Borussia Dortmund’s 11 if They Had Kept Their Best Players Would Be Unstoppable

The butterfly impact is a strange factor in soccer – and it fairly often makes its method into conversations across the summer season switch window. With gamers continuously coming and going, it is easy to marvel what might need been when issues begin to unravel. Borussia Dortmund followers, greater than most, know that feeling all too effectively.

Regardless of making a current Champions League remaining, they’ve watched numerous generational abilities flutter away, solely to bloom elsewhere. Final season’s 25-point hole to Bundesliga champions Bayern Munich mentioned all of it. However that gulf owes a lot to the truth that Dortmund’s brightest stars so typically use the membership as a stepping stone.

Nonetheless, imagining what Germany’s iconic black and yellow membership would appear to be in the event that they weren’t a springboard for stardom is staggering. It highlights simply what number of world-class gamers they’ve nurtured – satirically, on the expense of their very own goals of tangible success.

Goalkeeper & Defence

Gregor Cobel; Hakimi Ash, Antonio Rudiger, Akanji, Raphael Warrior

If something highlights Dortmund’s present predicament, it’s that Gregor Kobel is the one lively participant from their squad to make this star-studded XI. Even then, his most important competitors for the No.1 shirt is 44-year-old membership legend Roman Weidenfeller. The remainder of the backline is a who’s who of management and energy, with Manuel Akanji, Antonio Rudiger, and Achraf Hakimi – every of whom has loved continental success since leaving Sign Iduna Park.

Rudiger, now broadly thought to be one of many world’s prime defenders, has lifted the Champions League with each Chelsea and Actual Madrid. Hakimi, in the meantime, performed a key position in PSG’s historic Champions League triumph this season. In the meantime, Akanji was a part of Manchester Metropolis’s iconic treble-winning aspect in 2022/23.

Then there’s Raphael Guerreiro – blisteringly fast down the left however one thing of a purple herring with regards to European silverware. Nonetheless, like many earlier than him, he crossed enemy traces to Bayern Munich in quest of trophies. His pace and agility have been on full show as he performed a vital half of their 2024/25 Bundesliga-winning marketing campaign, racking up seven objective contributions in 24 video games from defence.

Midfield

Jude Bellingham & Ilkay Gundogan

During the last decade or so – or extra particularly, since Jurgen Klopp’s rock’n’roll philosophy took maintain of the membership’s id -Dortmund have been adored by neutrals for his or her fearless, attacking model of the gorgeous sport. So it comes as little shock that their fantasy lineup, had they held onto their finest abilities, solely options two midfielders.

Jude Bellingham made the leap from Birmingham Metropolis (who retired his shirt quantity) to Dortmund to show he was value his weight in gold, earlier than being snapped up by Actual Madrid upon his contract expiry. There, he received a La Liga and Champions League double in his debut season – reaching the highest earlier than his twenty third birthday. Alongside him on this theoretical XI is Ilkay Gundogan, a participant who’s all the time been the quiet conductor slightly than the lead soloist.

Throughout Klopp’s youth at Dortmund, he as soon as referred to as Gundogan “a strategist,” praising his imaginative and prescient and really feel for the sport: “To have such imaginative and prescient, such a passing sport, such a watch for the scenario, is extraordinary and makes him a unprecedented participant.” Those self same qualities helped him turn out to be a multi-time Premier League champion at Manchester Metropolis, and an important cog of their historic treble-winning marketing campaign.

Assault

OusMane Dembele, Erling Haaland, Alexander Isak, Jadon Sancho

Each Ousmane Dembele and Jadon Sancho have been as soon as tipped for greatness throughout their wonderkid days in Germany’s North Rhine-Westphalia area. Nevertheless it’s secure to say their journeys have veered in utterly completely different instructions. Whereas Dembele initially flopped after a near-£100 million transfer to Barcelona, he’s now a Ballon d’Or frontrunner after rediscovering his spark with PSG. Sancho, alternatively, finds himself in limbo this summer season following a big-money transfer to Manchester United in 2021 that by no means actually caught hearth.

Nonetheless, each have been stars at Dortmund – and there’s little motive to doubt they’d nonetheless be thriving had they stayed at Sign Iduna Park. In Sancho’s case, he’d seemingly chunk your hand off for the prospect so as to add to his spectacular 53 targets and 67 assists in 158 appearances for the membership. This can be a stark distinction from his document at Outdated Trafford, which has seen him handle simply 12 targets and 6 assists in 83 outings.

Then once more, with a dream strike power of Alexander Isak and Erling Haaland to goal for, it wouldn’t have been onerous for any winger to rack up eye-watering help numbers. Two of the most effective forwards within the sport proper now, Isak and Haaland mixed for 45 Premier League targets final season, whereas present Dortmund frontman Serhou Guirassy wasn’t far behind both – bagging 23 Bundesliga targets of his personal, which is greater than sufficient to get him a spot on the bench.

Substitutes

Mats Hummels, Henrikh Mikhitaryan & Robert Lewandowski characteristic

For probably the most half, Dortmund’s bench would characteristic loads of acquainted faces from the present squad, with backup goalkeeper Roman Burki holding his spot, alongside Niklas Sule, Marcel Sabitzer, Emre Can, Karim Adeyemi, and the aforementioned Guirassy filling out the areas to present Niko Kovač some outstanding squad depth.

Mats Hummels would have introduced invaluable expertise to this lineup. The very fact he managed 14 Serie A appearances for Roma final season proves he nonetheless has one thing left within the tank, too. With over 500 appearances for the membership, he’s a real icon at Sign Iduna Park.

Henrikh Mkhitaryan, in the meantime, has loved one thing of a renaissance since becoming a member of Inter Milan. He seems nearly as sharp as he did throughout his Dortmund heyday, following underwhelming spells at Manchester United and Arsenal. Watching him hyperlink up with Robert Lewandowski – maybe the unluckiest participant by no means to win a Ballon d’Or – one final time can be a dream state of affairs for any Dortmund aficionado, particularly since this lineup normally (which you’ll be able to see beneath) would absolutely be adequate to win that Champions League title they bought so near in 2013 and 2024.

All statistics courtesy of Transfermarkt (right as of 10/07/2025)