How do Dortmund and Leipzig compare?

Before their heavyweight Matchday 16 encounter, bundesliga.com pits the two clubs against each other to see how they match up on and off the pitch, and ponders which of the duo will emerge victorious and how.

Club vs. Club

The pair will stand as equals on the Signal Iduna Park pitch, but off it, Dortmund are Obi-Wan Kenobi to Leipzig's Anakin Skywalker. Dortmund were founded a full century before Leipzig came to life, the fruit of the purchase of the playing rights of fifth-tier SSV Markranstädt by Red Bull in 2009.

On the pitch, they have made up for the lost time in dramatically impressive leaps and bounds. It took five years for them to go from the fifth tier to Bundesliga 2. After two seasons there, it was time for promotion to the big boys' playground in 2016. A year later, they had bullied all of their rivals bar Bayern Munich to finish runners-up in the most breathtaking debut since Kaiserslautern went from newly-promoted outfit to champions in the space of one fairy-tale 1997/98 season.

Since then, Leipzig have established themselves as perennial top-four challengers, barging their way into an elite club that Dortmund have belonged to for some time. Age is not necessarily a marker of quality, but Dortmund's weighty trophy haul that includes eight league titles, including five in the Bundesliga era, and their 1996/97 UEFA Champions League triumph certainly is. The most senior piece of silverware Leipzig have won is the Regionalliga Nordost, one of Germany's regional divisions in the fourth tier.

One of the 16 original clubs to have founded the league thanks to winning the last pre-Bundesliga national title, Dortmund dominate global - never mind Germany's - attendance figures, with their 55,000 season-ticket holders alone enough to sell out Leipzig's Red Bull Arena and still leave several thousand locked outside.

Johann-come-latelys? Leipzig surely won't be long in matching them. They had an average attendance of just over 2,000 when they started, and in a decade have swelled that to nearly 40,000.

Watch: Leipzig have had success at Dortmund already...

Forward line vs. Forward line

Barcelona and Manchester City. That's it. Across Europe's top five leagues, only the reigning Spanish and English champions have found the net more times than Leipzig this season. Even better, when you consider Leipzig have played 90 fewer minutes of league football.

Julian Nagelsmann's men have scored 42 goals - Barca have 43, City 44, in case you're wondering - five more than Dortmund with Bayern sandwiched in between. "We're playing some great football," said Emil Forsberg, who, together with Marcel Sabitzer, has contributed 10 of the league strikes. No fewer than 13 different Leipzig players have scored so far this season as Die Roten Bullen define their brand of football as very much 'a team game'. "We create a goal threat in various areas, try to share it around," said Konrad Laimer, himself a 2019/20 scorer with a superb effort against Cologne.

The bulk of the goals have, of course, come from Timo Werner. His 16 league strikes falls just one short of the combined tally of Marco Reus (9) and Jadon Sancho (8), Dortmund's two most prolific marksmen. While the Leipzig threat comes from virtually everywhere bar goalkeeper Peter Gulacsi, Dortmund have seen 'only' 10 men strike their 37 league goals this term. Add in Paco Alcacer's five goals, and BVB do seem heavily reliant on their front three to make the difference. Stop them, stop Dortmund?

Watch: How Reus and Werner shape their teams

Coach vs. Coach

There are 30 years between their ages, but there is far more to bring Nagelsmann and Lucien Favre together than to divide them. Both had their playing careers ended by injury, both made their coaching debuts with youth teams: Favre at the helm of Echallens' U17 team in Switzerland, Nagelsmann in the grander surroundings of Hoffenheim and their U19 side. Favre led his team to an unexpected promotion, Nagelsmann won the national title with his aged 26.

It is true though that just when Nagelsmann was trying to break into 1860 Munich's reserve team as a player in 2006/07, Favre was winning the Swiss title with FC Zürich as a coach and was about to take his first Bundesliga role at Hertha Berlin. Given that, Nagelsmann's eventual appointment as Leipzig boss last summer was one that could not have been more fitting.

Both were unknowns in 2009 when the club came into being, and in the decade since, have become so much more than household names beyond the confines of their own back yards. A novelty when he was appointed Hoffenheim boss at 28, Nagelsmann has stepped out of the shadow of that anomaly by first saving the Sinsheim club from relegation, and then leading them to fourth place in 2016/17. He topped that the following season with a third-place finish that brought UEFA Champions League football to the club for the first time and cemented his credentials as an up-and-comer who had already arrived.

Favre worked a similar miracle at Hertha in 2008/09, taking the club with the 13th-biggest budget to fourth, and the Swiss 'did a Nagelsmann' before the young tactician had been heard of when he joined Borussia Mönchengladbach: saving them from seemingly inevitable relegation in 2010/11 before finishing fourth the next season, beating Bayern home and away en route.

"Anyone can say those sorts of things," said Favre on the subject of teacup-throwing half-time tantrums from disgruntled coaches in the dressing room. "Such things don't interest me." It's impossible to imagine the cerebral Nagelsmann's 'hairdryer treatment' after a lacklustre first 45 minutes is anything more than a quick blow dry too.

Their playing style is also similar: intense, attractive and - above all - winning. Favre's Gladbach team - featuring an up-and-coming Reus - were nicknamed 'Borussia Barcelona', while Nagelsmann lists Pep Guardiola and former mentor Thomas Tuchel as his role models.

"When I see a ball, I have to play with it," says Favre, whose boyish enthusiasm for the game soaks into his strategy. "I see my players enjoy playing like this," said Nagelsmann of the tactics he put in place while at Hoffenheim and which he has so successfully transferred to Leipzig. "It's important to always bear in mind that football is something beautiful and fun."

Defence vs. Defence

It is not gung-ho all-out attack from the pair though. "My players must be ready to suffer in training," said Favre, while Nagelsmann says, "To have possession of the ball, you have to have a plan." Fitness and structure underpin both sides. While their forward momentum is what catches the eye, the contribution of the work done in the shadows in trying to stop opponents scoring is just as significant in winning matches.

Leipzig average a collective 73 miles per game, Dortmund 72; both win over 51 per cent of their challenges and both, as of just a few weeks ago, play with three men in their backline. Only Wolfsburg have conceded fewer goals than the 16 Leipzig have let in so far this season, while Dortmund have shipped 19, two fewer than Bayern, and that despite an unhelpful rash of injuries that have ravaged their backline.

When opposing forwards have been given a glimpse of goal, Gulacsi has played his part for Leipzig, stopping 38 shots to underline the Hungary international's importance to his side; Dortmund duo Roman Bürki and Marwin Hitz have halted 23 shots between them, but have conceded more goals.

"Attack, press," responded Favre when asked how his team would play against Bayern last season. "And defend well." The very words Nagelsmann also lives by.

Watch: The tactics of Nagelsmann's Leipzig

Key player vs. key player

Sometimes a tweak is all it takes. Favre did what Peter Bosz did last season at Bayer Leverkusen and drafted Julian Brandt - a winger for most of his career - into a deeper, more central midfield role. The effect was the same as he has dictated teammates and tempo from the centre of the park in recent weeks, spraying passes and snapping at opponents' heels in equally effective measure.

"He has given us significant added value since he started playing as a No.8," said Mats Hummels. Comparisons with former Dortmund man Ilkay Gündogan are far from wide of the mark, and Brandt's performances have silenced his critics, not that the man himself was one of them.

"I never doubt myself. That's the truth. I have very healthy confidence levels. Of course I question some things, you should do that. But I never doubt whether I can do something or not," Brandt told bundesliga.com, revealing a mental strength belied by the 23-year-old's baby-faced good looks.

"I'm on my way to making sure that I'll be the player here at Borussia Dortmund that many of you already know me as."

Brandt's role in keeping the likes of Sabitzer silent will be crucial - a 53 per cent ratio of duels won on the ground suggests he has the tenacious streak required to do that, while Favre praised the attacking midfielder for being "very clever in helping out defensively" in the DFB Cup tie with Gladbach in late October, a game in which he scored both goals in a 2-1 win.

While the rhythm Brandt plays at may turn the game Dortmund's way as he seamlessly links attack and defence, Patrik Schick's qualities could help give Leipzig the edge.

The Czech Republic international's spell in Germany initially stalled due to injury, but he has started Leipzig's last two games, registering an assist and a goal - a superb strike at that in the win against Paderborn - to finally make an impact after his summer loan move from Roma.

Schick's 6'1" frame gives opposing defenders a physical challenge, and forces them to keep their eyes on him when they should also be watching Werner. It is no coincidence the Germany international has netted four times on the three occasions Schick has started alongside him.

But as he showed with his dragback, turn and deft finish against Paderborn, Schick has more than 'a good touch for a big man'. He allies the role of a pivot Werner can play off with the talent and mobility to be a significant goal threat himself. The Dortmund defence are going to have their hands full.