Areas Where Borussia Dortmund Are Worse Than Last Season

Borussia Dortmund's 2015/16 campaign—to this point at least—is remarkable in many ways, especially when compared to the ill-fated 2014/15 season that would end in Jurgen Klopp's departure. The Black and Yellows are better across the board.

Or so one would think.

While it's true that Thomas Tuchel's first six months in charge have been a resounding success, or "a triumph of many small tweaks, on and off the pitch," as ESPN FC's Raphael Honigstein put it, there are some areas where Dortmund have regressed since last season.

Those problem areas haven't factored into Dortmund's standing in the Bundesliga table, of course, where the Ruhr side sit in second place with 38 points at the halfway point of the season. Last season, they reached that number in April, two weeks after Klopp's announcement that he'd leave the club.

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One truth about Klopp's swan-song season, however, is that Dortmund weren't as bad as their position in the table indicated. At this time last year, they were second to last, but their performances weren't that bad.

That explains why Tuchel didn't need to revolutionise BVB's style. He only needed to adjust it to eradicate some weak points. And it explains why there are, as mentioned, some areas where Klopp's Dortmund hold an edge.

The most glaring weakness of Tuchel's side this season so far is an obvious susceptibility to counter-attacks. According to an article in Monday's edition of German sport magazine Kicker, 35 per cent of the Bundesliga goals Dortmund have conceded this season have come from counter-attacks, compared to 19 per cent in the last two years of the Klopp era.

This vulnerability is a direct result of Dortmund's tweaked playing style. The entire team is positioned further up the pitch, there's a focus on ball retention and position play. Whenever the Black and Yellows lose possession, opponents have an easy path to the goal.

Per Dustin Ward of StatsBomb.com, "Dortmund allow the [second-closest] average shot in the league. This has helped opponents get a higher [percentage] of shots on target against Dortmund than any other team in the league at [46 percent]."

Dortmund's weakness against counter-attacks was the driving force behind their struggles against opponents they should have comfortably handled a few times this season, most notably in meetings with Hamburger SV and SV Darmstadt.

The Black and Yellows have identified this problem—defender Matthias Ginter mentioned it in a press conference at least (via Matthias Dersch of local paper Ruhr Nachrichten, in German)—and one can expect it to be a big focus of their work during the winter break and beyond, as we predicted earlier this month.

For all the praise people have heaped on Tuchel's side—with good reason, of course—their defensive record isn't all that impressive, even compared to last season. They're currently slated to concede 46 goals in the league—four more than last season.

Considering the large number of injuries they suffered in defence in 2014/15—their first-choice back line of Lukasz Piszczek, Sokratis Papastathopoulos, Mats Hummels and Marcel Schmelzer missed a combined 32 Bundesliga games, per Transfermarkt.co.uk—one would have expected Dortmund to be much stingier at the back this season. 

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Instead, they have the seventh-best defensive record at this point, after having the eighth-best last season.

The saving grace is that, unlike last year, their prolific attack makes up for most defensive frailties. Should the goals ever dry up, though, Dortmund could be in trouble—especially in the UEFA Europa League, where two 1-0 losses to FC Krasnodar and PAOK already cost them the group win.

Overall, however, the positives far outweigh the negatives. We highlighted the improvements Dortmund have made under Tuchel in November. If the 42-year-old and his staff manage to work on the areas mentioned here, Dortmund have a good chance to not only rebound from last season, but also to get something tangible out of the current campaign: a trophy.

Lars Pollmann is a featured columnist writing on Borussia Dortmund. He also writes for Yellowwallpod.com. You can follow him on Twitter.