A new year, a new Borussia Dortmund. That was the plan after a fractious, difficult and sometimes traumatic 2017, which took in the stress of parting company with two head coaches and – more seriously – the horror of the attack on the team bus in April before the Champions League quarter-final with Monaco. Following the exit of the influential head scout Sven Mislintat to Arsenal, still affected by being marginalised under former coach number one Thomas Tuchel, the failure of former coach number two, Peter Bosz, is still being unpicked by his replacement Peter Stöger.



Looking at the team sheet for Sunday’s resumption of their Bundesliga campaign at home to Wolfsburg, the freshness of a new start felt tangible, with teenagers Alexander Isak and Jadon Sancho – with the latter first Englishman to play for Dortmund – included in the XI for the first time in the league. The young pair made their respective presences felt, each coming close to breaking a frustrating goalless deadlock by hitting the woodwork.

Paper and reality are appreciably different, of course, and that was the case here, with Isak and Sancho’s participations aided and abetted by Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s latest exclusion for “disciplinary reasons” – the third time it has happened in the last 12 months. On the last occasion, before November’s game in Stuttgart, it had been a clear irritant, but CEO Hans-Joachim Watzke’s will to reconcile was clear, talking about the Gabonese forward being part of the club’s “family”.

This time, the feeling is more of the straw that broke the camel’s back. “There’s a point,” the sporting director Michael Zorc said after the game, “where you can’t tolerate it anymore. I don’t know what’s going on in his head.” Stöger explained that Aubameyang had skipped an “important” team meeting on Saturday that involved the whole squad, “even the injured guys.” The coach dismissed Aubameyang’s explanation. “He said he forgot,” Stöger said, “but we all know that’s not the case.”

Stöger is a solid, standup guy, who should be able to make BVB sturdier than their early-season incarnation, but he is not a magician, as was proved when he was victim of a letdown of a summer transfer window in Cologne. Like Bosz with the Ousmane Dembélé saga, the coach is saddled with continuing to try to imbue his philosophy while also shielding his players from the fallout of a borderline mutiny from a star player.



It feels now as if Aubameyang’s future at the club is untenable. They would have been happy to have moved him on under more amicable circumstances last summer, but the right buyer could not be found, with Chinese Super League interest – reportedly from Guangzhou Evergrande – affected by the government’s new tax demands on clubs buying in high-profile foreigners.

There has been a surprisingly small market out there for such a consistent goalscorer. Perhaps it is because his game is heavily based on pace, and he is now 28 and would require significant investment in terms of transfer fee and wages. He has been less involved in Dortmund’s all-round play in the last year, even if his goalscoring return remains excellent.

Dortmund’s Jadon Sancho shone in patches after starting for the first time in the league. Photograph: Friedemann Vogel/EPA

Despite the untidiness of the situation, maybe January is the best time to make a deal happen. As Arsenal are edged towards a deal for Alexis Sánchez, going for Aubameyang – who was originally identified by Mislintat as the man for Dortmund while playing for Saint-Etienne – this month would take some heat off the board. Renewed interest from China is not to be ruled out either, with the tax situation not deterring Beijing Guoan from laying out an eye-watering €74m for Villarreal’s Cédric Bakambu, a fine player but nobody’s idea of Aubameyang’s equal.

It might be a forlorn hope but it would be good if Dortmund’s relationship with Aubameyang is remembered for what it was, rather than for how it looks to be ending. Club and player have been great for each other, and Watzke’s “family” comment in November wasn’t throwaway. Aubameyang and his loved ones have been happy in Dortmund for the vast majority of his time here.

The irony of Sunday’s blow-up is that Aubameyang had begun the day as the wronged party, with Kicker’s chief writer Karlheinz Wild criticising him on the magazine’s TV channel, describing what he called an “Affenzirkus” – monkey circus’ – around the player. Aubameyang, quite understandably, complained on Instagram and his father Pierre made a post on Sunday night that he subsequently deleted that went considerably further, raging that the journalist “wants to bring us back to Hitler’s time”. Wild has apologised through Kicker for his choice of words.

Dortmund will move on, as they always do, and will have a contingency plan up their sleeve, as much as Isak and Sancho show promise. The future is already being unfurled and the Basel defender Manuel Akanji, also coveted by Liverpool, was at Signal Iduna Park on Sunday and is set to sign for a fee north of €20m. Hopefully, in time, they and Aubameyang will remember the good times.

Talking points

• The striker who should have had the headlines this weekend was Simon Terodde. As the clock ticked into the fifth minute of stoppage time in the Cologne v Mönchengladbach derby, the bottom side’s fans might have consoled themselves that new/old signing Terodde is a proven goalscorer in the second tier before next season. Then, with the game’s last touch, he proved he was a returning hero for now, heading a dramatic winner to spark joyous celebration and to keep Cologne alive, just. They face Hamburg in a relegation six-pointer on Saturday, with HSV coach Markus Gisdol under big pressure after defeat the at Augsburg.

Cologne’s Simon Terodde celebrates with team-mates after scoring the winning goal against Borussia Mönchengladbach. Photograph: Lars Baron/Bongarts/Getty Images

• On the subject of comeback kings, Mario Gómez did the job on his second debut with first club Stuttgart, provoking a bizarre own goal from Niklas Stark to hand his team victory. In this weekend of centre-forward feats, Niclas Füllkrug doesn’t deserve to be overlooked after his hat-trick brought Hannover a win from 2-0 down against Mainz.

• Still on strikers, with Robert Lewandowski out it seemed certain his new locum Sandro Wagner would start – if not now when, one wondered? In the event he played just the final 12 minutes, replacing Franck Ribéry, who had continued his return to form in preparation for the season’s second half, scoring in the 3-1 win at Leverkusen. Another good Jupp Heynckes call, with Karl-Heinz Rummenigge again eulogising the coach. “We would be ill-advised if we gave up this man without a fight, and we won’t do that.”



• Leipzig might have ruled out a January move to Liverpool for Naby Keïta, but no sign of the Guinean downing tools. He opened the scoring in the 3-1 win over Schalke and even needed to be withdrawn later by the coach, Ralph Hasenhüttl, with his trademark bite threatening to earn him a fourth red card of the season.