Tuchel can "already sense what it's going to be like here tomorrow"

Boris Rupert reporting from Thessaloniki

At the pre-match press conference there was a lot of talk about players - including the five first-teamers who did not travel to Greece with the squad: Hummels, Sokratis, Gündogan, Kagawa and Aubameyang. "We made the decision to give a few players a bit of a break for this one," said Tuchel, before going on to speak about this week's away double-header in Thessaloniki/Munich: "Absolutely everything will be demanded of us physically in these two matches, so we need a fully fit team for each match. But we have a whole host of good players here with us for this one!"

Despite the absence of both Sahin and Durm, the depth of the BVB squad allows Tuchel to rotate his team around. The coaching staff want "to give players who have trained really well in recent weeks the opportunity to show what they can do in such an important match and to prove themselves in competition." But the coach had nothing more to say on the matter at that point: "If we talk about it too much we'll lose focus on the most important thing: the match and the task that's awaiting us here tomorrow night."

"Keep a cool head, play our game and win"

The Black and Yellows' opponents "are really compact, play with great energy and are spurred on by their fans," said Tuchel. "PAOK are very passionate, courageous and don't shy away from tackles." BVB player Gonzalo Castro, who has personal connections with Greece and "loves being here", knows that they have "a very intense atmosphere here" and states: "They want that to have an impact on us. We'll need to keep a cool head. If we just play our game, then we have a very good chance of winning here."

Despite some debate on personnel matters in the build-up, a strong Borussia Dortmund side will take to the field in the Toumba Arena at 22:05 local time (21:05 CET) in a bid to pick up the next three points of their UEFA Europa League campaign.

BVB total! video: Looking forward to the atmosphere