So, now here I am, not quite live.

Because, ideally, one learns from their mistakes I won't do this like I did it in Mainz some years ago, where, because I was all choked up with tears, no one could actually hear what I wanted to say. Despite that it was important to me to get the chance to talk to and speak with you one more time.

Seven years of our life together will end next week, but today we are in the Signal-Iduna-Park together for the last time, a place I loved to call home. It's an extraordinary stadium, an extraordinary place, which is only this special, not because of its amazing construction, but because you all make it extraordinary.

I have enjoyed every second, not just here, but with you all in general, and for that, from the bottom of my heart: thank you.

My team and I were very lucky in making the decision to come here in 2008, and if anyone in the history of soccer ever spoke of a win-win situation, that would, I think, describe the core of it very well. We have spent a very long time of our lives together, and, as is the best case scenario, one makes stories and memories – positive memories – that stay with one for a long time, and I'll take a very big bag full of positive memories with me, and I hope it the same thing will be true for you.

This is the moment in which one says thank you, thank you, of course, to Reinhard Rauball, Aki Watzke, Micheal Zorc, to every single employee of Borussia Dortmund. You can be, trust me, I know, be proud that people like them are taking care of your club, because every single person working at the BVB is also a fan of Borussia Dortmund. I'm not sure if that is the way it is everywhere, but that's the way it is here. Because of the way people are, they make mistakes, but everything the people here do, they do with conviction and spirit, and are the best at what they do and it was a great pleasure working with them. Above that, it was a great pleasure to work for this club, for you all, to, at least, not disturb the one or other victory we got to celebrate together, but to make them possible, and now it's over.

I'll give you a very small piece of advice as someone who had to say goodbye from a great club already, in my case Mainz 05, I can only say – don't compare. Comparing diminishes the great memory, and makes it harder to create a great future, and I'm sure this club will have a great future, the base is amazing, you all are amazing, all the people that work here are amazing, your new trainer is phenomenal, everything will be alright.

We still have something to do, and we still have a very big final next week, and perhaps, if all goes well, we'll see each other in the city center next Sunday, I'd really be in the mood for that. I think it would be appropriate to end this great time with such an amazing moment.

I had a lot of fun, and, once again, thank you. We'll surely see each other again, sometime.

'Til then,