Breaching the Yellow Wall

Celtic got off to a great start on match day one with their 5-1 victory over Slovan Bratislava at Celtic Park, with goals from Liam Scales, Kyogo Furuhashi, an Arne Engels penalty, Daizen Maeda and Adam Idah – as well as a quite spectacular finish from Slovan’s Kevin Wimmer – ensuring Celtic won their opening Champions League “group” match for the first time in thirteen attempts.

That statistic is a bit misleading, because this is no longer a group like it was previously, it’s a league phase. Which makes it really awkward to say “Champions League league phase” and the other competitions have the same problem! Celtic have definitely won their opening match in the pre-Champions League branding days many times, including their very first European Cup match against FC Zurich in 1966.

Regardless, no one will be under any illusion that it won’t get more difficult for Celtic from here on in. If that game was, at least on paper, the easiest of the eight since it was against their pot four team at home, then by the same measure the next prospect is the hardest.

Borussia Dortmund are not only Celtic’s pot one team that they have to face away from home, they also happen to be last season’s beaten Champions League finalists, having lost 2-0 to Real Madrid at Wembley four months ago.

Of course, there is that infamous statistic that says Real Madrid haven’t lost in a final of one of the main European competitions since Aberdeen beat then in Gothenburg in 1983, so maybe that was inevitable! Real Madrid are also by far and away the most successful side in Champions League history, having won the tournament on fifteen occasions now. They’ve won the tournament more since its rebranding in the 1990s than any other club has managed since its inception the 1950s. Such is their dominance that Milan and Liverpool, the second and joint third most successful teams in the history of the competition, met each other on match day one and they only have thirteen between them!

But look further down that list of competition winners and you’ll find the names of both Borussia Dortmund and Celtic. Dortmund’s appearance in the final in June moved them slightly ahead of Celtic as whilst they now have one win each – 1997 for Dortmund and 1967 for Celtic, Dortmund have also been runners up on two occasions now, adding to their 2013 defeat to Bayern Munich where Celtic haven’t been in the final since their 1970 defeat.

Celtic may be slightly behind Dortmund on that list, but currently there’s only one team in Europe ahead of them. After match day one, Celtic are second in the league phase, with only Bayern Munich’s 9-2 win over Celtic’s match day six opponents, Dinamo Zagreb, keeping Celtic off the top spot.

No one is under any illusion about that of course, but let’s enjoy it while it lasts!

Dortmund also won on their opening match day, picking up a 3-0 win away to Club Brugge. It took a while to get there, with Jamie Gittens opening the scoring in the final quarter of the hour of the game, adding a second with a few minutes of regular time to go, and Serhou Guirassy adding an injury time penalty to have them in joint fourth place with Aston Villa.

Incidentally, Sparta Prague also won 3-0 on the opening match day, but as they did so at home rather than away from home like Villa and Dortmund, they’re currently classed as sixth. So yes, away goals are back and count as one of the tie breakers for the league phase! Worth keeping that in mind if it comes up later!

Celtic have faced Dortmund on two occasions previously, both in two-legged ties, and on both occasions it was Dortmund that came out on top.

The first came in Celtic’s centenary season of 1987/88, where Celtic actually won 2-1 at Celtic Park thanks to goals from Andy Walker and Derek Whyte, but the away goal from Frank Mill in between was a cause for concern.

Dortmund then won the second leg in Germany 2-0, both goals coming from Nobby Dickel.

Five years later the teams met in the UEFA Cup again, this time Celtic trying to turn around a 1-0 away leg defeat after Stephane Chapuisat had given Dortmund a late lead in that match. Celtic had turned around a two goal deficit against another German team, Cologne, in the previous round to win 3-2 on aggregate. However, while Gerry Creaney did open the scoring to level the tie in the second leg, Dortmund eventually won the match 2-1 thanks to second half goals from Chapuisat and Michael Zorc.

Can’t find footage of either of these games, even when you look at videos of Dortmund’s route to the final that year! Dortmund lost out to Juventus that year, but did get their ultimate revenge four years later by beating the Italians to lift the European Cup. Which I’m going to include here now if only because it’s the second time I’ve mentioned it and Paul Lambert was in that team, keeping Zinedine Zidane in his pocket.

Celtic’s overall record against German opposition isn’t the best either. That 1987 win at home against Borussia Dortmund is one of only four wins against Germans – the others being the aforementioned 3-0 win over Cologne in 1992 as well as the 3-1 win over Stuttgart in the UEFA Cup fourth round tie on Celtic’s way to the final in Seville in 2003, and most recently the 2-1 win over Celtic’s upcoming match day four opponents RB Leipzig in the Europa League group stages of 2018/19.

You’ll note all four of these wins have come at Celtic Park, which is why I’m saving them more for match day four!

Celtic’s record in Germany is about as poor as they come. And when you consider the summer just past and the disappointment Scotland had at the Euros over there, that’s saying something.

It took until the Stuttgart match in 2003 for Celtic to even score a goal in what was their seventh visit to Germany. But, just like buses, two came along at once as both Alan Thompson and Chris Sutton scored in the opening fifteen minutes that day in a game that ultimately finished 3-2 to Stuttgart but was still enough for Celtic to progress 5-4 on aggregate.

Only one of the six games prior to that wasn’t a defeat, that being a goalless draw away to Werder Bremen in the 1988/89 European Cup second round. There’s been seven more trips to Germany since that Stuttgart match, five of which have ended in defeat and two were draws. There was a goalless draw in the 2009/10 Europa League group stage away to Hamburg, and a 1-1 draw away to Borussia Mönchengladbach in the 2016/17 Champions League group stage. Moussa Dembele being the only Celtic player to score in Germany in a game that didn’t finish in defeat!

Celtic’s most recent trip to Germany was in the 2022/23 Champions League, which saw a 3-1 defeat to RB Leipzig. Jota scoring Celtic’s goal to level the game before half time after Nkunku had given Leipzig the lead, but Andre Silva scored twice in the second half.

And as it’s the most recent, I’ll include it here knowing full well we’ll see it again in a few weeks!

Fourteen trips to Germany, eleven defeats and three draws. Only five of those games saw Celtic even manage to score. The other two games were Alan Thompson giving Celtic the lead against Bayern Munich in the 2003/04 Champions League group stage only for Roy Makaay to score twice late on and turn the game around for a 2-1 home win…

And a late 3-2 defeat to Bayern Leverkusen in the 2021/22 Europa League group stage, where Celtic went behind early to a Robert Andrich goal but a Josip Juranovic penalty before half time and a goal from Jota ten minutes into the second half had Celtic leading going into the last ten minutes. But Andrich levelled the game and a few minutes later Moussa Diaby got the winner.

So at least when Celtic score there’s something of an exciting game!

However, it’s a record that Celtic would dearly love to improve on, and it would be quite a feat if it were to improve today. But it is possible. After all, Rangers went to Dortmund as recently as the 2021/22 Europa League playoff round and won 4-2!

A James Tavernier penalty started things off before Alfredo Morelos and John Lundstram had Rangers three up just after half time. Jude Bellingham pulled a goal back, only for Dan-Axel Zagadou to put into his own net a couple of minutes later. Raphael Guerreiro got a late goal to give Dortmund some hope ahead of the second leg, but that ended up in a draw and so Rangers progressed.

Mind you, Dortmund haven’t lost at home in Europe since. Six wins and four draws, all in the Champions League, since that defeat to Rangers. Copenhagen, Manchester City, Sevilla, Chelsea, Paris Saint-Germain (twice), AC Milan, Newcastle United, PSV Eindhoven, and Atlético Madrid. That’s a decent list.

Just to complete Dortmund’s record of hosting Scottish sides, that win for Rangers a couple of years ago was their fifth visit to Dortmund. The first two were both goalless draws, those coming in the 1966/67 Cup Winners Cup second round (where Rangers won the home leg and ultimately progressed to the final) and the 1982/83 UEFA Cup first round (where rangers won the home leg but lost to Cologne in the next round). Amazingly, these two ties between Dortmund and Rangers were actually consecutive appearances for Dortmund in Europe! They didn’t qualify for anything in between!

Can’t find footage of the away legs, so here’s some Ibrox action to enjoy instead, with some spoilers for what I’m about to say too.

In the 1995/96 Champions League group stage it was a 2-2 draw. Brian Laudrup opened the scoring, but goals from Andreas Moller and Karl-Heinz Riedle had Dortmund winning until a late equaliser from Gordon Durie shared the points in what was already a dead rubber for both teams by that point. Juventus had the group won ahead of Dortmund and their head to head record against Steaua Bucharest was always going to have them finish second ahead of them. Rangers were consigned to bottom spot.

In the 1999/2000 UEFA Cup third round, it took extra time and penalties for Dortmund to eventually see off Rangers, although after 90 minutes in Dortmund it was 2-0 which cancelled out the 2-0 win Rangers took there from Ibrox. It was almost a famous victory for Rangers though, as Fredi Bobic scored in the 92nd minute to level the tie and take it to extra time. And if you want to know how close this was, it’s the Dortmund keeper Jens Lehmann who slices a shot that falls to Bobic!

The only other Scottish club to face Dortmund in Europe are Motherwell. In the first round of the 1994/95 UEFA Cup, it was a 3-0 aggregate win for Dortmund, winning the home leg 1-0, that man Andreas Moller with the goal.

Dortmund are currently fifth in the Bundesliga, three points behind leaders Bayern Munich after five matches. On Friday night they came from 2-0 down to beat Bochum 4-2. They travel to Union Berlin on Saturday.

Celtic are currently top of the Scottish Premiership with a 100% record and no goals conceded after six matches, ahead of Aberdeen on goal difference. On Saturday they won 6-0 away to St Johnstone and travel to Ross County next on Sunday. If they keep a clean sheet in that game, they’ll match Rangers 2020/21 record of seven consecutive clean sheets in their opening league games.

The game tonight kicks off at 8pm oor time in the Signa Iduna Park, or Westfalenstadion as those of us who tend to ignore sponsorships and focus on the actual historical name of the stadium would call it, and it’s live on TNT Sports 2.

Good luck to Celtic tonight! Back on Thursday with a blog ahead of Rangers second match in the Europa League and Hearts opening match in the Conference League.