data above are refreshed automatically — as is the 1/X/2 estimate, recomputed on every view.