TSG claim deserved point against Dortmund

Hoffenheim have ended Dortmund’s spell at the top of the Bundesliga table after claiming a 1-1 draw against BVB in an entertaining match at the WIRSOL Rhein-Neckar Arena. Sebastian Rudy had the home side ahead at the break, but Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang levelled the scores in the second half.

Line-up and tactics:

Markus Gisdol made two changes to his team for Wednesday night’s clash with BVB – Ermin Bicakcic and Jeremy Toljan came into the side in place of Fabian Schär and Jin-Su Kim, who both dropped to the bench.
Hoffenheim lined up in a 4-3-3 formation, with a back four of Pavel Kaderabek, Niklas Süle, Bicakcic and Toljan in front of goalkeeper Oliver Baumann. The midfield three was made up of Eugen Polanski, Sebastian Rudy and captain Pirmin Schwegler, while Jonathan Schmid, Kevin Volland and Eduardo Vargas led the line. The look changed to a 4-4-2 when defending, with Schmid dropping into midfield.

TSG made three changes in the second half. Tobias Strobl came on for Polanski, Steven Zuber replaced goalscorer Rudy and Vargas made way for Kevin Kurányi. There were no changes to the system though.

Moment of the match:

There were millimetres in it. In the 50th minute, Eduardo Vargas produced a turn and chip that had the beating of Bürki and the rest of the BVB defence, but it was the post that denied him. That would have been 2-0 to TSG, and then who knows…

Number of the match: 47.6%

That’s the share of the one-on-one duels that Hoffenheim won against Dortmund. It’s not the majority, but Dortmund’s average this season was 55% of challenges won. The Hoffenheim boys got stuck into every tackle and made the former league leaders work hard until the death. Markus Gisdol had already highlighted the importance of this stat ahead of the game and it would seem he had a good point.