bundesliga.com takes a closer look…
In the last decade, Dortmund (not to mention the Bundesliga) has one of the most productive places for a young, promising player to develop.
Haaland appears to be the most recent example: the Norwegian announced his arrival in Germany with a hat-trick in the 23rd minute on his devastating debut against Augsburg. The 19-year-old had clearly established himself at Salzburg and had played in the UEFA Champions League – before joining Lucien Favre’s side. Despite a multitude of offers, one of Europe’s most sought-after players still sees Dortmund as the ideal destination.
Watch: Erling Haaland’s hat-trick in 23 minutes in all its glory
BVB has a clever habit of recruiting young, promising players who have not yet made their professional breakthrough. Think of Jadon Sancho and Gio Reyna among those in existence, or American foreigner Christian Pulisic in the past. But why were the 1997 European champions so horny? option?
If you’re smart enough, old enough
In recent years, Pulisic, Reyna and Sancho have all made their Bundesliga debuts at the age of 17. But Dortmund have been giving young players opportunities and making the most of them for some time.
Think of Liverpool head coach Jürgen Klopp from the last title-winning group. Nuri Sahin, a key member of the 2010/11 championship-winning team, still holds the record for the youngest player in the Bundesliga. Now at Werder Bremen, he made his league debut for Dortmund in August 2005, aged 16 years and 335 days.
Future Dortmund captain Marcel Schmelzer and future FIFA World Cup winner Mario Götze also came through the club’s youth academy, before being given every chance to shine at senior level. Hopes are high that 15-year-old goalscoring sensation Youssoufa Moukoko could be one of the next home-grown players to storm through the ranks.
Severe monetary difficulties in 2005 forced Dortmund to adopt a new recruiting technique, and temporarily cast a wide net. Sporting director Michael Zorc explained last year that they were looking to identify young players with serious opportunities for improvement.
Reyna is the latest teenager to play for BVB and shows some glimpses of his apparent ability after his attack against Augsburg. Zorc has said in the past that “almost every single club in Europe” was willing to sign the American youth international, but Dortmund’s track record apparently helped them win the race.
A network
In the summer of 2010, before winning the first of their consecutive league titles, Dortmund made two key signings abroad. Japanese attacking midfielder Shinji Kagawa, unknown in Europe, but BVB scouts felt the 21-year-old valued signing.
Another unfamiliar name was Robert Lewandowski. Catching the headlines with Lech Poznan and already capped by Poland, the 20-year-old certainly had potential. The volcanic ash cloud that downed flights across Europe that summer scuppered his potential visit to Blackburn Rovers, and one of the greatest strikers the world would ever see instead decided to move to Germany.
Like Haaland, Dortmund were willing to shell out money for a young player they hoped would turn into a high-quality signing. Lewandowski’s first goal came in the win over Schalke in September 2010; Kagawa scored the other two. in the 3–1 win, and scored 103 goals in 187 appearances for the club.
Since then, the hits have kept on coming. Pulisic [2015] and Ousmane Dembele [2016] both made their mark at Dortmund before the club earned a healthy profit by selling them to Chelsea and Barcelona.
The race to find the next star of the game is clearly heating up, and players from all over the world are being scouted from an early age. But if Dortmund invest in a promising teenager, they feel obliged to look after him.
“It’s enough to recruit to win the Bundesliga junior title,” BVB youth coordinator Lars Ricken said after Reyna’s arrival in 2019.
“The club has a responsibility to the player and his family when you take them out of their social environment at such a young age.
“We only sign young foreigners when we are 100 per cent sure that the player has a chance of playing in the first team. “
Exploration & Training
Dortmund’s recruitment network deserves high praise for consistently locating the next big thing and convincing the club that those players are buying. But coaches also want recognition.
Almost always the youngsters who come to the club will come out on top. In the end, Pulisic paved the way for young Americans in the Bundesliga, but it was Dortmund’s position and attitude that made the difference in the first place.
“When he was 15 and playing for national teams, he realised he had to temporarily take the step to expand his game,” his father Mark told the Guardian in 2016. “Once, as parents, we felt that he was in a position and that he wanted anything, we made a stopover in Dortmund.
Watch: Christian Pulisic – made in the Bundesliga
“We all made the right decision and the club was wonderful with us, so we took the step. “
The value of good luck in honing that talent, of course, is that other clubs come calling. Götze, Kagawa, Lewandowski, Sahin and more recently Dembele, Pulisic and Julian Weigl have all been lured to Dortmund. But the reputation acquired through the black team -A los amarillos in terms of actor progression has allowed them to reach a very horny destination.
“I don’t want to say anything else,” Zorc told ESPNFC last year, speaking of the club’s appeal to young foreigners and their representatives.
“I’m just showing them the team sheets. There are 3 or 4 players under the age of 21. They’re excited to have the chance to compete against the players at the Champions League World Cup. “
Game time at a top club
In fact, it’s not just the fact that young players have first-team opportunities that makes Dortmund an ideal club. It’s just that they have a lot of playing time in one of the most productive groups in Europe.
Achraf Hakimi is one such beneficiary. The 21-year-old – named African Young Player of the Year for 2019 – has excelled during his two-year loan spell from Real Madrid. The Morocco international had played a handful of matches with his parent club’s first team before joining Dortmund, of course, but – with four goals in this season’s Champions League – he has now grown into a player that clubs around Europe fear.
Sancho is another example. Finding his way to the first team blocked by a large number of recognizable stars at Manchester City, the shrewd boy found a welcome home in Dortmund. His sensible gamble, a move to Gerguyy in August 2017, has paid off in large measure. He made his debut in October of the same year and 12 months later he was already a full international with England.
“This speaks for itself,” Sancho told FourFourTwo magazine, when asked last year why he had decided to sign for Dortmund. “Young people have opportunities. We have Dortmund to thank, because it’s unheard of for a team that receives 80,000 at House, each and every game, to rely a lot on youngsters.
Sancho didn’t play in low-pressure league games or matches at European organisational level without rubber, as Zorc pointed out when asked in particular why Dortmund was an apparent selection for English teenagers.
“They can’t get into their first teams because the squads are so big,” he told espnfc. “But they understand that we can provide a platform for them to play – that our coaches have the courage to play them.”
Of course, there is trial and error, especially with young players. But for Dortmund, it has a tried-and-true winning formula.
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