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Borussia Dortmund will aim to close the gap on Bayern Munich and RB Leipzig when they host Bayer Leverkusen at the Signal Iduna Park on Saturday.
Bayer are presently in fourth place, level on points with the champions and two behind the Red Bulls. Meanwhile, with two wins and a shock 3-1 defeat to Union Berlin, BVB occupy the fifth spot on the table.
Dortmund, vying for the Bundesliga trophy since they last won it eight years ago, came closest to it last season, finishing just two points adrift of Bayern Munich.
Leverkusen, having started well this term, are in no way opponents that can be treated lightly. However, recent history doesn't favour the visitors, who have leaked goals and ended up on the wrong side of the result against Dortmund in each of their last three Bundesliga games.
On that note, let's revisit the previous three encounters between these two sides ahead of a potential thriller of a contest on Saturday.
Borussia Dortmund 3-2 Bayer Leverkusen - February 24, 2019 | Bundesliga
In an absolute roller-coaster of a contest, young Dan-Axel Zagadou made headlines as he opened the scoring in the 30th minute of the game.
Moments later, Kevin Volland restored parity, before Jadon Sancho put his side's nose in front again. Proceedings swung both ways throughout the game, but Mario Gotze's goal at the hour mark put the result beyond doubt.
Jonathan Tah did claw his side back into it in the 75th minute, but Dortmund held on to claim all three points.
Bayer Leverkusen 2-4 Borussia Dortmund - August 29, 2018 | Bundesliga
Dortmund emerged as deserved winners on this occasion as well, but they had to churn out a victory in a different fashion.
Mitchell Weiser and Tah got Leverkusen up by two goals inside 40 minutes on the back of a promising start to the game. It seemed like an out-of-sorts Dortmund, who were struggling to find the final ball and round off sustained spells of possession, were well and truly out of it.
However, Marco Reus and co. had different plans, as they netted four in the second half to show why they deserved to be champions. Although they slipped up post the turn of the year, Dortmund looked the deal back then.
Goals from Jacob Bruun Larsen, Marco Reus and super-sub Paco Alcacer helped the cause.
Borussia Dortmund 4-0 Bayer Leverkusen - April 21, 2018 | Bundesliga
A splendid double from Marco Reus and goals from Jadon Sancho and Maximilian Philipp portrayed what was a silky, free-flowing attacking display from the hosts.
BVB, time and time again, carved open the opposition defence and were simply a treat to the eye. As envisioned, they didn't enjoy more possession but launched nine shots on target.
At one point in time, it was just a matter of when the likes of Reus, Sancho or Pulisic would play the beautiful through pass. Credit also goes to the performance of young Sancho, who capped off his goal with a couple of fine assists.
