Перевод "Borussia Dortmund 1-1 Mainz"

Borussia Dortmund 1-1 Mainz

Dortmund dropped points for the second week in succession as a spirited performance from Mainz in the final quarter of the game and a last-gasp equalizer proved enough to hold the league leaders to a draw.

Both sides came into this game on the back of disappointing 1-0 defeats – Dortmund to Hoffenheim, and Mainz to Leverkusen. They were the success stories of the first half of the campaign, but whereas Dortmund have stayed in good form after the winter break, Mainz have been up and down. There were a number of notable injured absentees – Shinji Kagawa and Patrick Owomoyela for the hosts, and Jan Šimák, Zsolt Lőw, Ádám Szalai and Marco Caligiuri for the guests.

Mainz took an early grip on possession, but fast-pressing and compact Dortmund kept the ball in harmless areas of the pitch. Despite the visitors enacting the same tactics when Dortmund seized possession, their width-laden 4-2-3-1 and more precise, fast-paced brand of passing ensured they used the ball with more lethality than Mainz. Nevertheless, it was André Schürrle who had the game’s first chance – a 30-yard free-kick from the left of midfield being sprinted at straight on, and hit as a right-footed bouncer which caused Roman Weidenfeller to spill (into the path of no one). Seconds later, Marcel Schmelzer fired in an equally tricky shot from range, albeit one that went over rather than summoning Christian Wetklo into a response.

But the home side’s more advanced ability on the ball was emphasised in the 8th minute after Nuri Şahin drew Bo Svensson out and won a free-kick. Curled in at a perfect weight and height by Mario Götze, Mats Hummels ignored Nikolce Noveski’s attempts to pull him away from the ball’s path by backwards-glancing the ball just wide of the right-hand post, only for Wetklo to somehow parry it backs towards goal and over the line! Dortmund didn’t let off post-goal either – they committed numbers to attacks, and got at Mainz when they lost possession, forcing sloppy, heavy passes, and thus, clunky, going-nowhere counter-attacks. Even when a quick Route One ball did manage to be held up in the final third thanks to a top-notch touch by Sami Allagui which caught Hummels out, Neven Subotić was over to LCB in a flash to help out his colleague and clear the danger. The Tunisian forward was the go-to guy for Mainz attacks, and was occasionally able to hold the ball up and wait for his colleagues to flood forward. But this Dortmund side don’t take no for an answer, and after winning the ball back with controlled levels of aggression, they looked so at ease playing one-touch triangles out of danger, towards the dropping Lucas Barrios. The Paraguayan is fantastic at controlling with his back-to-goal and spinning in a nanosecond to either play a through-ball or dribble past his static and stunned tight marker.