Next Friday, 5th of December 2014, an unrecognizable Borussia Dortmund will entertain an always dangerous Hoffenheim side at the splendorous Westfalenstadion for round 14 of the Bundesliga, on a match of paramount importance for the former European champions, who currently occupy the last place of the league table.

There aren’t enough words to describe what is happening to Borussia Dortmund so far this season. The German powerhouse are at the bottom of the table and they are digging a deeper and deeper grave as matches go by. Last weekend, Jürgen Klopp’s boys sucumbed at the hands of Eintracht Frankfurt and changed places with Stuttgart in the last places of the table. The experienced German attacking midfielder Alexander Meyer was Dortmund’s executioner at the Commerzbank-Arena last Sunday by netting in his team’s first goal and by providing an excellent assist to Seferovic for Eintracht’s second goal that sealed their win.

Once again, Dortmund enjoyed from more ball possession and plenty more goal attempts than their opponents, but that was not enough for them to secure the much needed three points.

For the first time in the season, this weekend, a Dortmund’s board member publicly admitted that the team is struggling at the Bundesliga and that they are, in truth, now battling to avoid relegation, a scenario almost impossible to foresee one year ago.

Dortmund have three wins in thirteen matches so far this season and their next match against Hoffenheim will certainly be far from being a walk in the park for Jürgen Klopp’s boys. The charismatic German manager is receiving a great deal of criticism from the media and some supporters and so far he does not seem to be able to find a way to solve the team’s urgent problems. For this particular match, Klopp will not be able to rely on the contribution of Marcos Reus, Sokratis, Hummels and Blaszczykowski, all currently sidelined due to injury.

As for Hoffenheim, despite their recent inconsistency, they have been having a very pleasant stint at Bundesliga so far this season. After three consecutive league defeats, Hoffenheim returned to wins last weekend as they overcame Hannover at home on what was a real goal galore. The Baden-Würtenberg team scored no more no less than seven goals over the last three matches and their attacking line is proving to be fairly effective this season, although, they have some problems in the defence. The team has conceded 21 goals (the same amount of goals they have scored) so far this season, some of them resulting from childish defensive mistakes.

No matter how bad Dortmund has been performing this season, they have to be considered favourites for next Friday’s match, since a defeat will drown them even deeper in the pit of the relegation zone.

Borussia Dortmund

Stats: W-2 L-2 D-1

Recent Form - LLDWW

Hoffenheim

Stats: W-2 L-3 D-0

Recent Form - WLLLW

Possible Line-ups

Borussia Dortmund (4-2-3-1) - Weidenfeller - Piszczek - Subotic - Ginter - Erik Durm - Kehl - Bender - Mkhitaryan - Kagawa - Grosskreutz - Aubameyang

Hoffenheim (4-2-3-1) - Baumann - Beck - Süle - Bicakcic - Kim - Polanski -Schwegler - Zuber - Firmino - Volland -Schipplock

Prediction

Borussia Dortmund 2 Hoffenheim 1