Borussia Dortmund struggling to shake off away blues
Marcel Sabitzer and Borussia Dortmund are yet to win away in the Bundesliga in 2024/25. - © IMAGO/Dennis Ewert/RHR-FOTO
Marcel Sabitzer and Borussia Dortmund are yet to win away in the Bundesliga in 2024/25. - © IMAGO/Dennis Ewert/RHR-FOTO
Nuri Şahin's Borussia Dortmund side slumped to their fourth consecutive away defeat in Mainz on Matchday 10. bundesliga.com takes a look at how it has gone wrong on the road for the Black and Yellows, and when it could be put right.
It has been a season of one glaring contrast for Dortmund. Last term's UEFA Champions League finalists boast an incredible 100 percent record afer five league games at home in front of their famed Yellow Wall in 2024/25, yet they have not taken a single away win so far in the Bundesliga and have lost a miserable six matches in a row on their travels in all competitions.
Battling with ten men for most of the match against a Mainz side they have found tough to beat in the recent past made Dortmund's latest away defeat an understandable one in isolation, but it continues a worrying trend.
Watch: Mainz 3-1 Borussia Dortmund - highlights
The sequence began with a 5-1 humbling by Stuttgart on Matchday 4, but in Dortmund's defence, it can be argued the other away losses in the run all had an element of misfortune to them. Losing 2-1 at a resolutely defending Union Berlin side was a disappointment but far from a disgrace, and they were shaded by Augsburg by the same scoreline.
In between that pair of Bundesliga away defeats came an unfortunate rematch of last season's Champions League final at Real Madrid. Dortmund had a superb 2-0 lead at the break and faced with a second-half onslaught from the European champions were level 2-2 after 82 minutes - until Madrid scored three late goals to seal another loss.
Watch: Şahin: "We have to defend better"
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A DFB Cup tie in Wolfsburg then went into extra-time until the hosts struck in the 117th minute. That defeat and the loss in Mainz came amid a serious injury crisis that has denied Dortmund the chance to field a number of key players including Karim Adeyemi, Niklas Süle and Waldemar Anton.
The hope will be that the injury list will ease before Dortmund's next away assignments. Fans will be relieved that their next two Bundesliga fixtures are at home to Freiburg and Bayern Munich - although should they win the first, the leaders will clearly pose a stern test to their flawless home run in the latter.
Watch: Julian Brandt on Dortmund's poor away form
A trip away to Dinamo Zagreb in the Champions League between the home league dates may offer a decent chance to end the away hoodoo. Dinamo were beaten 9-2 by Bayern in September while Dortmund are the second-highest scorers in the competition currently and took their sole away win of the season in it at Club Brugge.
Trips to Mönchengladbach and Wolfsburg in December then provide the last two chances to reverse their away Bundesliga misery before the winter break.
Any analysis of Dortmund's away performances would ultimately point to one thing - they need to play better, as Julian Brandt reflected after the defeat in Mainz, saying: "We need to defend together and we need to defend more consistently. We need to do our homework, and unfortunately we didn't do that today, like in many of our away games."
