To make matters worse, Watzke extended his contract a few months ago. I sincerely hope that whoever succeeds in the future shows is more ambitious.
Firstly playing or being selected for the national team means nothing. Benteke has been awful for the last 4 years, but still gets regularly called up and is Belgium's second choice striker. Witsel has spent his entire career avoiding playing in the top leagues and when he finally conned a top club for one last pay day he was woeful. I will give you several reasons why Witsel kills possession teams. 1. He rarely shows for the ball in pressure situations. So this means our back 4 or other midfielder have no options for the pass. They then look bad due to hoofing it or giving the ball away, but Witsel was at fault for not moving. 2. He often gives hospital passes. He is being pressed and he just passes the ball backwards allowing the pressing team to continue closing our player down. He does not change the angle or occasionally break the press. This allows teams to press without fear. 3. Carrying in from 2, it means that teams can step up and ignore movement from our attacking players since Witsel will never make the pass. I can take a player who messes up trying to do the right thing for the team, but not a player who plays for his passing stats. I agree with what you say about Can. I would happy for him to play lots of games as a utility player. That's precisely why I don't want a CB. Can plays well there, I would be happy for him to play a number of games in Central midfield of right back. He is a winner and fights for every ball.
When it comes to Burki and Kobel comparison, i think many people forgot Burki came here as a great BL GK, that season he had the best percentage of saves.. In the end he was just an average GK. Im afraid Kobel will be the same like Burki, hope im wrong..
You have to take into account that Freiburg (against most teams) will be playing a defensive style where a large part of those shots the keepers face will be further away from goal which makes them a lot easier to save which, at the same time, increases the goalie's save percentage. Dortmund plays a completely different style where the defensive line is much more agressive and plays a lot higher which leads to much more counter-attacking play for the opponent abnd odd-man situations making the shots against much more difficult. I'm not saying Kobel will be a guaranteed upgrade to Burki as projections are always difficult due to development paths that differ from keeper to keeper. However, what makes me more optimistic on Kobel is his ball skills which are much better than Burki's even at this stage of his young career. He still struggles with long balls and will need to improve but his style fits much better with the Dortmund plat style.
It looks like Wolf will get his chance at right back in the preseason. With Meunier likely to go deep into the Euros with Belgium and consequently get a few extra weeks off, this means we are highly unlikely to buy a right back. So will are likely to sell Sancho, Balerdi, Burki and Delaney. So we should have even more money to spend on a CDM and winger. On the Weigl front he is for sale, because Benfica need to sale and need to pay us off. It wouldn't be hard to get a deal done for him. There's still no news on who we are targeting for Sancho's replacement.
Watching this U-21 final left me thinking that Adeyemi would be the natural Sancho replacement in time. To begin with he could split time with Reyna and Knauff and eventually grow into the starter.
I was watching and thinking Wirtz would be the perfect Sancho replacement. He has great feet, an eye for a pass, fantastic touch and can score goals. Probably impossible, but I would go all out for him. Would anyone else want to sell Hazard? Leicester and Tottenham are after a winger. Reports that they are both looking at our all boy Hofmann. I would sell Thorgan and use it to invest in the three key areas we need to improve: RB, CDM and winger.
Sportsbild are reporting that depending on sales we will buy 1. A RB (great) 2. A winger. (great) 3. Central Defender(huge waste of money) Next season we will not meet our targets if we don't improve on the 6. Chelsea just showed you how vital the midfield is. With a great midfield they went and won the CL. So angry we plan to keep going with our inadequate midfield. It's just like when we kept Burki in goal or Favre as manager KNOWING they weren't good enough. EDIT The midfield is the key to everything. Our front three last year was top 3 in the world. Our centre backs and left back are as good as ANY team in the world. Yet we are not improving our defensive midfield, which is Bundesliga 2 level. Madness.
Yeah Wirtz would obviously be the best option but not realistic for Dortmund. The MOTM was by far the DM Dorsch. He was simply everywhere, had an immense game.
Dorsch should definitely come back to the BL, I would try to sign him. Has all the attributes to become a top DM. Wirtz would be unaffordable at this point. he has a contract to 2026 and no buy out clause. Adeyemi is a BVB fan apparently, however I'm not sure he is a good Sancho replacement, still lacks the awareness of team mates at times and is more of a natural striker then winger.
According to RN, Burki, Schulz, and Brandt are all alowwed to leave the club this summer is a suitable offer is submitted.
Brandt really got screwed by the Favre era if you ask me. Seriously, fvck Watzke for hiring that fraud in the first place.
Absolutely madness to let Brandt go. If he goes we will deeply regret. Favre really screwed our midfield and team. If Witsel had not gotten injured we would have lost Dahoud too, which we still might. We are killing our future. The board are very, very lucky that Reus was so loyal. Without Reus Dortmund would be back with Leverkusen, Wolfsburg and Gladbach. Edit It really seems like we are planning on selling Brandt to Arsenal. So unbelievably stupid. When Reus retires/declines we will do what Arsenal have done. If you are not striving to improve you will go backwards. As for Wirtz he is possibly affordable. We spent 25million on Bellingham rather than getting a quality midfielder. We can offer 40 million on him. I am very worried for next year now. We are relaxed about signing Dahoud. Hugely worrying. We are letting Brandt go. Hugely worrying. We are selling Sancho. Hugely worrying. We don't care our midfield is trash and want to have 400 centre backs, because we fail to realise we conceded so many goals due to failing failing control the midfield. Hugely worrying. The only positive is that the Euros start and the pain of England going out will stop me raging about the stupidity of the club.
Also I am ranting but Hazard has been really poor for 2 years and shows no sign of improving, no desire to sell him. Meunier has been awful, no desire to sell him. Delaney has been a great servant and has always given his all for the club, but we need better. Why is he not on the list?
Yeah, I don't get it either. The club is willing to sell a promising talent like Brandt, but Hazard is considered an asset to the squad. Huh?
Hazard was good the first year. Maybe not a starting attacker for a world class team, but 7 goals / 13 assists in the league was a really solid body of work in 19-20. I share your concerns about the midfield but at least it seems that the situation with Dahoud is headed toward an extension.
The club should absolutely not sell Brandt, ********ing stupid decision. If Favre hadn't been fired Dahoud would probably be gone too.
Good enough for squad rotation. As you mentioned - Can is a leader, does all he can but is not at the required level to challenge for more. However, he is more than adequate for rotation and slotting at RB when we have no options. Overall he is not a bad utility player to have. We are not selling Witsel so we might as well slot him in some place. I fully agree with you that he is not at the required level and hides in the shadows of better players around him, while playing safe back passes, but he could be used for rotation purposes against weaker opposition. My concern with this is if he is going to eat up minutes that Raschl could be getting. Getting Weigl would be great, no doubt, however I cannot see any indication that anybody in BVB is actually thinking about such a move. What I have seen is rumours about a potential move to Chelsea and Tuchel. Whoever in the club thinks that selling Brandt is a wise move, should probably be smacked across the face for being a complete idiot. I am amazed how incompetent and clueless management is.
Denis Zakaria will reportedly be sold by Gladbach this summer after rejecting a new contract. If he is over his injuries he could maybe be an option?
He would be an ideal DM for us who should also be relatively affordable. But, like you said, health has always been a question mark with him.
Yup, mentioned him as my candidate on the first page. He's in his prime and ready for a step-up in his career.