A Sting in the Tale : The Borussia Dortmund Guide

Being a 'Borusse' myself, I've been mostly playing with Dortmund for a couple of saves. Here are some observations and additions I'd like to add:


  • All three central defenders (Hummels, Subotic, Santana) perform exceptionally well when it comes to headers. When taking corners, send both of them into the box, and instruct your wing backs to stay back and cover the rear area. Overall, they'll easily sum up to 10-15 goals per season.
  • Although not having extraordinarily good stats, Grosskreutz makes for a brilliant left attacking midfielder. In most of my seasons, he scored more than 10 goals. In my current one, he even made it my best scorer with 15 goals due to many injuries amongst my strikers. Contrary to fueledbypassion's original post, I would recommend putting Grosskreutz in AM(L) position at all times, even if his ball-winning abilities make him a decent choice for a rather defensive set-up.
  • No offense, but forget about Ginczek :) Lewandowski is the striker you're looking for to improve.
  • Being absurdly quick, Blaszczykowski lacks the stamina for playing 90 minutes at full throttle. Use him as a substitute in 2nd half.
  • As in reality (sadly), Dede, Owomoyela and Kehl will spend a good bit of their time injured. Use your young back-up players, especially Bender and Schmelzer have the potential to become as good as Kehl and Dede, respectively.


  • Financially, the first season can be pretty tough, with almost no space for signing additional players. However you can save up on individual players' wages. Especially the older players have high-wage contracts that have a massive impact on your budgets. Try offering new contracts with a lower wage to Owomoyela, Dede, Zidan, Kehl and Weidenfeller.
  • Try to ged rid of some players you won't use at all, like Rangelov, Zidan, Kringe (hard one to do, since he's been at Dortmund for most of his life).
  • Use that saved money to offer long-term contracts to Hummels, Subotic, Sahin, Schmelzer.
Tactically, I'm still struggling to make a decent 4-2-3-1 work fluently. The thing is, playing a short passing game somehow doesn't work for me. My players end up kicking around the box, eventually trying for a ranged shot that misses. However, playing more directly results in too many long crosses that end up nowhere. A massive problem seems to be my (even after 2 seasons) still "poor passing", that somehow doesn't improve.

I'm still confused, to be honest. :/
 
Last edited:
Blarry said:
Being a 'Borusse' myself, I've been mostly playing with Dortmund for a couple of saves. Here are some observations and additions I'd like to add:


  • All three central defenders (Hummels, Subotic, Santana) perform exceptionally well when it comes to headers. When taking corners, send both of them into the box, and instruct your wing backs to stay back and cover the rear area. Overall, they'll easily sum up to 10-15 goals per season.
  • Although not having extraordinarily good stats, Grosskreutz makes for a brilliant left attacking midfielder. In most of my seasons, he scored more than 10 goals. In my current one, he even made it my best scorer with 15 goals due to many injuries amongst my strikers. Contrary to fueledbypassion's original post, I would recommend putting Grosskreutz in AM(L) position at all times, even if his ball-winning abilities make him a decent choice for a rather defensive set-up.
  • No offense, but forget about Ginczek :) Lewandowski is the striker you're looking for to improve.
  • Being absurdly quick, Blaszczykowski lacks the stamina for playing 90 minutes at full throttle. Use him as a substitute in 2nd half.
  • As in reality (sadly), Dede, Owomoyela and Kehl will spend a good bit of their time injured. Use your young back-up players, especially Bender and Schmelzer have the potential to become as good as Kehl and Dede, respectively.

  • Financially, the first season can be pretty tough, with almost no space for signing additional players. However you can save up on individual players' wages. Especially the older players have high-wage contracts that have a massive impact on your budgets. Try offering new contracts with a lower wage to Owomoyela, Dede, Zidan, Kehl and Weidenfeller.
  • Try to ged rid of some players you won't use at all, like Rangelov, Zidan, Kringe (hard one to do, since he's been at Dortmund for most of his life).
  • Use that saved money to offer long-term contracts to Hummels, Subotic, Sahin, Schmelzer.
Tactically, I'm still struggling to make a decent 4-2-3-1 work fluently. The thing is, playing a short passing game somehow doesn't work for me. My players end up kicking around the box, eventually trying for a ranged shot that misses. However, playing more directly results in too many long crosses that end up nowhere. A massive problem seems to be my (even after 2 seasons) still "poor passing", that somehow doesn't improve.

I'm still confused, to be honest. :/
Click to expand...

* Subotic has been my best goalscoring defender, but Santana is almost as good when he plays, and it is definitely an area to exploit.

* I've had success with Grosskreutz in both positions, but for the 4-2-3-1 to work well and have balance, I prefer to play him a little deeper.As an AML inside forward he scored 15-20 goals for me in one season and set up 10, so it really is down to personal preference.

* Lewandowski is far better than Ginczek, especially in the later patches. Ginczek can turn a tidy profit if you nurture him well though.

* I prefer to start Kuba and sub him around the 70th minute to keep him fresh, mainly due to a lack of options in that position.

* I haven't had much trouble with injuries to Dede and Kehl. Schmelzer was my first choice left back from day one anyway, and Bender is a ready made replacement for Kehl so it isn't a problem anyway. He turns out to be a very good player.

* I agree with the player sales, apart from selling Zidan. I have found him very effective playing as an AMC, possibly more so than Gotze and Kagawa whom I have struggled to get firing.

Cheers for the post, you made some very good points there, particularly useful in the first season
 
A brilliant guide and couple of very good points mentioned above!

In my experience, I'd try to sign a defender who can cover both DC and DR as I'm getting quite a bit of injuries for my defence. Totally agree on Grosskreutz at AML inside forward, he's been strangely good scoring alot! In addition I'd advice people to ask the board to make more transfer revenue available ASAP! I couldn't do it in the first transfer window and not yet in january but the 35% (atleast on 11.3) is a pain in the ***.
 
Easily the best guide I've read on the site. Only one I've read from start to finsih.
 
Dortmund save, coming right up!

Very nice FBP, best guide on the forum.
 
Just started out with the 11.3 patch. There are some new players on the team like Florian Kringe and Antonio Da Silva. Unfortunately they only serve as backup players. But the good news is Sven Bender is even better and ready for the big time. I'm trying to make the tactics myself but they are lacking some data. If there are any downloads for the links or full team instructions it would be greatly appreciated.
 
peowulf said:
Just started out with the 11.3 patch. There are some new players on the team like Florian Kringe and Antonio Da Silva. Unfortunately they only serve as backup players. But the good news is Sven Bender is even better and ready for the big time. I'm trying to make the tactics myself but they are lacking some data. If there are any downloads for the links or full team instructions it would be greatly appreciated.
Click to expand...

It's just a simple guide on the tactics, I never made them successfully enough to upload them. I have been using this tactic to great effect with BVB, although I am on 11.2 patch and haven't tried it on 11.3. It might be worth trying though.
 
HELP!!!!!!my dortmund team are very indifferent at the moment i beat bayern 3 -0 away from home then next game st pauli beat me at home 4-3 im struggling to get any sort of performance from grobkreutz and kagawa also during games my teams passing is great but then they dilly dally that long that some decides to shoot from outside the box and it goes nowhere! any idea's? dont want to give up this save!!!
 
Gav123 said:
HELP!!!!!!my dortmund team are very indifferent at the moment i beat bayern 3 -0 away from home then next game st pauli beat me at home 4-3 im struggling to get any sort of performance from grobkreutz and kagawa also during games my teams passing is great but then they dilly dally that long that some decides to shoot from outside the box and it goes nowhere! any idea's? dont want to give up this save!!!
Click to expand...

Play Grosskreutz as an inside forward or a wide midfielder, Kagawa has been a struggle for me though. He always plays excellently for Japan but I can't seem to figure out his best role
 
I always respected Dortmund aswell. Jan Koller used to be a beast

Im gonna start a save but a pity in FM12 they wont have Sahin as hes off to Spain with Madrid
 
Great guide.. Just started a save.. sold 2 players and got Verratti in.. retrained him to AMR and is doing really well.

Great squad to work with too..
 
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