Second Half Surge Leads Borussia Dortmund Past Hamburg SV

Borussia Dortmund 2 (Kagawa 49’, Barrios 70’) - Hamburg SV 0

Borussia Dortmund extended their lead at the top of the Bundesliga to seven points with victory over Hamburg SV thanks to second-half goals from Shinji Kagawa and Lucas Barrios. Jürgen Klopp’s side had played out one of their poorest halves of football in the opening forty-five minutes on Friday; fortunately for the hosts Hamburg were just as poor. Neither side created much of anything in the first half as the three-man central midfields canceled each other out, and the best chance fell to Mario Götze from a cross by Marcel Schmelzer, but his poor first touch sent the ball dribbling out of play past Jaroslav Drobny’s post.

The hosts came out with a fresh energy in the second half and were rewarded within just four minutes. Lars Bender played the ball out wide for Lukasz Piszczek, who centred for Kagawa to smash in (albeit aided by a deflection off Heiko Westermann). The runaway Bundesliga leaders were in command after the opening goal and far closer to doubling their lead than Hamburg were to levelling the match. The second for Dortmund was coming, though, and arrived on seventy minutes courtesy of an intricate move that summed up the hosts’ superiority after the break. Kagawa released Götze into the inside-right channel, but his dink over Drobny was going wide until Kevin Großkreutz cleverly side-heeled the ball at the far post into the path of Barrios, who tapped in for two-nil. Two goals to the good, Dortmund were barely troubled by their visitors for the remaining twenty minutes, and though Mladen Petric headed one good chance over the bar with a quarter hour to play, Hamburg were fortunate to not lose more heavily after a consummate second-half display by BVB.