Borussia Dortmund Story.

Picture the scene: Sky Sports News are going through their usual patter to fill the void that is football's pre season, with the endless amount of transfer rumours which are made up by Dave from the IT department's mum's sister's boyfriend's brother's mate has come up with in a bid to impress Georgie Thompson, who is looking fine on the telly. Suddenly, she gets a piece of breaking news from the world of German football: an emergency press conference has been called by the Borussia Dortmund chairman, Reinhard Rauball. Cue a hasty cut to the scenes from Signal Iduna Park.

Reinhard Rauball: "We are here today to announce the shock departure of Jurgen Klopp as the manager of Borussia Dortmund Football Club. We are disappointed that this has had to happen, but due to the unfortunate revelation to us that Jurgen had been having an affair with Mats Hummels' girlfriend, he simply had to go. This aside, we are indeed very grateful to Jurgen's efforts at our club, and we would very much like to say thank you to him for leading our young team to success last season in the Bundesliga and for giving us such solid foundations for the future. That is all that we are saying at this present time, thank you"

Back to the Sky Sports studio...

Georgie Thompson: "Well, there is the shock so far of the summer, but who will Dortmund hire as their new manager? Let's have a look at the likely candidates... Thomas Schaaf, Louis van Gaal and Jurgen Klinsmann are the three favourites at the moment, but who do you think they will hire?"

The simple answer is, none of the above.

Ladies and Gentlemen, step forward Joe Smith.

This exact story has been done before, even including the affair with players part. So boring, do something original.

July 2011

"The board of the Bundesliga champions Borussia Dortmund have today announced the appointment of Joe Smith as the club's new manager, with the ultimate aim of becoming one of the dominant forces of global football. With a currently rather small budget, Smith has been given a two year contract on £20,500 per week and has been promised the ability to sculpt his squad as he likes as well as having free reign on who to keep and dispose of in his backroom staff.

After a particularly difficult couple of weeks for Dortmund, the board, fans and players alike are hoping that Smith's apparent laid back, media friendly approach will reap rewards for the team over the next few years."

In the transfer market, Smith has made it clear to the board that he wishes to build a team full of German speaking players (to ensure bedding into the squad), preferably with youth on their side so as to ensure that they grow together. However, he also said that, if the right player comes along, he will spend big on them to bring them to the team.

One big transfer agreed before Klopp's departure was the arrival of Marco Reus, the young, German winger for a fee in the region of £15m, but Smith has made it clear that he is not necesarilly going to keep the young midfielder around for long at all if he doesn't prove his ability over the coming season with Monchengladbach.

Pre-Season

After a straightforward pre season, the German Super Cup came around with Dortmund facing Schalke. Dortmund scored an equaliser with 3 minutes left and then won on penalties.

Transfers

Chris Lowe to Sporting
Antonio da Silva to Stuttgart
Florian Kringe to Monchengladbach
Moritz Leitner to Nurnberg (loan)

Total income of about £2.5m, not a lot but got rid of the players to free up some space. I haven't brought anybody of note in yet as we near the first game of the season, but I have some irons in the fire and I will tell you of them when they come in. A few youth players have been brought in in the form of Wesley Said, Saul and Joel Valencia, and they will be getting game time in the dead rubber matches. And fear not, the match reports will be a bit better for the meaningful games: I shall update as each month passes, as transfers come in/out and if there are any special matches, as well as any news of note.

Transfers

Forgot to add this:

Felipe Anderson



In on a loan deal for the season for a fee of £1.3m, with an option to buy for £5m at any time if he impresses me. I intend for him to feature in most matches this season.

Tactics

These are the tactics I hope to use this season, providing they give me some success.

1

2

3

1 and 2 are used to kick off most matches, I like possession football as my players don't get so tired and it covers for Weidenfeller, who I believe is a questionable keeper. Also, it limits the oppositions chances to very few. Tactic 3 is used for closing out games and, for me, it's been pretty successful in other saves.