Borussia Dortmund suffered a major blow to their Bundesliga title hopes on Tuesday evening and were also dealt a setback with Erling Haaland picking up an injury.
Lucien Favre’s side hosted rivals Bayern Munich in the early kick-off in midweek, and Joshua Kimmich’s sublime chipped goal was enough to secure all three points for the visitors.
That now moves them seven points clear at the top of the table with six games to play, thus taking them a big step closer towards an eighth consecutive Bundesliga title.
While that in itself would have been a major blow for Dortmund, their misery has seemingly been compounded as Haaland was forced off in the second half with an injury problem.
As noted by Goal.com, the 19-year-old limped off in the second half with what appeared to be a muscle problem having pulled up just minutes earlier.
While it will take something special for them to turn things around in their favour in the title race now, Dortmund will have their best possible chance of pulling off an unlikely success with their prolific forward fully fit and leading the line.
Haaland has bagged 13 goals in just 14 appearances for Dortmund since he joined the German giants in January, and so taking his goal threat out of the side on top of losing to Bayern this week could be a double blow that Favre’s men may struggle to bounce back from to stay in contention if their rivals slip up.
There was better news for them as Emre Can, Axel Witsel and Giovanni Reyna all came off the bench during the showdown after recovering from injury issues of their own, but time will tell if Haaland can join them for the trip to Paderborn on Sunday.
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