Same Old Story Brings End Lucien Favre’s Time at Borussia Dortmund

As VfB Stuttgart netted their fourth of the afternoon, the cameras cut to Borussia Dortmund’s manager Lucien Favre pensively pacing on the sidelines. However, it was the blanketed figure in the background who told the real story.

Slumped in his chair, Dortmund’s sporting director Michael Zorc slid his hand over his face so he didn’t have to watch a sight he had seen all too often in the past.

Stuttgart's riotous 5-1 win at Signal Iduna Park on Saturday consigned Dortmund to their fourth league loss of the season already, and ultimately earned Favre the sack following the latest in a sequence of defeats which have stuck to a distressing pattern in recent years.

During Favre's time at the helm since the summer of 2018, Dortmund lost 15 league games. Four of which came against Bayern Munich - a problem in and of itself for their supposed chief challengers. However, nine of the remaining 11 reversals were dished out by teams who were either newly promoted or finished the previous campaign ninth or lower.

Dortmund's four losses this season have strictly adhered to this pattern, coming against Bayern (obviously), FC Koln (who finished 14th last season), Augsburg (15th) and the second tier runners-up in 2019/20, Stuttgart.

Bayern Munich - who finished above Dortmund in each of Favre's two full campaigns at the club - haven’t lost to a team that ended the previous season lower than tenth in this same time span.

A clever finish from Giovanni Reyna earned Dortmund an equaliser going into the break against Stuttgart. Yet, after the interval the visitors carved their illustrious hosts open time and time again, rattling in three goals in 11 second half minutes before Nicolas Gonzalez added a deserved layer of gloss to scoreline in the closing stages.

The knives were out after the match. Favre branded the result 'a disaster', club captain Marco Reus claimed Dortmund were 'lacking everything that we actually needed on the pitch', but defender Mats Hummels dealt the heaviest blows.

The 31-year-old centre-back bluntly highlighted the common thread in most of the goals, telling Dortmund's official website: "The goals for 2-1, 4-1 and 5-1 all came from us losing the ball in a way that we should never have allowed to happen... They had a good plan, were aggressive and determined. We weren't."

Hummels doubled down on his scathing analysis, as he went on to lambast the very style of play Favre is famed for, complaining: "We always try to play tiki-taka through small gaps. We lose the ball so often when we try that. If it works, it looks good. Unfortunately, it works in very few cases. We don't have enough depth in our game and we are taking the space away from each other."

Such fierce criticism may have been informed by how fresh the pain of defeat would have been for Dortmund's defensive linchpin, especially straight after coming off the pitch on the back of a humbling pummelling.

However, when viewed in the context of the campaign so far, Saturday's setback looks more like an aberration, rather than the culmination Hummels has framed it as.

Going into the weekend's fixtures, only two teams - Bayer Leverkusen and RB Leipzig - had conceded fewer Bundesliga goals than Dortmund. In fact, when considering the team's underlying numbers, Dortmund ranked second-best in the German top flight for expected goals (xG) conceded according to FBRef and were offering up the fewest shots in the division.

This impressively resolute start to the campaign was further supported by the fact that opponents were taking fewer touches in their area, completing fewer passes into their defensive third and BVB were even pressing with more intensity compared to last season. Though, the club's struggles at this end of the pitch in Favre's previous campaigns have undoubtedly contributed to his dismissal.

Yet, all this emphatically flew out of the window as Dortmund self-imploded in the second half against Stuttgart and the powers that be ultimately couldn't overlook the weekend's humiliation.

Dortmund's plummeting home form doesn't exactly aid the appraisal of Favre either. Regularly labelled the best support in Europe, let alone Germany, Dortmund have endured a stark drop-off in the absence of a packed crowd.

Since the German top flight returned last May, Dortmund have played 11 home matches in the Bundesliga. Incredibly, BVB have lost six of the seven played entirely behind closed doors and won all three with some fans allowed in.

The Black and Yellows lost just one of their first 29 home league fixtures under Favre’s stewardship before the coronavirus pandemic.

As their home form deserts them and defeats that should really be wins rack up, Dortmund can also fret over Jadon Sancho's struggles this season and the loss of star striker Erling Haaland until the new year.

Zorc couldn't watch any more on the weekend and ensured he won't have to ever again after letting Favre go. Whoever takes his place isn't encountering quite the malaise Hummels has painted, but there is plenty of room for improvement for the Ruhr region's giants.