Despite contrasting domestic successes in recent years, Borussia Dortmund and Paris Saint-Germain boast remarkably similar European records.
Neither have won continental silverware since the turn of the millennium. PSG won the now-defunct Cup Winners’ Cup in 1996 and finished second the following season – their lack of European achievements since is symptomatic of Ligue 1 teams in Europe.
Dortmund won the Champions League the season following PSG’s success, in 1997. Both teams have appeared in just one Champions League final each since those trophies, both of which were beaten by Bayern Munich – Dortmund, 2-1 at Wembley in 2013, PSG, 1-0, in 2020, after eliminating Dortmund in the round of 16.
With Bayern facing Real Madrid in the other semi-final, this opens up the possibility of a repeat of the final – Dortmund or PSG versus Bayern would be the ninth different Champions League final to have been played at least twice.
This semi-final is also a meeting between the first two of the “group of death”. Dortmund won Group F ahead of PSG, who beat AC Milan and Newcastle United. It was one of only two groups (along with Group H) where each team won and lost.
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The oddity was that Dortmund failed to win either game against PSG, with their only defeat in the group stage coming on matchday one at the Parc des Princes. The return match, the sixth day (with Dortmund already qualified), ended with a score of 1-1.
“We didn’t like the first game in Paris at all,” Dortmund coach Edin Terzic said after the quarter-final second leg victory at home to Atletico Madrid. “We are a much stronger team than we were in September or even December.”
Dortmund played a 3-5-2, defending in 5-3-2, in Paris. Tellingly, they did not return to this formation, switching to 4-2-3-1. “We had too much respect,” Terzic said. “We wanted to come out of our positions much more courageously and put the opposition under pressure much earlier and much more aggressively.”
The setup was designed to counter-attack – 33% possession for Dortmund – but Terzic lamented their inability to make passes stick when they regained possession, leading to waves of PSG attacks.
Dortmund had a wide pace against the quick dribbling threats of Kylian Mbappe and Ousmane Dembele and this back-five shape provided better cover to defend PSG’s rotations. Luis Enrique’s team lined up in 4-3-3 but would play in 3-2-5. Right-back Achraf Hakimi took up advanced positions inside and central midfielder Vitinha joined the last line, moving to the left wing so Mbappe could play centrally.
They could have had cover, but Dortmund defended wide areas poorly, particularly when Hakimi found himself underneath and PSG combined down the right for both goals.
The second leg was a much better performance from Dortmund. PSG, in the absence of Dembele, played a rare back five and a “box” midfielder. Dortmund had more possession and were better against the press, splitting their central defenders wide in the build-up and pushing both full-backs to pin PSG.
Playing Emre Can as a lone defensive midfielder allowed central midfielders Julian Brandt and Marcel Sabitzer to take up aggressive positions between the lines. Brandt is the attacking heartbeat and Sabitzer has recorded five assists in his last seven Champions League appearances. Dembélé, now at PSG, is the only Dortmund player to have made more assists during a Champions League campaign (six in 2016-17).
Dortmund’s direct play on No.9 Niclas Fullkrug was something PSG never really mastered. Dortmund are among the top five most successful aerial duel teams in Europe this season, with PSG in the bottom five, and their struggles defending Barcelona’s long balls against Robert Lewandowski in the quarter-final first leg proved that could be a fruitful path for Dortmund. Again.
Counter-attacks were the theme of the 1-1 draw at Dortmund. Terzic’s side do not dominate the ball – they have the most tackles, interceptions and clearances of any team in the Champions League – and have quick inverted wingers that they can release after recovering the ball. ball. Despite Luis Enrique’s best efforts to replicate Barcelona’s traditional style with PSG, they retain a counter-attacking threat, inevitable with the speed and ball-carrying ability of Mbappe, Dembele and Bradley Barcola.
There have been 18 Champions League matches this season in which a team recorded at least six “direct attacks” – an indicator of counter-attacking – with PSG and Dortmund involved in seven of those matches. They have a common strength in attack but a collective weakness in defense. Luis Enrique compared PSG’s defeat in Milan to a tennis match, such was their failure to counter-press and stop transitions (shown in the GIF below).
For Dortmund, the first pass in transition is crucial to bypass the counter-press and exploit the space left by PSG. “We lost a lot of ball unnecessarily. When you have the ball back and you give it away after three seconds, it makes things even more difficult,” Terzic said after the defeat in Paris.
The return match will be, whatever the result, Mbappé’s last European evening at the Parc des Princes.
The quarter-final first leg against Barcelona was an unusually quiet night for Mbappé in Paris. He failed to score, having done so in each of the three matches in the home group stage and the round of 16 first leg against Real Sociedad.
He has scored eight goals in the Champions League this season, including three penalties, his most in any European campaign (also eight in 2020-21), and is the competition’s top scorer in 2023-24. Mbappe accounts for 42 percent of PSG’s Champions League goals this season, the highest proportion of any team in the round of 16. His shot map (below) shows what a threat he poses all around the penalty area.
Even in its efforts to become a more balanced and varied team in attack, PSG still rely on Mbappé to open games, especially against compact and deep defenses, which Dortmund can be expected to provide.
For Mbappé to succeed, he will need the midfielder’s service. PSG were often overtaken in the group stage, notably in Newcastle with Luis Enrique’s experimental 4-2-4. The significant change in the round of 16 was not systematic but personnel-based, replacing the defensively mediocre Ugarte – who has a 32.3% duel success rate this season – with Fabian Ruiz. He anchored the team better, allowing Vitinha to pose a threat in the final third from midfield, crashing the box, making penetrating runs and connecting with the wingers.
Dortmund’s goal difference is in complete contrast to that of PSG. Their 15 Champions League goals have been scored by 11 players, with none from more than two. The lack of a main goalscorer is less of a problem given PSG’s defensive weaknesses – they have conceded in their last 18 Champions League away games, the last keeping a clean sheet in a 2-0 win against Istanbul Basaksehir in October 2020.
Mbappe got the better of Gregor Kobel from the penalty spot on matchday one, but the Dortmund goalkeeper has been excellent this season. Using the expected goals on target (xGOT) metric – which provides a modified value of a shot on target after the player’s shot – we can see that Kobel was, statistically, the best shooter in the Champions League (with a ‘ goals prevented” of 4.8). No one has more than their four clean sheets either.
Often, one-on-one battles between players are seen as a direct adversary (winger versus full-back, number 9 versus center back), but Dortmund will likely rely as much on their goalkeeper as their defense to stop Mbappé.
Kobel embodies Dortmund’s reliance on individuals – a tendency more common than one might expect when it comes to knockout teams. In their 10 European matches this season, opponents have scored seven times as many expected goals (xG) as Dortmund, suggesting they are creating more chances. Knockout rounds are all about performing when it counts, so outstanding (non-sustainable) performances in both boxes count even more, but they are far from watertight.
If history dictates that games are won and lost in the final 15 minutes, that might not apply here. PSG have consistently been mediocre in European first halves, especially in home Round of 16 matches against Real Sociedad and Barcelona in the Round of 16.
Clearly, Luis Enrique’s team discussions and tactical adjustments at half-time worked. PSG has scored just four first-half goals in the Champions League, conceding six, but is 10-3 in the first 15 minutes after halftime. This turns out to be Dortmund’s weak point, as they started the second half slowly, conceding five and scoring twice (their worst 15-minute period of play).
PSG and Dortmund, in many ways, couldn’t be more similar and different at the same time. PSG’s individual quality and national strength make them a slight favorite, but the first leg in Dortmund makes things particularly difficult to predict. After the group of death comes the semi-final of possibilities.
(Top photo: Alex Grimm/Getty Images)
