BAYERN MUNICH travel to Borussia Dortmund in Saturday evening's Der Klassiker from the Bundesliga. Jack Wright (@JackWright_BSB) is on-hand to preview his favourite fancies.
Borussia Dortmund vs Bayern Munich | Saturday 7th November 2020, 17:30 | BT Sport
The two highest scoring sides in the Bundesliga meet as second place hosts the league leaders – it’s time for Der Klassiker.
Borussia Dortmund have a poor recent record in this with just two wins from the last 10 meetings although both came here at the Signal Iduna Park, they are also yet to concede a goal in their three home league games so far this season, whilst scoring 10 themselves.
That strong defensive record could come under no sterner test however, than with the visit of the current Bundesliga and UCL champions, who have already racked up an incredible 24 goals from the opening six games in their title defence, breaking a 46-year-old record – not to mention the 12 goals in three Champions League matches. An average of four goals per-game over an opening nine fixtures is sensational – Hansi Flick’s side currently look totally formidable.
Unless you are Hoffenheim of course, who sprung a 4-1 surprise in game week two, ensuring the Bavarians have tasted defeat this season – although they have won all nine games since, scoring 33 goals in the process – a run that started with the most recent head-to-head.
So how are Lucien Favre and his team going to stop this fearsome Bayern side? Well they have built their strong start this campaign not only around defensive solidity but by taking control of games with a league high average of 63% possession, just over 1% more per-game than their guests.
Winning the midfield battle will be crucial and it is interesting to see that Dortmund have an average of 13.3 tackles– the joint-second lowest in the Bundesliga. However, in recent games against Bayern this dramatically rises – with the last six H2Hs seeing BVB rack up 111 tackles at an average of 18.5 per-game.
I cast my eyes to the team tackles market and saw Boylesports offering odds of 23/20 for Over 15.5 by Dortmund – that’s a line they crossed in five of the last six H2Hs: 23-17-14-17-19-21.
It takes two to tango, so I am also keen to play someone on the other side of that battle. Early team news suggests that Bayern may be missing Leon Goretzka with a calf issue and if the 25-year-old German midfielder is ruled out that will add more responsibility to his regular side kick in the engine room, Joshua Kimmich.
Having spent a good spell covering at right back, Kimmich is now reveling a return to his favoured central midfield, winning 4-3-3-3 tackles in his last four appearances for his club, also winning four in his most recent outing for Germany, as well as another four in the aforementioned last meeting with Dortmund – the German Super Cup in September.
With the combative nature of this fixture I strongly fancy Kimmich to make at least another three tackles and we can get 6/4 with Ladbrokes that he does just that.
But enough of this tackle, battle, business. As I said at the top of this piece the two top scorers are going head-to-head here – and that is largely down to two men.
Keep Lewandowski onside
It’s easy to forget Erling Haaland has only played 20 Bundesliga games for Dortmund since his arrival from Salzburg, but impossible to ignore that he has scored 18 times in that period and has started this campaign well with five goals from five appearances.
Very nice stats indeed – until you compare them to the insanely prolific Robert Lewandowski that is.
I really feel the champions will try to use this game to put down a marker and by resting their unstoppable Polish striker last week, have looked to keep him fresh with to some extent the midweek UCL fixture, but more so this massive clash in mind.
Last season was a phenomenon, with an incredible 34 goals from 31 league appearances, 15 strikes in his 10 UCL outings and we can even throw in six more goals from five DFB Pokal ties – that’s not even including his work on international duty.
However, the 32-year-old hitman seems to be getting better with age as this season already sees him on 10 league goals from four starts and a 30-minute cameo in that aforementioned defeat to Hoffenheim.
Lewandowski warmed up nicely for this clash against his former employers, who he unsurprisingly has a fantastic record of 16 goals in 12 Bundesliga appearances against them, with a brace in the midweek 6-2 thrashing of Salzburg.
Let me run through our options to get the great man onside. To score is a best priced 4/7 (SkyBet), to bag the first goal is 14/5 (Unibet), a brace maybe, well that’s just 13/5 (Betway) and for the ultimate glory of smashing another hat-trick – which would incredibly be his third in the league this term – is 10/1 (William Hill).
Nah, that’s not big enough for me – and I’ve posted two very strong bets for those of you looking for some German efficiency, so instead I’m using the Ladbrokes Bet Builder to drop down Lewandowski shots on-target to the maximum available – 6+ at 66/1.
Now it’s over to the two teams and roll on teatime when we can see if it’s a case of Bayern ‘vorsprung durch Lewandowski’.
Best Bets
Borussia Dortmund vs Bayern Munich – Over 15.5 Borussia Dortmund Tackles (23/20 Boylesports)
Borussia Dortmund vs Bayern Munich – Joshua Kimmich 3+ Tackles (6/4 Ladbrokes)
Borussia Dortmund vs Bayern Munich – Robert Lewandowski 6+ Shots on-Target (66/1 Ladbrokes)
