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Tuchel praises Dortmund players’ sharpness after Leverkusen win

From the start of the match Dortmund imposed its dominance, and looked the better side throughout, but Leverkusen must also be held accountable for squandering some golden opportunities to keep the match within arms reach.

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Dortmund defeated Leverkusen with 3-0.

“It does not matter whether we see Leverkusen as our strongest opponent so far”.

“We need to just focus on ourselves, we mustn’t let up and not let anything from outside influence us”, said Tuchel, who replaced Jurgen Klopp.

Jonas Hofmann’s first-half goal gave Dortmund a deserved lead, but when Leverkusen threatened to force their way back into the contest, Dortmund shut their visitors out and added further efforts through Shinji Kagawa’s cool finish and a penalty from Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.

Schalke’s Leroy Sane underlined his status as one of Germany’s rising stars with his club’s second-half victor to seal their 1-0 victory at VfB Stuttgart to leave the Royal Blues fourth.

Dortmund responded by doubling their lead through Kagawa.

Instead it was the Ruhr valley club, transformed this season under coach Thomas Tuchel after a disappointing 2014/15 campaign, that scored again with Japan worldwide Kagawa, in stellar form this season, flicking in to complete a quick passing move in the 58th.

They start the weekend on top of the Bundesliga on goal difference from champions Bayern Munich and fresh from beating Russian side FC Krasnodar 2-1 in their opening UEFA Europa League group game on Thursday. Former Leverkusen midfielder Gonzalo Castro struck the crossbar in the final minute. “People want to take their chance to be on the stage and take responsibility”.

Last season, Dortmund flirted with relegation before finishing seventh and struggled to replace Robert Lewandowski after their main source of goals left for Bayern.

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With Marco Reus, Kagawa, Aubeymeyang there is plenty of attacking talent here and that has been evident from the start of the season as Borussia have been goal happy scoring fifteen goals in four games.

Dortmund Ease Past Leverkusen