Mario Goetze (right) and Marco Reus of Borrusia Dortmund in a previous game.
Germany’s World Cup winner Mario Goetze has been left out of Borussia
Dortmund’s squad for Tuesday’s Champions League last 16, first-leg,
clash against Benfica.
The 24-year-old has fallen out of favour with coach Thomas Tuchel
after a string of below-par performances and is struggling with a leg
injury, which kept him out of Saturday’s shock 2-1 defeat at Bundesliga
bottom side Darmstadt.
“For him, the game in Lisbon came a bit too soon,” Dortmund’s director of sport Michael Zorc told BVB.de. Injury and loss of form mean Goetze, who scored the winning goal in
the 2014 World Cup final, has played just 24 minutes of football so far
in 2017.
Dortmund have been boosted with the return of both captain Marcel
Schmelzer and Lukasz Piszczek, who missed the Darmstadt defeat with
injury.
Wingers Ousmane Dembele and Marco Reus have both shaken off knocks picked up in Darmstadt.
Tuesday’s fixture at the Estadio da Luz will be the first meeting
between Benfica and Dortmund since the first round of the 1963/64
European Cup, a tie the German club won 6-2 on aggregate.
