Bundesliga

5 reasons Dortmund will progress against Barcelona

Serhou Guirassy will spearhead Borussia Dortmund's quest to get past Barcelona in the UEFA Champions League.
Serhou Guirassy will spearhead Borussia Dortmund's quest to get past Barcelona in the UEFA Champions League.

Borussia Dortmund can be considered dark horses to go all the way in the 2024/25 UEFA Champions League. bundesliga.com explains why they'll take the next step on the road to Munich by beating Hansi Flick's Barcelona in the quarter-finals...

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1) They ran them close already

It’s easy to forget, given the new format of this year’s tournament, but Dortmund have played Barcelona once already this season in the league phase. That meeting, in early December 2024, saw the Bundesliga side succumb to a narrow 3-2 defeat at Signal Iduna Park. BVB fell behind twice during the game, with Serhou Guirassy leveling on each occasion, before a late winner from Ferran Torres sent the Catalan club home with three points. 

While Dortmund might have failed to win that match, they pushed their illustrious visitors all the way, making life extremely uncomfortable for them. Borussia took only one shot fewer (12) and enjoyed 44 percent possession against a club that prides itself on dominating the ball. The German side must now use the lessons they took from that game to spring a surprise for old flame Robert Lewandowski and his teammates when the sides meet again over two legs.

Watch: Robert Lewandowski, the Dortmund years...

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2) Beginning to click under Kovač

After suffering unfortunate consecutive defeats on Bundesliga Matchdays 26 and 27 against Augsburg and RB Leipzig, games in which Dortmund dominated throughout but failed to put the ball in the net, Niko Kovač's BVB seem to have turned a corner again. A statement 3-1 win over top four hopefuls Mainz was a sign that the Black-and-Yellows are starting to gel under the Croatian, with only two defeats coming in their past nine matches in all competitions.

The most impressive result of that run – even beyond Matchday 23’s 6-0 hammering of Union Berlin and a 4-1 win in Freiburg on Matchday 28 – was the last Champions League fixture. The 2-1 comeback win against Lille showed the type of bite Kovač teams have always had – and the sort of resilience Dortmund have been accused of lacking in the past. As the season enters its most important phase, Borussia are turning a corner at the perfect time.

Niko Kovač only took the Dortmund job at the start of 2025.

3) Goal-rassy

Guirassy celebrated his 29th birthday in Dortmund’s second-leg victory over Lille, but his biggest surprise must have been that he didn’t score a goal. So reliable has the Guinean become of late, that it’s genuinely a curiosity not to see his name among his team’s scorers following a win. 

Guirassy has 25 goals in 37 games for Dortmund across all competitions this season. A tally of 15 in 24 Bundesliga appearances is impressive enough, but it’s on the continent that he’s really dazzled. Ten in 12 Champions League outings this term have put him among the competition's top scorers from the get go, and Barcelona will have to be at their most vigilant to prevent him from adding to that haul when the sides meet in the last eight.

Serhou Guirassy has been in red-hot form this season.

4) Last season's heroics

Experience is often what makes the crucial difference in tight encounters in the Champions League knockout stages. Dortmund have that in abundance, after making last season’s final, which they lost to Real Madrid in London.

BVB’s run to Wembley included wins over the likes of AC Milan, Newcastle United, Atlético Madrid and Paris-Saint Germain. The latter pair in tightly contested knockout ties, where Dortmund’s players were praised for displaying grit and determination in such testing circumstances. The confidence and togetherness a campaign like that breeds cannot be underestimated. They’ll back themselves to pull off another upset against Barcelona.

Karim Adeyemi goes close to scoring against Real Madrid in last season's Champions League final.

5) Munich or bust

With Dortmund down in eighth place in the Bundesliga, and already out of the DFB Cup, the Champions League now represents their only realistic chance of silverware this season. Kovač and his players can focus most of their attention on their European assignments, with success in the tournament also coming with a valuable qualification place for next season.

Opponents Barcelona, on the other hand, are engaged in a close La Liga title race with rivals Real Madrid and are in the Copa del Rey final. With so many irons in the fire, their focus and resources are split across multiple fronts.

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