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This season’s German Bundesliga title has long been decided, so the top two sides facing each other has no real purpose, but yesterday’s Borussia Dortmund vs FC Bayern Munich match was the prelude of the UEFA Champions League final on May 25 at Wembley Stadium in London.As expected, both sides did not play their best teams as Dortmund made five changes to the team which faced Real Madrid on Tuesday, while Bayern Munich made seven changes to the starting eleven against FC Barcelona.
Bayern Munich had more of the ball initially, but it was Dortmund who took the lead with their first chance in the 11th minute as Nuri Sahin passed the ball to the left to Jakub Blaszczykowski, whose cross across the whole defence was volleyed in by Kevin Großkreutz past Manuel Neuer. Only three minutes later, Dortmund was weakened by the forced substitution of Ilkay Gündogan who limped off.
Thereafter the match evened out, but Bayern Munich got the equaliser in the 23rd minute after a perfect Rafinha cross was headed in by Mario Gomez, his 11th goal of the campaign. Thereafter it was a lot of midfield action, but just before the break Gomez had the chance to put Bayern ahead, an excellent Roman Weidenfeller denied the German international. It remained 1-1 at the break.
After the break, it got more and more intense besides the two teams losing their precision in their game. In the 58th minute, referee Peter Gagelmann blew a handball against Jerome Boateng in the penalty area, but Robert Lewandowski’s shot from the spot was saved by Manuel Neuer. A little later in the 65th minute, Rafinha picked-up his second yellow card of the match in quick succession after an unnecessary elbow against Blaszczykowski and he had to go off, but it resulted in heated discussions, amongst others, between BVB coach Jürgen Klopp and FCB’s Director of Sports Matthias Sammer. After all had cooled down, it was back to football, but though Dortmund had a man more on the field, and had some half chances through Julian Schieber and Nuri Sahin, they couldn’t do anything with their domination.
The match ended one-all with Bayern Munich dropping their first points after the winter break, but maintaining their 20 point lead over Dortmund.
And surely no lessons were learned for the upcoming UEFA Champions League final on May 25 at Wembley Stadium in London.
