Sebastian Kehl described Borussia Dortmund’s 4-1 victory over Galatasaray as an “undisputed win”, “in which we created a lot of scoring chances that we took well.” Dortmund have qualified for the last 16 of the Champions League with games to spare and that should give the team “strength and motivation in the league.” Next Sunday (17:30 CET), they play Borussia Mönchengladbach at home, in what Sebastian Kehl expects to be “a tough game.” DFB.de got all the answers from the ex-Germany international.
DFB.de: Mr. Kehl, before and during the game, the Galatasaray fans were using pyrotechnics. Flares were thrown onto the pitch and into other blocks of fans. The police recorded those fans responsible in the away end and also those that attempted manslaughter. In what way does the chaos influence the way you go about your game?
Sebastian Kehl: Of course it does when Galatasaray fans throw flares into our fans. You have thoughts like: Which idiots are doing that? Has anyone been injured? Are there any children in there? All of those things were what we were thinking on the pitch. At the same time, you can’t let yourselves, as players, get distracted. I was concerned for a little while that we would lose our rhythm because of the incidents, but that didn’t happen.
DFB.de: Apart from that, you must have had few concerns about BVB. How good is this win?
Kehl: It’s good that we won again. Wins help self-confidence. They allow you to sleep well and therefore we’ll enjoy the fact that we’ve already qualified for the last 16 of the Champions League for a short time. On the other hand, we have to finally show that we can take our performance from the Champions League into our game at the weekend and pick up a few points. It’d be good if we could start that on Sunday against Gladbach.
DFB.de: What won you the game against Galatasaray?
Kehl: We played well, we were good in possession, we were compact, we gave very little away and we invested a lot. We’ve been trying to do that over the last few weeks, in the league as well, but we haven’t had the rewards. It was an undisputed win against Galatasaray. We created a lot of scoring chances and took them well. There were a lot of parallels to the away game against them (4-0 win in Istanbul).
DFB.de: What were you thinking when they pulled one back? Something like: please not again?
Sebastian Kehl described Borussia Dortmund’s 4-1 victory over Galatasaray as an “undisputed win”, “in which we created a lot of scoring chances that we took well.” Dortmund have qualified for the last 16 of the Champions League with games to spare and that should give the team “strength and motivation in the league.” Next Sunday (17:30 CET), they play Borussia Mönchengladbach at home, in what Sebastian Kehl expects to be “a tough game.” DFB.de got all the answers from the ex-Germany international.
DFB.de: Mr. Kehl, before and during the game, the Galatasaray fans were using pyrotechnics. Flares were thrown onto the pitch and into other blocks of fans. The police recorded those fans responsible in the away end and also those that attempted manslaughter. In what way does the chaos influence the way you go about your game?
Sebastian Kehl: Of course it does when Galatasaray fans throw flares into our fans. You have thoughts like: Which idiots are doing that? Has anyone been injured? Are there any children in there? All of those things were what we were thinking on the pitch. At the same time, you can’t let yourselves, as players, get distracted. I was concerned for a little while that we would lose our rhythm because of the incidents, but that didn’t happen.
DFB.de: Apart from that, you must have had few concerns about BVB. How good is this win?
Kehl: It’s good that we won again. Wins help self-confidence. They allow you to sleep well and therefore we’ll enjoy the fact that we’ve already qualified for the last 16 of the Champions League for a short time. On the other hand, we have to finally show that we can take our performance from the Champions League into our game at the weekend and pick up a few points. It’d be good if we could start that on Sunday against Gladbach.
DFB.de: What won you the game against Galatasaray?
Kehl: We played well, we were good in possession, we were compact, we gave very little away and we invested a lot. We’ve been trying to do that over the last few weeks, in the league as well, but we haven’t had the rewards. It was an undisputed win against Galatasaray. We created a lot of scoring chances and took them well. There were a lot of parallels to the away game against them (4-0 win in Istanbul).
DFB.de: What were you thinking when they pulled one back? Something like: please not again?
Kehl: No. When they pulled one back to make it 2-1, one or two people would have been a bit anxious. But I always had the feeling that we would get a chance to score a third and we did. We made it 3-1 relatively quickly and after that and the game calmed down. Galatasaray had hardly any opportunities but it’s annoying to concede from a set-piece. But these things happen. It’s very, very important for us that we won so convincingly in the end. That should help us to find strength and motivation in the league.
DFB.de: What can you take from this game into the tough test against Gladbach on Sunday?
Kehl: The fact that it’ll be a completely different game. I think it’ll be similar to the game against Bayern. Gladbach are a team with a lot of playing ability that press their opposition brilliantly- that’s something that Galatasaray definitely didn’t do. Sunday will be a tough game. But if we can combine a few things that we did against Galatasaray, and a few things that we did in Munich, then we can pick up points in the league as well. The key to victory is definitely to be solid at the back. You could see that in parts against Bayern, but especially well against Galatasaray.
