Haaland set for Dortmund reunion as Man City hope new striker can lead team to Euro glory

Nico Schlotterbeck recalls it as a defining afternoon in his career, a breakthrough Bundesliga fixture from just over a year ago. “It was when I realised how good I can be,” the defender proudly said of the day he marked Erling Haaland, when his then team Freiburg beat Borussia Dortmund 2-1, and, most importantly, Haaland was kept off the scoresheet.

It turned out that Dortmund had also found the young centre-back’s performance revealing. At the end of the season, once they were reconciled with the fact their outstanding young Norwegian striker would be the latest to move on from the club for a high profit, they reinvested €20 million of their Haaland dividend on signing Schlotterbeck from Freiburg.

He is only 22, rapidly establishing himself in the German national team and, as he told Sport Bild, still treasures that rare boast among defenders who have operated in the Bundesliga over the last two-and-a-half years: He kept Haaland quiet for 90 minutes. Indeed in three matches against Haaland – including two substitute appearances, one while on loan at Union Berlin – he has yet to witness a Haaland goal.

Now comes the hard part. If Haaland was a phenomenon in his coming-of-age Dortmund period – when he spread his 62 league goals, in 67 appearances, against 18 different clubs – in the Champions League, where Dortmund face City on Wednesday, he is even more prolific.

His brace against Sevilla last week, on his European debut for the English champions, elevated his tally to 25 in 20 matches. His total already for City, across competitions, stands at 12 goals from eight games.

That’s daunting form for Schlotterbeck, for the experienced Mats Hummels, who spent two-and-a-half years at Dortmund being bruised and outsprinted in