Germany legend Lothar Matthaus has predicted that Borussia Dortmund will sneak into the Champions League quarter-finals after being drawn against Tottenham Hotspur in the last-16.
Mauricio Pochettino’s side will welcome Dortmund to either Wembley or their new stadium in mid-February before travelling to Germany for the second leg at the Signal Iduna Park in early March.
Matthaus has now predicted that Dortmund will narrowly secured progress against Spurs, but admitted his respect for Pochettino and his work at the London club in a rave review.
In a column for The Sun, Matthaus said: “Spurs and Borussia Dortmund met in the group stage last year, when Tottenham were far better. But Dortmund now have the leaders they didn’t have then, a better goalkeeper, stability, and in Lucien Favre a coach who knows what he wants to do and has built on what he did with Moenchengladbach and others.
“I’ve real respect for Mauricio Pochettino and Spurs. He doesn’t need to pay £50million, £60m, £70m for a player — he takes players and builds them and that is an incredible job. They have so many top players, many of them English too.
“Spurs have improved mentally from last season, when they were better than Juventus but lost because they had two or three bad minutes over the whole tie. I think that Dortmund will get through, just, but only because I am German.”
OPINION
This is a tie which could go under the radar as a real cracker in the last-16 of the Champions League. More focus may be on another Germany-England clash when Liverpool meet Bayern Munich, but the marriage of styles between Spurs and Dortmund promise a real thriller when February rolls around. It is made even more interesting by the fact that these sides met in the group stages of last year’s competition, with Spurs emerging winners on both occasions – a 3-1 win at home and a 2-1 win away. Obviously both sides have changed since then, with Dortmund improving significantly under Lucien Favre, who has turned them into genuine title contenders in the Bundesliga. They currently sit nine points clear at the top of the table and look well on the way to a first title in several years. Their form in the Champions League has also been good, meaning this will be a stern test for Tottenham, who will have their work cut out if they want to go a step further than last season.