Borussia Dortmund Vs Atalanta [2–0] – Champions League 2025/2026: Niko Kovač’s Tactical Masterclass – Tactical Analysis

Dortmund took a commanding 2-0 advantage after a dominant performance at home against Atalanta.

The German side had very quietly been on a great run domestically, winning seven of their last eight Bundesliga matches, and had climbed within six points of Bayern Munich.

Nico Kovač’s side are looking to improve on their quarter-final run last year and their performance on Tuesday must have put a lot of teams in the Champions League on notice.

Atalanta had been on their own good run coming into Tuesday’s match, but the Italian side were humbled at Signal Iduna Park.

Raffaele Palladino has done a great job since taking over the club in November, because since his appointment, only Inter Milan have accumulated more points in Serie A.

However, a couple of bad results towards the end of their Champions League campaign caused them to fall outside the top eight.

They are now in a deep hole heading into the second leg at New Balance Arena and will need to improve many tactical aspects to turn the tie in their favour.

In this tactical analysis, we will take a look at Dortmund’s effective use of dropping their forwards deep to take advantage of Atalanta’s aggressiveness and some of the issues Palladino’s side had in build-up against Dortmund.

Dortmund Vs Atalanta Lineups & Formations

Nico Kovač lined his team up in their usual 3-4-2-1 formation

Gregor Kobel occupied his usual spot in goal behind the centre-backs of Ramy Bensebaini, Waldemar Anton, and 17-year-old Luca Reggiani.

Julian Ryerson and Daniel Svensson started together once again as the two wing-backs.

Felix Nmecha and Jobe Bellingham started as the two central midfielders.

Julian Brandt started alongside Maximilian Beier as the two number 10s, while Serhou Guirassy occupied his usual spot up top at striker.

Nico Kovač made four substitutions in the match.

In the 70th minute, Carney Chukwuemeka came on for Brant, and Karim Adeyemi came on for Beier.

In the 83rd minute, Marcel Sabitzer came on for Nmech, and Fábio Silva came on for Guirassy.

Raffaele Palladino also lined Atalanta up in a 3-4-2-1 formation.

Marco Carnesecchi lined up in goal behind Odilon Kossounou, Berat Djimsiti, and Sead Kolašinac.

Davide Zappacosta started at right wing-back while Lorenzo Bernasconi started at right wing-back

Marten de Roon and Éderson started alongside each other once again in central midfield.

Mario Pašalić and Nicola Zalewski started as the two number ‘10s’ with Gianluca Scamacca ahead of them as the main striker.

Raffaele Palladino made five substitutions in the match.

In the 46th minute, Isak Hien came on for Dijmsi, ti and Nikola Krstović came on for Scamacca.

In the 63rd minute, Kamaldeen Sulemana came on for de Roon.

In the 72nd minute, Raoul Bellanova came on for Zappaco, and in the 82nd minute, Lazar Samardzic came on for Zalewski.

Dortmund In Possession

Dortmund did an excellent job of possession, using their forwards dropping in to create space behind.

This is a concept Kovač uses all the time, and it has been really successful against teams like Atalanta, who both man-mark and play a high line.

What he did was use their aggressiveness against them.

Here, they funnel the ball out wide to draw in the man-to-man press.

Initially, Beier drops in and draws the defender, then plays a one-touch pass to Ryerson.

Then Brandt shifted over to drop in and draw a defender with him out wide, which freed up space for Beier to receive the ball and easily carry it into Atalanta’s final third.

Kovač will typically have his team build up in a 3-2-5 like this, with their wing-backs given freedom to push on or drop off.

Sometimes they will drop deeper, like in the first example, to help build up, and other times they will push forward to send crosses into the box, just like the first goal of the game.

This is a perfect example of how Dortmund like to use Guirassy in their 3-2-5.

Guirassy is really good at dropping deep to get on the ball and will often force a defender to follow him, which frees up space in behind.

Here, he was able to receive the ball, turn, and drive right at Atalanta’s backline, which freed up space for Brandt to get off a shot.

The concept is that if the defender doesn’t follow him, then Dortmund has a midfield overload.

If he does follow Guirassy, then Dortmund will aggressively try to have their two number 10s make runs into the space Guirassy created and try to play through balls to them.

The second Dortmund goal is another really good example of them using Guirassy to take advantage of Atalanta’s man-marking.

Here, you can see that Atalanta is man-to-man high-pressing.

So, Guirassy drifts out wide to receive a direct ball from the back line, holds up play, passes it back to Nmecha, and then burns his man in behind to set up a cross to Beier for the goal.

Dortmund were doing this kind of stuff all night long, and Atalanta didn’t really have an answer because it was pretty clear their backline couldn’t win these 1v1 battles against Dortmund’s front line.

Atalanta Struggles In Build Up

Atalanta struggled all night long in the build-up, just getting the ball into Dortmund’s final third, and then did nothing once they got there.

Despite holding a little over 55% of possession, they had only 17 touches in the penalty area, compared to Dortmund’s 29.

Palladino is known for his brand of build-up, always trying to overload the opposition in the first two phases.

There were instances when they pulled Dortmund defenders out of position, but the decision-making was less than ideal.

Here is an example where Scamacca drops in and creates a lot of space behind, but immediately tries to play a switch ball instead of playing the ball behind Terensconi.

You can see from this image in the final third that no Atalanta players are making runs into deep areas or occupying the space between the lines, which means their only hope of creating anything is to play balls over the top and try to win 1v1 matchups.

Once Dortmund went up two goals, they sat back in a midfield block, and Atalanta ended up just circulating the ball from side to side, trying to find gaps through the middle, but they simply were not there.

You can see from their pass map a high volume of passes from side to side, but very few actually penetrating the middle of Dortmund’s defensive block.

What ended up happening then was that, once all the side-to-side passes weren’t working, Atalanta started trying to play more aggressive direct balls to the forwards, but consistently lost duel after duel.

Conclusion

It was a tough night for Atalanta in Germany, and they have a lot to improve on for the second leg.

The final expected goals favoured Dortmund, who created 2.10, while Atalanta created a mere 0.47 from seven shots.

One thing that has to change for Atalanta going into the second leg is finding a way to play direct effectively.

Dortmund will be perfectly comfortable sitting in a mid-block position and denying space through the middle.

Because they are down two goals, they will have to be much more aggressive with their passing, which is something they do in Serie A.

Per Opta, Atalanta lead Serie A with 55 direct attacks and 34 fast break shots, but they didn’t really get any counterattacking opportunities against Dortmund.

Atalanta also needs to win their 1v1 battles because Dortmund will use the exact same tactics with their forwards, trying to exploit Atalanta’s man-to-man marking system.

There needs to be a little more intensity from Palladino’s side in possession to cut out the long, direct passes to the forwards that allowed Dortmund to create their most dangerous chances in the first leg.

Dortmund have been in great form away from home in the Bundesliga this season, going 6-4-1, but they went 1-1-2 in the Champions League, with their lone win coming against Copenhagen.

Atalanta have a +16.2 expected goal differential in 13 Serie A matches at home this season, but in the Champions League, they’ve had mixed results, drawing with Slavia Prague and losing to Athletic Bilbao.

Both teams face a very difficult test over the weekend, as Dortmund takes on RB Leipzig and Atalanta hosts Napoli.

We will see how the second leg goes, but it would be a shocker to see Atalanta get back in this tie after how the first leg went.