{"id":21551,"date":"2025-10-02T06:04:15","date_gmt":"2025-10-02T06:04:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=21551"},"modified":"2025-10-02T06:04:15","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T06:04:15","slug":"guirassy-helps-dortmund-sink-bilbao-in-champions-league","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=21551","title":{"rendered":"Guirassy helps Dortmund sink Bilbao in Champions League"},"content":{"rendered":"
Serhou Guirassy scored a goal and set up another as Borussia Dortmund beat Athletic Bilbao 4-1 at home on Wednesday for their first Champions League win of the season.<\/p>\n

Karim Adeyemi supplied Daniel Svensson’s opener before the half-hour mark and Carney Chukwuemeka added Dortmund’s second early in the second half, his first goal since signing from Chelsea in the summer.<\/p>\n

Dortmund promised more stability after starting their European campaign with a wild 4-4 draw at Juventus but invited Bilbao into the match, handing Gorka Guruzeta a goal with a defensive mix-up on the hour.<\/p>\n

Dortmund looked shaky but Guirassy calmed their nerves, getting a boot to a Marcel Sabitzer shot to restore their two-goal lead with nine minutes remaining.<\/p>\n

Julian Brandt then added a fourth for the hosts to wrap up the match in stoppage time.<\/p>\n

“We made things a bit more exciting than we needed to, but we scored a couple more goals and can go home happy,” said Brandt.<\/p>\n

Making their first Champions League appearance since 2014-15 and just their third overall, Bilbao missed the creativity of the injured Nico Williams.<\/p>\n

The loss was their fifth in six games without the Spain winger, having scored just twice in that time.<\/p>\n

Despite an unbeaten start to the season, coach Niko Kovac made good on his pre-match promise to rotate the side and get more minutes into the legs of his bench players.<\/p>\n

Jobe Bellingham started his first match since August while Chukwuemeka made his full debut in the starting line-up.<\/p>\n

Dortmund’s lack of fluidity was evident early, particularly for Bellingham, who struggled to find his passing range.<\/p>\n

Kovac praised the English midfielder despite the mistakes. “He did well. He was agile, he pressed and managed to keep the opposition at bay.<\/p>\n

“I don’t want to look at everything so negatively. There may not have been a lot of positives, but he’s only 20. He can improve a lot.”<\/p>\n

The in-form Adeyemi created Dortmund’s opener, burning down the right flank and threading a pass across the face of goal for Svensson to tap home.<\/p>\n

The goal sparked Dortmund into life but their decision making was poor. Niklas Suele, making his first appearance of the season, opted for a long-range effort rather than passing to the unmarked Guirassy inside the box.<\/p>\n

Chukwuemeka doubled Dortmund’s lead on the 50 minutes, blasting in at the near post after being put into space by Guirassy.<\/p>\n

Dortmund looked on course for a routine win but invited Bilbao back into the match with a clumsy defensive error. Suele failed to clear a ball in the box which fell to Guruzeta, who scored with ease.<\/p>\n

The goal put the fright into Dortmund who struggled to get out of their own half.<\/p>\n

Bilbao had a handful of half-chances to draw level and a goal ruled out for offside but Guirassy would put the hosts on track again, deflecting Sabitzer’s shot into the goal for his sixth goal in seven games this season.<\/p>\n

Brandt provided further gloss to the scoreline at the death.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Serhou Guirassy scored a goal and set up another as Borussia Dortmund beat Athletic Bilbao 4-1 at home on Wednesday for their first Champions League win of the season. Karim Adeyemi supplied Daniel Svensson’s opener before the half-hour mark and Carney Chukwuemeka added Dortmund’s second early in the second half, his first goal since signing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21551","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21551","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21551"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21551\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}