Klopp not concerned by midfield shuffle

By FOX Sports Staff

The German coach made the surprising statement when questioned as to why Nuri Sahin and Ilkay Gundogan were placed together in midfield. 

The two attack-minded players had not previously played together but Klopp's decision proved justified as Sahin bagged a brace in the game. 

Leonardo Bittencourt scored the final goal after Robert Lewandowski also helped himself to two goals to complete an easy rout of the Freiburg visitors. 

"It's not about who plays in defensive midfield," Klopp told Ruhr Nachrichten after the match. "It's about how a team close spaces together." 

"I could have asked Chuck Norris and Sven Bender to defend together. Nuri and Ilkay had a few problems at first, but got back into the game well to have a great match. It's a beautiful story.

"Today [Sunday], the opponents were extremely physical, while tactically and technically assured. But in the end, it was a perfect afternoon."

Sahin scored the first goal since returning to Dortmund in the January transfer window. The Turkish international stated that he was not worried over the long wait to get back on goalscoring terms and was happy to have finally scored again for his boyhood club.

"I owed this to the club," he said. "It was important for me for the penny to drop sooner or later and the coach always said it was just a matter of time.

"I had a good feeling. I knew I had to play well today [Saturday] because my son was in the stadium.

"It had to be a special game and I, or we, managed it.

"The coach had said it time and time again, it was only a matter of time. I'm not hiding my bad passes, but that's part of my game and the coach knows that.

"I had not performed well against Hamburg [in February], but today [Saturday] was put in charge of making things happen again and succeeded.

"I was a bit frustrated in the first-half, but in the end it was another important step in our development."

Sahin thanked coach Jurgen Klopp for keeping faith in him after a difficult few months since arriving from Liverpool, where he had not been playing regularly.

"I played a few bad passes, but that's part of my game and you can get away with that with this coach.

"That does you good. It's not only the coach, though. The whole club is standing behind me in the same way the coach is, and you only get that here.

"I owed something to them, and I owe them something still, but I think I contributed to us winning this game."