Dortmund blow 2-0 lead as Werder Bremen snatch stoppage-time draw

Dortmund had the game won and let it slip in twelve minutes of madness. Borussia Dortmund controlled things from start to finish, went up 2-0 with a pair of late strikes, and still ended up sharing the points in a 2-2 draw with SV Werder Bremen at SIGNAL IDUNA PARK in the Bundesliga.

For nearly eighty minutes, this was a one-sided affair. Dortmund dictated the tempo at will, finishing with 71.8 percent possession, and strung together chance after chance without the scoreboard budging: Sabitzer rattled the post from a direct free kick, Guirassy headed one off the crossbar, and Nwaneri tried his luck from distance a couple of times. Werder Bremen, for their part, dug in and looked to hit on the counter, with Füllkrug their lone outlet up front.

The first half ended scoreless despite the home side's siege, but Dortmund's patience finally paid off just past the 79th minute. A counterattack ended with Daniel Svensson finishing with his left foot from the center of the box, set up by Fábio Silva, to make it 1-0. Five minutes later came the second: a corner kick, a Joey Veerman cross, and a Nico Schlotterbeck header into the top corner for 2-0 in the 84th minute. The game looked over.

Werder Bremen hit back in stoppage time

But Werder Bremen refused to go quietly. Just three minutes after Dortmund's second goal, Ludovit Reis pulled one back with a low shot from outside the box that snuck in by the left post, set up by a pass from Oskar Wójcik. The 2-1 left the door open for a finish that arrived deep into added time: with six minutes of stoppage signaled, Niclas Füllkrug rose in the box to head home, from a through ball by Marco Grüll off a free kick, to make it 2-2 in the 91st minute.

The home side's control was also reflected in the final numbers from the match:

According to our post-match xG estimate based on the shots taken in the game, Dortmund generated 2.827 expected goals to just 0.99 for Werder Bremen, a gap that makes clear who did the more dangerous work, even if the final score ended level.

Before kickoff, our preview gave Dortmund a 70 percent chance of winning, against a 19 percent chance of a draw and an 11 percent chance of a Werder Bremen win, with expected goals of 2.42 for the home side and 0.90 for the visitors. The chance-creation numbers ended up matching that projection, but the final result, the draw, turned out to be the least likely of the three outcomes, and it happened even though Dortmund were two goals up with ten minutes left to play.

What it means in the standings

The draw does not cost Dortmund much in the table: they remain on top with 13 points from 5 matches played, on a record of 4 wins, 1 draw and 0 losses. Werder Bremen, for their part, sit on 8 points from 5 matches (2 wins, 2 draws, 1 loss), 5 points behind their opponents from this round. For a team that controlled nearly the entire match, Dortmund walk away with the feeling of having let two points slip through their fingers; for Werder Bremen, Füllkrug's stoppage-time goal counts as a small prize rescued from a night that had gotten away from them.