By Ewah Chika.
A minute can change many things and paper many cracks in football and what exactly explains such statement is the report that Borussia Dortmund have resigned German international Mario Gotze for £22 million from Bayern Munich after losing such stars like Matts Hummels (Bayern Munich), Ilkay Gundogan (Manchester City) and Henrikh Mkhtaryan (Manchester United) this season.
Dortmund might have lost the spine of last season with the loss of the aforementioned players but the resigning of Gotze who was a fan favourite before his exit to Bavaria for €37 million , and the signing of Emre Mor (Nordsjaelland) , Sebastian Rode (Bayern Munich ) , Rapheal Guerreiro (Lorient) , Ousmane Dembele (Rennes) , Andre Schurlle (Wolfsburg ) and MatBatra (Barcelona) is a step in the right direction.
"In the last few years he was bit unlucky with his injuries.
"But I think every time he was on the pitch he always tried to give his best . His statistics show us that he was an important player for us," David Alaba said of the 24-year-old German.
Gotze will replace the same man (Henrikh Mkhtaryan) who replaced him after he left for Bayern Munich in 2013 and will be a jewel for coach Thomas Tuchel, displacing Shinji Kagawa and playing in his favourite position which is slightly behind the No.9 (Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang), while Marco Reus and Ousmane Dembele/ Emre Mor / Schurlle play from the other wing in a 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1 formation . Judging on form , Tuchel presently has the deadliest team on the counter attack and one of the deadliest in Europe considering the pace and devastating effect of his attackers on opposition defenders . Gotze's goal scoring ability is also worthy of mention considering his 31 goals in 116 games for Dortmund before his exit to Bayern Munich. Tuchel is sure going to get the best out of Gotze just like he did with Julien Weigh and Henrikh Mkhtaryan before his exit. With the exploits of Weigl who finished the season on the high as one of the league's best passer of the ball (slightly behind Jerome Boateng and Joshua Kimmich all of Bayern Munich). Like the his colleagues Turkish defensive midfielder Nuri Sahin also got his taste of success considering his form when fit which was close to his career best form in Dortmund before his ill fated move to Real Madrid in 2010.
Tuchel is expected to supplement attack and midfield with a central defensive pairing of Sven Bender (who can also play in that position)/ Batra and Sokratis with Marcel Schmelzer/ Rapheal who was the best left back during the Euro's in France and Lukasz Piszczek in the left and right side of defence. What this means is that the former Mainz coach now has a team that can match Bayern Munich 11 against 11, but one thing Tuchel might be lacking is depth considering he only has the big names likes Shinji Kagawa, Mattihias Ginter on the bench while the likes of Gonzalo Castro, Adrian Ramos , Moritz Leitner and Christian Pulisic have all been inconsistent blowing hot and cold.
Dortmund might have lost important players all through the years but the club must be commended for their intelligent and wise transfer window dealings which has plugged their gaps in quality . Mario Gotze might have left when he was set to blossom into the world's finest (not forgetting his extra time goal that won Germany the World Cup in 2014) but now he is set to start another era in Ruhr.
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