I would too, though it wouldn't be til 2016.
Jurgen Klopp and Dortmund
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I would too, though it wouldn't be til 2016.
The problem is that Klopp hasn't reinvested the cash very well in the last few seasons. Reus is the last signing i'd say that had really improved their first team and that was back in July 2012.
Aubameyang hasn't been half bad, nor was Gündogan, who might well have been the best transfer of the lot but for his injuries. Getting Kagawa and Sahin back so fare had more of a nostalgic value. None of the youngsters has improved significantly, leaving quite a dent in Klopps reputation of being a coach who has a magic hand when it comes to developing talent.
I believe their injury streak had a bit to do with it, as it is easier for new and especially young players to play up to their potential when going into a working team. Expecting them to lead the way out is asking too much. That would be the task of Hummels, Kehl and Weidenfeller. Apart from Kehl, i have a gut feeling they may not be 100% behind the club and the coach any more.
Klopp is to blame for not adapting enough to the situation with the options he has at hand.
I'll be honest, I rated Aubameyang, but he's shown this season that he's not upto it. 5 goals in 17 appearances just isn't good enough. Decent squad player but nothing more. Gündogan was bought in 2011, he's been a very good purchase, but that's 3 years ago now. I think the only transfer i'd argue that improved their first team over the last 2 years was Sokratis who had a good season last year but has since looked terrible.
You can't afford to keep losing your best players and then failing to bring in adequate replacements. Eventually it'll come back to bite you in the bum and I think this season is simply the result of a few bad transfer windows. Granted they've been unlucky with injuries, but not so bad to put them down in the position they are.
I do admire Klopp, but it's the first sign of weakness in his CV.
Replacing Gotze, Lewandowski and Reus (through injuries) is not easy, especially when you replace them with Mkitaryan, Immobile and Aubameyang. They had a lot of injuries, and if we have a lot also, we should be lucky enough with the length. Dortmund had Subotic, Hummels, Gundogan, Blacikowski Picszek and co all injured for long, it’s not easy for this kind of club to handle.
Then, Klopp’s main critic comes from the fact that he didn’t replace his players by the same profile. He asks his teams to play a certain way, and he’s not adapting his methods to the characteristics of his players. He can’t play liked he did with Gotze, Lewandowski and Reus upfronf, when he has 3 others.
ki and Reus (trhough injuries
Then, Klopp’s main critic comes from the fact that he didn’t replace his players by the same profile. He asks his teams to play a certain way, and he’s not adapting his methods to the characteristics of his players. He can’t play liked he did with Gotze, Lewandowski and Reus upfronf, when he has 3 others.
ki and Reus (trhough injuries
My dream since a few years....Wenger would be perfect for the job
Yeah, you'd know he'd actually re-invent English football. The players would respect him and he'd have it set up right from the youngest age category.
Back to Klopp though. He's been unlucky with some of his signings and injuries, but the league speaks for itself and it firmly rests with him they are the way they are.
I want to see that too which is why I said when LvG retires. We have atleast 3yrs, plenty of time for him to recover and prove himself.
Dortmund have just signed Kevin Kampl. He's been brilliant for Salzburg, it will be interesting where he plays and how he adjusts. Maybe he'll take one of the 3 spots behind the striker along with Reus and Kagawa/Kuba/Mikhi/Gundogan?
He is the heir to Reus, simple as that. Kampl is very similiar to Reus in his playing style, not nearly as good but I think he can develop into a nice player for them. Finally a player like Reus that has pace and has great techinque. Very good purchase from Dortmund
I doubt he'll improve Dortmund.
Not just because he comes from the austrian Bundesliga.....he only has played in the lower leagues in Germany (before his move to Salzburg) and has done not much there.
Of course you never know......but i think that's another poor Dortmund transfer.
Seems like he models his hair on Reus. So I'm guessing with Daehli and Kampl being signed by German clubs, that their transfer window is now open? When did it open?
The negotiations are done, the transfers become active on January 1st, when the transfer window opens.
Ah, gotcha.
I agree. Haven't seen enough of him, so I could be wrong, but I don't see him as a player who can make the difference in the 2nd half of the season. It's also telling that Zorc comes out with the 'he fits very well in our pressing/counterpressing game' comment. They should go for individual quality and adjust the team accordingly, not buy decent players and hope that the so far failing system will become as great again as it was 2 years ago.
Cant wait to see Kampl in action 
I have to disagree. Kampl is a great player and could make an instant impact at Dortmund. Not only does he fit their scheme very well, he also is just a very talented player. I have seen him play against some very good clubs in the EL and he was a standout player. Watch him when Salzburg destroyed Ajax. Kampl and a fit Gündogan could very well make a huge difference for Dortmund.
Interesting move for Kampl, if a player from the Austrian league can make an impact in the Bundesliga, then he. He was also brilliant in most games in Europe and is their most important player, they will struggle in the second half of the season without him. And I know people don't take our league serious (it is not good so it's deserved), but players like Fuchs, Junuzovic, Baumgartlinger are also not completely useless in the Bundesliga and Kampl is on a complete different level to them. I thought he would follow Roger Schmidt to Leverkusen, but with the current form of Dortmund's attacking players, it's most likely the better move for him.
Well individual quality tends to cost loads of money, so a club like Dortmund can't just go around and pick freely. I don't think Dortmund's or Klopp's football is failing systematically, it's not like German clubs suddenly found some miraculous way to counter their style, imo they first suffered from their injuries and now their players seem to have serious problems dealing with their crisis (a mental downward spiral).
Kampl seems like a guy who really fits Dortmund's style and a fresh player who isn't burdened by this season's first half might give them some new sparks on the other hand they already had an extremely well stocked midfield (at least on paper) for a Bundesliga club.
I guess they needed a bit more depth in AM, because Aubemayang leaves for the Africa Cup soon and Kagawa for the Asian Cup. They'll both miss large parts of the training in the winter break and probably the first few games as well.
Think he will do well. Has done very well at Salzburg. Will be interesting to see what Klopp makes of him.
Sack watch
not really.
i'd really want dortmund to sign players who do not look like inbred lizards.
Really good article on Klopp's tactics at Dortmund: http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/dec/23/borussia-dortmund-jurgen-klopp-bundesliga
Good article that.
I must admit though I think for the first time it may have reached a point with Klopp where he must consider a change of scenery, Otherwise it is going to take a lot of tools and resources to build Dortmund back to the level it was at 2 years ago. Also you must ask when does get to the point where Dortmund have to adjust the mentality in keeping their star players rather then selling, Because to be the stature of Bayern in the future they are going to have to do this at some point.
I must admit though I think for the first time it may have reached a point with Klopp where he must consider a change of scenery, Otherwise it is going to take a lot of tools and resources to build Dortmund back to the level it was at 2 years ago. Also you must ask when does get to the point where Dortmund have to adjust the mentality in keeping their star players rather then selling, Because to be the stature of Bayern in the future they are going to have to do this at some point.
I agree, he's obviously got talent but before Dortmund he got Mainz relegated, They finished 7th in the bundesliga last season. I'm not saying he's a bad manager but maybe he got lucky with some of the players he got?
He had also got them promoted against all odds back when they were more of a lower tier 2. Bundesliga team.
I always felt it was kind of sad that the talented youngsters Dortmund had weren't really given much playing time anymore once they had won the league twice. I guess it was the desire to keep the success going which lead them to buying "proven" players instead of the talented youngsters that made them so strong the problem is that Dortmund can't afford the highest caliber of "proven" players and had to go to the second tier which turned out to be not good enough.
But it also has to do with tactics of course. When Dortmund started their recent success story there were very few teams that put as much emphasis on pressing and fast transitions as they did which gave them a tactical advantage but these days a lot of teams have picked up on this and Dortmund is often enough getting beaten by what made them once so successful. Add to that the chronically bad passing percentage of Dortmund and you get a recipe for defensive instability.
And of course there is the mental aspect. Dortmund is still in the mindset of a CL candidate for whom it's embarrassing to lose against "smaller" teams which makes them super nervous in every game and they end up making game breaking mistakes. This will be Klopps hardest task to change this mindest in his players. Maybe starting some of the fringe players and youngsters a bit more often would help here as they still have to prove themselves and aren't yet in the mind set of being among those who have already made it but of course this will only work if those players actually have some quality in them and aren't just fringe players because they aren't good enough to play Bundesliga.
The truth is they quite simply can't keep them. It's not like they ran to Bayern or Real and said "please take our best players" but the truth is they are a second tier club and if the first tier clubs come knocking there is nothing they can do about it than let their players go sooner or later because they quite simply can't compete with those wages.
But the thing they really have to take care of are those pesky buy out clauses and than again Reus might not even have signed for them if he wouldn't have gotten a buyout clause in his contract and maybe Götze wouldn't have signed a new contract but instead left on a free like Lewandwoski without the buyout clause in his contract.
I think atm they won't have any other choice than rebuilding the team but I feel they have don't it in a wrong way the past two seasons where they bought a lot of average players instead of going for the highly talented youngsters again that made them so strong.
whoever said Kampl's not gonna make Dortmund any better obviously hasn't been watching him play at all.
I think it's a great move for everyone involved, Kampl deserves to play in one of the top leagues in Europe, and his qualities should suit Klopp/Dortmund's style.
I think it's a great move for everyone involved, Kampl deserves to play in one of the top leagues in Europe, and his qualities should suit Klopp/Dortmund's style.
Well the plight's worse than I imagined. Time for Klopp to prove himself.
Plays on the right though, doesn't he?
The problem are not players that fit the style - but the style itself. Underdog tactics work as long as you are the underdog - if you are a top club you have to adjust it. And that is the main problem. Dortmund has enough players that are good when the "Dortmund style" works against teams that try to play open with them - then it does not even matter if the best players miss or not - like seen in the CL.
In the Bundesliga a lot of the real underdogs and midtable clubs follow that style themselves today - with teams in which the players are not as good as the Dortmund players are but in which that "team"-thinking still works. The rest parks the bus in a conventional way or follows more the Bayern way to fight this tactics with very good players and ball security like e.g. Wolfsburg.
The problem that Dortmund has is that there has not been much development the recent years. Dortmund had a lot of this problems already last season in which they already did not have a high percentage of goals out of open play - masked by a lot of goals through set-pieces.
No - Dortmund even with that should not be 17th in the league - but signals that they are on the way downwards already have been there last season. But - Dortmund only looked up to Bayern - and never to the other ones who got very close already in the last seasons and probably now overtook. Wolfsburg e.g. is one striker away from a real top team.
I agree with Blackwidow. Klopp need to develop his tactics. They simply can't afford having only 75% passing success per game in a league where a lot of teams are great at counter attacks. It affords too many options for them to hit Dortmund on the counter and their Gegenpressing will fail every now and then if the opposition is as fast in transition as they are.
Imo it's time for Klopp to borrow a bit from Bayern's approach. Make sure his team better capable at keeping the ball and especially not giving it away in dangerous situations. Maybe shift a bit more towards Real style who are great in transition but still capable of keeping a 85%-90% passing success rate. Than again maybe Dortmunds current crop of players just isn't good enough on the ball to achieve this even though Hummels, Gündogan, Sahin, Kagawa, Reus, Mkhitaryan look all like capable passers of the ball, so in theory a slight shift in playing style should be possible for them.
Imo it's time for Klopp to borrow a bit from Bayern's approach. Make sure his team better capable at keeping the ball and especially not giving it away in dangerous situations. Maybe shift a bit more towards Real style who are great in transition but still capable of keeping a 85%-90% passing success rate. Than again maybe Dortmunds current crop of players just isn't good enough on the ball to achieve this even though Hummels, Gündogan, Sahin, Kagawa, Reus, Mkhitaryan look all like capable passers of the ball, so in theory a slight shift in playing style should be possible for them.
I agree with everything in your post...apart of the last words
Wolfsburg are needing 3-4 top top starting XI players to come closer to Bayern Munich.
And i think Wolfsburg will never be a top 3/top 4 club in the Bundesliga over years. Players like Rodriguez and De Bruyne will see Wolfsburg just as a stepping stone for a bigger club.
I think Mönchengladbach (with Favre) will have much bigger potential to be a top 4 club.
Of course this season Wolfsburg should make a CL place because Dortmund are out of the race.
But over the next years i see
1) Bayern Munich
2) Dortmund
3) Schalke
4) Mönchengladbach
5) Wolfsburg/Leverkusen
6) Wolfsburg/Leverkusen
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But back to Dortmund and Mr Klopp
I really can't wait for the start of the "Rückrunde". I hope Dortmund are winning again and are getting together a very good squad.
But i would found interesting to see what will happen if Dortmund are picking up just 1-2 points from their first 3 games.
Yawn... So many cliches.. Last season in particular most points they dropped were either down to bad finishing or silly defensive mistakes. Feel free to make a list of the games that were lost because of systematical shortcomings.
Hummels is nowhere near top shape, which hurts us immensively defensively (stability of the back four) and offensively (build up)
Gündogan is still far from being his old self, especially when it comes to pressing resistancy, which leads him to lose a lot of balls in dangerous situations
Sahin played exactly 8 minutes in the Bundesliga and in hindsight his injury probably hurt us the most. While often times unspectacular his biggest strengths (organizing and game flow control) are two of the biggest things we lack right now. The spaces we leave between the defensive and offensive are huge.
Kagawa has immense adjustment problems right now, both mentally and physically, which let his form fall to a low point.
Reus simply can´t catch a break in terms of injuries.
Mkhitaryan is also currently injured and before that was solid in everything outside the opposing box.
So, yes, the player material is there for that, but for various reasons the material does not manage to bring it on the pitch. As a whole the team bar three players consists of basically nothing but underperformers right now. Outside Aubameyang, Kehl and Sokratis no one plays consistently on their usual level. This is simply not enough to play successful football.
We can discuss tactical adjustments. We can ignore that the Bundesliga teams already changed their approach vs. Dortmund in 2011/2012, which ultimatively led to several other formations outside the core 4-2-3-1 (4-3-3 both defensive and offensive, 4-1-4-1 flat, 4-4-2 flat and diamond) and a way higher focus on set pieces to break deep lying defense lines (another huge problem right now). Klopp clearly favoured a two striker system in the pre season, but was then forced to return to the old 4-2-3-1 because he simply lacked the necessary ability in the midfield (Sahin, Kirch and Gündogan all injured) to pull that off. He clearly hoped to bring the collective strength back with a system the vast majority knew in and out.
Klopp certainly made mistakes in this season, some of them also in tactical matters, but at the end of the day this crisis comes mostly down to the players. They need to step it up after the winter break. The lead players need to start to actually lead the team and the rest needs to get their form in order. They have finally some time now to make adjustments.
Surely Klopp is the one who should be getting the players to lead on the pitch?. It is his job after all. Amusingly on these forums when a couple of posters were blaming players for our problems under Moyes, the majority of posters felt Moyes was the problem and not inspiring the players enough.
The fact that the same players are doing much better now, pretty much proves that the players weren't the problem.
Also, Klopp has the benefit of the doubt. He took a team that had a smaller revenue than 100m (which is the budget of typical English midtable teams) and made it one of the best teams in Europe, winning two league titles (despite being underdogs), a national Cup and reaching the UCL final. If he is having a bad year, then his record make people believe that he will turn it.
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