In the curtain raiser for the German season, it was Borussia Dortmund who emerged victorious after a thrilling 4-2 victory against last seasons treble winners Bayern Munich.
Pep Guardiola's reign at the helms of Bayern started off in the worst possible fashion with a defeat to arch-rivals Borussia Dortmund, who will now enter the season with additional belief that they can regain the league title.
Bayern's defeat will also give the other teams in the Bundesliga a boost, with the side that ran away with the domestic league and cup looking nothing like the side that took to the field today.
An early mistake from Tom Starke gifted Marco Reus a goal and that was the difference at half-time.
In the second-half, 3 goals in 3 minutes turned the game on it's head.
Arjen Robben equalised only to see Van Buyten score a own goal to give Dortmund the advantage once again. Then, Gundogan made it 3-1 with a superb finish.
Thomas Muller hit the bar late on before Marco Reus sealed the victory for Dortmund after Aubameyang cut the ball across the goal to him.
Thiago Alcantara was selected for his competitive debut but Dortmund were unable to field any of their new signings due to illness and injury.
Pep Guardiola's first introduction into German football started in disaster. Bender's header should've been easily gathered by goalkeeper Tom Starke but he clumsily dropped the ball, leaving Marco Reus with one of the easiest goals he'll ever score.
It nearly got worse a few minutes later when Gundogan unleashed Lewandowski, who fired a finish underneath Starke. Luckily for Bayern, the linesman had raised his flag for offside.
Bayern's first real chance of the match fell to Shaqiri, who forced a smart save from Weidenfeller after a one-two with Arjen Robben.
The Dortmund keeper was the only reason the sides were not level a few moments later when he denied Muller after Alaba had played a low cross into the area. Weidenfeller was on hand again for the rebound, superbly tipping the ball away for a corner.
Starke was not looking confident in the Bayern goal. He denied Lewandowski with a superb stop but almost awarded the Polish striker a goal later on when he unnecessarily dribbled the ball past the Dortmund striker.
Bayern were starting to improve and were very close to levelling the scores 10 minutes from the interval. Alaba's square ball into the danger zone was just out of the reach of Mario Mandzukic.
At half-time the home side held the advantage due to a defensive error but in truth, there was not much between the two sides.
Dortmund made one change at half-time, bringing on captain Sebastian Kehl for the second-half in place of Sven Bender.
The half started off slowly until the 54th minute, when the game struck into life.
Lahm crossed a inch perfect ball into the head of Arjen Robben for the equaliser, who scored the winner against Dortmund in the Champions League final.
However, immediately after Borussia Dortmund took the lead again. They charged forward and Van Buyten attempted to get rid of the danger with a diving header but he found the corner of his own net for one of the best own goals you will ever see.
They weren't done their. Dortmund surged forward again with Gundogan, who cut back and brilliantly curled the ball into the net off the post to give Dortmund a 3-1 lead.
The next goal in the game wasn't as quick as the previous, it took Bayern 8 minutes to make it 3-2.
Lahm was again the provider and his low cross to Robben was expertly finished on the turn. The Dutchman scoring his second of the game and 70th goal in Bayern Munich colours.
Aubameyang was given his debut in the place of Blaszczykowski for the final 20 minutes of the game while Bayern continued the rehabilitation of Schweinsteiger by bringing him on in the place of Shaqiri.
Pizarro was also brought on the replace Mandzukic.
With 10 minutes remaining Thiago chipped the ball over the top to Thomas Muller, who's volley flicked off the top of the bar.
Tom Starke continued his mixed display by rushing out of his goal to deny Aubameyang a debut goal before superbly stopping a shot from Gundogan after Sahin had cut the ball back.
However, nothing could stop Dortmund from getting their fourth. Lewandowski's through ball gave Aubameyang plenty of space to work with and he unselfishly cut the ball across the goal to Marco Reus for his second simple finish of the evening.
Pep Guardiola went for broke and deployed centre-half Dante as a striker for the final few moments. Dortmund also made another change, gifting new signing Sokratis Papastathopoulos his debut as he replaced the superb Gundogan.
0 comments:
Post a Comment