RB Leipzig Vs Borussia Dortmund [2–2] – Bundesliga 2025/2026: Niko Kovač’s Second-Half Turnaround – Tactical Analysis

This past weekend’s Bundesliga showdown between RB Leipzig and Borussia Dortmund delivered a dramatic ebb and flow befitting two of Germany’s most tactically intriguing sides, finishing in a riveting 2–2 draw at Red Bull Arena.

Leipzig under Ole Werner appeared to take control early, executing their playstyle with aggressive structure and vertical thrusts, surging into a 2–0 lead courtesy of a Christoph Baumgartner double before half-time.

Dortmund, by contrast, were initially passive in possession but Niko Kovač methodically adjusted their tactics in the second period, striking back through an own goal and a late Fabio Silva equaliser deep into stoppage time to salvage a point and maintain their strong Bundesliga momentum.

From the outset, Leipzig’s approach was defined by controlled progression through midfield and incisive use of wide channels, allowing Baumgartner, energised between the lines, to benefit from quality service by Yan Diomande and David Raum.

Leipzig’s structural coherence in the first half suggested a team capable of both creating and sustaining pressure, and their 2–0 advantage seemed to reflect that strategic upper hand.

But in this tactical narrative, football’s unpredictability shone, with Dortmund’s increasing intensity after the break, unsettling the hosts’ rhythm and forcing a shift in the balance of play.

The late twist, a dramatic stoppage-time strike from Silva, encapsulated the contest’s overarching duality: Leipzig’s early tactical assertiveness versus Dortmund’s adaptability under duress.

In this tactical analysis, we’ll dissect how each coach’s match plan, in-game adjustments and patterns of play shaped a contest that swung from apparent control to shared spoils in compelling fashion.

RB Leipzig Vs Borussia Dortmund Lineups & Formations

For the home team and Ole Werner, a couple of things changed compared to the last couple of games.

In goal, their number one choice, Péter Gulácsi, missed the game due to injury, so Maarten Vandevoordt got the start in goal.

Werner played a back four, with Ridle Baku on the right, Willi Orbán and Castello Lukeba in the centre, and skipper David Raum on the left.

The two Austrian internationals, Nicolas Seiwald and Xaver Schlager, played as the double-pivot, with the third Austrian international, Baumgartner, as the attacking midfielder.

Brighton-loanee Brajan Gruda started on the right wing, with wonderkid Yan Diomande starting on the left wing, flanking Romulo as the lone striker in a 4-2-3-1 formation.

Niko Kovač lined up his Borussia Dortmund team in a 3-4-1-2 formation on the other side.

Gregor Kobel started in goal, and Ramy Bensebaini, Waldemar Anton, and 18-year-old Luca Reggiani played as the three centre-backs.

Daniel Svensson and Julian Ryerson played as the two wing-backs, with Jobe Bellingham and Felix Nmecha playing as the double pivot in central midfield.

Marcel Sabitzer played as the attacking midfielder, with Serhou Guirassy and Maximilian Beier playing as the two strikers for the Croatian coach.

RB Leipzig Control

From the start, RB Leipzig controlled the game and the ball.

Dortmund tried to press high with a man-oriented approach, but Werner prepared his team well with a variety of good solutions.

Kovač’s team was not too keen on possession; they followed a rather pragmatic approach once again, trying to keep their compactness against the ball intact while hurting Leipzig with fast-paced attacks and their efficiency.

Leipzig played with their four defenders very close to their own box; the two centre-backs formed a backline with their Belgian goalkeeper, the two full-backs stayed very wide, but also in a very flat position.

The double-pivot staggered in the centre, with Schlager pushing higher up the field and Seiwald dropping back into the space in front of the backline, playing as more of a holding midfielder.

Werner heavily involved Vandevordt in his passing game, and they often tried to get to their full-backs quickly through a triangle with Seiwald.

Leipzig had a very vertical approach from there on out; they often played passes towards their attacking players, who dropped back into midfield.

Then, Werner’s men often played lay-offs into the midfielders, especially Schlager, who often found himself in open space and could be the playmaker for his team.

Leipzig also chipped these passes often; they were not afraid of playing high passes.

Their attacking players all have a very good first touch, and they showed it in this game.

After these lay-offs, Schlager and Seiwald often looked to find another vertical pass immediately.

Romulo then became the target man for Leipzig, positioning himself very high up the field and winning many of the physical duels against Dortmund’s centre-backs.

Romulo was able to play more lay-offs; often, Diomande and Gruda started making vertical runs, and the Brazilian striker was able to hit them in stride.

Other than that, Baumgartner also positioned himself well between the lines often and helped his striker out.

If the press of Dortmund got to the Leipzig backline, they still had solutions ready.

Kovač’s team has a great run of form at the moment, and their play against the ball has been a key part of that, so it wasn’t surprising that the press of his team worked out rather well at the start of the game, especially in line one.

Werner decided that the best approach to combat Dortmund’s man-oriented style was to just play over the press with long balls if the pressure got too intense.

The coach kept his two wingers very wide when building up in the first line, allowing Romulo to drop back into midfield next to Baumgartner.

Because of the man-orientation, the space in the centre behind the midfield was vacated, and the two Leipzig players did well as target men, bringing down the long balls consistently.

When Leipzig got behind the first line of press, they quickly transitioned their attacks into the final third through triangle rotations and well-timed third-man runs.

The full-backs stayed in a very wide position, and Baumgartner, as an attacking midfielder, stayed high up the field.

This allowed Gruda to drop back in the half-space and receive the passes from Seiwald or the defenders.

Dortmund were often too passive in those situations, not applying enough pressure on the ball and allowing Leipzig to find Gruda with little resistance.

Grunda then played passes towards Baku near the sideline and then made a vertical run, threatening the space behind the full-back, who had to press forward now.

This allowed Baumgartner to drop back to receive a diagonal pass now, allowing Werner’s team to find Gruda through the triangle.

With these diagonal passes into the movement in opposing directions and third-man runs they found through Baumgartner, Leipzig often played through Dortmund’s midfield press with ease, giving them complete control of the game.

Attacking Down The Left

Dortmund defended well under pressure for about 20 minutes, then Leipzig consistently found their rhythm and created opportunity after opportunity.

Werner had his men focusing on the left side, abusing the young centre-back of Dortmund, and it worked out really well for his team.

The two goals they scored in the first half were not enough, considering the quality of opportunities they created for themselves.

Leipzig often overloaded the right side, keeping Yan Diomande very wide, isolating him on the left wing and allowing him to get into 1v1s against Ryerson.

In the situation pictured above, Seiwald switched play with a beautiful long ball towards Diomande, who shows his class first touch and gets into the take-on against Ryerson, beating him towards the baseline.

These situations happened way too often for Kovač’s liking; Reggiani failed to provide enough support to Ryerson, leaving the Norwegian international alone against one of the best dribblers in the Bundesliga far too often, and many big chances went to Leipzig.

From then on, Leipzig did the same thing over and over to create opportunities for Baumgartner.

The attacking players all moved towards the six-yard box line, sometimes even away from the goal if they had to; only Baumgartner, who started his runs from a deeper position, was moving into the six-yard box.

This created a lot of problems for the defenders of Dortmund, especially Reggiani, who struggled with it regularly, and in the situation above, Baumgartner scored the first goal for Leipzig.

Leipzig just abused it every time they could, creating good shooting positions pretty much every single attack with that pattern.

Here, they went with a long throw-in to Romulo, Reggiani, and Anton, all of whom are too far away from the striker to actually get to him in time.

Romulo then turns, goes into the 1v1 against Anton, and takes him on, passing the ball towards the six-yard box again.

With two of the centre-backs not in the box, the rest of the defenders failed to pick out Baumgartner, and the Austrian midfielder was able to make the run towards goal again, getting his foot on the ball just a couple of yards out.

This time, he missed, but it was the second of four opportunities created the same way, and Dortmund did not manage to defend it at all.

Then Leipzig started to vary their attacking patterns after switching to the left side.

They kept overloading the right wing and then passed it to Diomande out wide.

In this situation, Raum then makes a vertical run in the space behind Ryerson, who had to move outwards to press the winger.

The underlapping run gets him wide open in the box here.

Reggiani again fails to anticipate quickly enough, and Raum gets through to the baseline, ready to use his elite crossing ability with his left foot.

Once again, all Leipzig attackers just move towards the middle of the box, with Baumgartner aggressively making a run towards the near-post.

This time, Raum finds his midfielder, but Baumgartner misses the big chance again, this time under a bit more pressure from Anton.

What they were able to do with an underlapping run, they also were able to replicate with an overlapping run.

In the situation pictured above, the positional play was not perfect because it happened just after a free kick; they still switched to Diomande, who was more in the half-space.

Seeing this, Raum makes an overlapping run; Reggiani and Ryerson again struggle to communicate the assignments, and Raum gets open again.

Once again, he finds Baumgartner with his cross; this time, the Austrian midfielder finishes the big chance and doubles the lead.

Four big chances for Baumgartner, two more opportunities for Diomande, Werner, and his team just picked apart the right defensive side of Dortmund in the first half.

Dortmund Second Half Rally

Kovač adjusted in the second half, giving his young centre-back and Ryerson more help out of midfield and stopping the attacking barrage over the right side.

Later on, he even substituted Reggiani for to strengthen his defence.

Dortmund got a bit lucky just after the half and got back into the game with an own goal by Romulo, but overall, the game stalled for a long time in the second half, with Dortmund stopping Diomande more often than not and Leipzig not risking too much.

Kovač’s men struggled to create opportunities for much of the time, so the experienced coach decided to sub on three additional attacking players: Julian Brandt, Karim Adeyemi, and Fabio Silva.

With the new attacking triangle, Dortmund became more dangerous but still lacked actual chances.

They got more vertical with their approach; Leipzig only defended in a deep block when they actually needed to and kept pressing Dortmund high up the field.

Dortmund now tried to find Julian Brandt with vertical passes in attacking midfield, then both of the new strikers used their pace to threaten the high line of Leipzig.

When they got into the final third, Dortmund still stalled out way too often and rarely created actual shooting opportunities.

They tried to work with overlapping runs a lot now and managed to get their wing-backs and even centre-backs into good crossing positions a couple of times, but just couldn’t create big chances from it.

Then, late in stoppage time, they finally had their best attacking spell of the game.

After winning the ball, Dortmund found the vertical line-breaking pass to Brandt again, and the two strikers quickly made vertical runs against the high line in a 3v3 situation.

Brandt played a fine pass in the path of Adeyemi in this situation, who then proceeds to use his pace to beat the defenders and squares the ball to Silva.

With a bit of luck, Silva finishes the one and only big chance Dortmund created, tying up the game and keeping the unbeaten run for Kovač alive.

Conclusion

Ultimately, the 2–2 draw between RB Leipzig and Borussia Dortmund was a testament to the oscillating fortunes inherent in modern Bundesliga football, a game where initial tactical ascendancy can be countered by adaptability and competitive resilience.

Leipzig looked every bit the team in control for large stretches, their first-half dominance a product of both proactive positional play and precise combinations that repeatedly unlocked Dortmund’s defensive lines.

Christoph Baumgartner’s brace embodied that intent, as he capitalised on quality delivery from the flanks and space between the lines to give his side what appeared to be a comfortable lead.

Yet Dortmund’s response was a masterclass in strategic patience.

Without their full complement of centre-backs available, they accepted periods of reduced possession but shifted the tactical balance through targeted substitutions and increased tempo after the interval, eventually pulling a goal back via a Leipzig own goal.

In the dying minutes, a combination of persistence, incisive movement, and chaos in transition culminated in Fabio Silva’s dramatic equaliser in stoppage time.

This moment not only kept Dortmund’s unbeaten run intact but also underscored the value of tactical readjustment and psychological commitment under pressure.

For Leipzig, the result feels more like points dropped than shared, with post-match voices emphasising frustration over the inability to see out a game they controlled for long phases.

Dortmund, meanwhile, will take confidence from their refusal to capitulate, converting adversity into a crucial fixture outcome.

In the wider context of the Bundesliga table and the tactical storylines at play, this draw reflects both teams’ competing ambitions: Leipzig’s quest for Champions League consistency and Dortmund’s pursuit of sustained title contention in a season defined by momentum and resilience, but ultimately, the draw was not enough to boost the ambitions of either team.