Dortmund's First Real Exam: Hoffenheim Awaits
The transfer window is shut. The rumours have gone quiet. For Borussia Dortmund, what’s left now is the thing that actually matters: the football.
They’ve started as you’d expect a title contender to start. Three points banked against Hamburg in the league, safe passage in the cup at HEBC. Clean, controlled, largely untroubled. Now comes something very different.
Hoffenheim away. The first real measuring stick of their season.
Hoffenheim Reborn – But Still Adjusting
Hoffenheim arrive from a strange place: momentum and disruption rolled into one.
Under Christian Ilzer, the club has dragged itself from the brink. He took over with relegation looming in 24/25, steered them to safety, then almost doubled their points tally last season. They finished just a single point shy of the Champions League spots. That’s not a fluke. That’s a team that knows exactly what it wants to be.
But the summer cut into that progress.
Bazoumana Toure, their electric winger, is gone. The planned headline move up front, Fisnik Asllani to RB Leipzig, collapsed on a failed medical, and Asllani remains sidelined through injury. So Ilzer had to pivot.
Patrick Wimmer arrived from Wolfsburg to plug the Toure-shaped hole out wide. Two of the Bundesliga’s most memorable names joined too: Mats Rots and Nathan De Cat. De Cat, a sharp, two-way midfielder, is expected to line up next to Wouter Burger in the centre. On paper, that pairing has bite and balance.
Only Wimmer started in Hoffenheim’s 2–3 defeat to Köln on the opening weekend, a result that exposed rust and fragility more than it did any tactical crisis. Ilzer is unlikely to leave it untouched. With Dortmund coming to town, this feels like the moment he reshapes his XI.
What won’t change is Hoffenheim’s identity. They want the ball. Last season they ranked fourth in the league for possession, and they held 59% of it even in that loss to Köln. At home, with Dortmund in town, they won’t suddenly sit back and wait.
Dortmund’s Dilemma: Who Plays, and How?
For Niko Kovac, this fixture throws up two big questions.
First: personnel.
Konstantelias is out with an ACL injury. Samuele Inacio is suspended. That rips a hole in the line just behind Serhou Guirassy, where chemistry and timing matter most. Someone has to step in alongside Karetsas.
The options are clear enough: Marcel Sabitzer, Carney Chukwuemeka, or new signing Ethan Nwaneri. All bring something different. Experience and control from Sabitzer. Drive and ball-carrying from Chukwuemeka. Raw, fearless talent from Nwaneri. The expectation is that Kovac turns to Sabitzer for this one, trusting his know-how in a game that could be decided by small details.
Then comes the second question: style.
Against both Hamburg clubs, Dortmund dictated everything. They dominated the ball, they dictated territory, and they peppered the goal. Across those two matches they out-shot their opponents 35–9, with a staggering 20 efforts coming in the Bundesliga opener alone. It looked like a team comfortable imposing itself.
Hoffenheim won’t allow that so easily. They finished just two spots above Dortmund in possession numbers last season (fourth to sixth) and are perfectly happy to keep the ball and probe. Kovac’s side now has to decide: fight fire with fire and try to win the midfield battle, or accept long spells without the ball and turn those rare moments into ruthless, clinical attacks.
For the first time this season, Dortmund might not be the team dictating tempo. How they handle that will say plenty about their ceiling.
The Kramaric Problem
There’s another subplot, one Dortmund know too well.
Andrej Kramaric.
At 35, he’s no longer the automatic starter, more super-sub than centrepiece. But against Dortmund, labels don’t seem to matter. He just scores.
Only five players in Borussia Dortmund’s entire history have scored more often against die Schwarzgelben. Four of those names sit in the Bundesliga’s all-time top ten scorers. The fifth is 15th. That’s the company Kramaric keeps when it comes to tormenting this club.
In 18 matches against Dortmund, he has 11 goals. Two of them came in this very fixture last season.
So even if he starts on the bench, his shadow hangs over the game. If Hoffenheim are chasing it late, or if the match drifts into a stalemate, expect Ilzer to turn to the Croatian with a familiar mission: punish Dortmund again.
Kovac’s Hand: Back to the 3-4-2-1
Tactically, the signs point to Kovac returning to what he trusts most.
After experimenting with a 4-3-3 in the cup win at HEBC, Dortmund are expected to revert to a 3-4-2-1 here. It suits the personnel, and it offers more security against a side that wants to monopolise possession.
Gregor Kobel will reclaim his spot in goal after Meyer’s midweek outing. In front of him, the back three should feature Gadou, Anton, and Ryerson – a blend of aggression, athleticism, and reliability.
Out wide, Svensson and Beier are set to operate as wing-backs, tasked with stretching Hoffenheim when Dortmund have the ball and racing back to plug gaps when they don’t. Their ability to manage that double shift could decide how often Hoffenheim can overload the flanks.
In midfield, Nmecha and Bellingham remain the heartbeat. They are the “go-to” pairing, expected to handle the hardest job on the pitch: either wrest control from a possession-heavy opponent or make every transition count when the ball finally breaks their way.
Ahead of them, Sabitzer and Karetsas are likely to float between the lines, feeding Guirassy and arriving late into the box. Guirassy himself, fresh from scoring last week, should once again lead the line. One chance may be all he gets. That’s usually enough.
A Narrow Margin
So where does all this leave the game?
Hoffenheim, at home, with the ball. Dortmund, wounded by absences but sharper in both boxes so far. A veteran striker who loves this fixture waiting in reserve. A coach in Kovac who knows this is the first time his new-look side truly gets pushed.
It feels tight. It feels like a one-goal match.
A narrow 2–1 Dortmund win? That’s the call on the table. Now it’s up to them to prove they’re ready for a season that won’t always let them have things their own way.
