Two days before Dortmund resume their Bundesliga campaign at Leverkusen, Jürgen Klopp admitted he was feeling a few mid-season butterflies, like before an important exam. The whole of footballing Germany will be looking towards the BayArena to find out if last season's runners-up, currently second from bottom in the table, can rediscover their winning ways. That, however, will be decided not just by this match but by the next 16 as well.

Jürgen Klopp is fully aware that a good start could do much to ease people's nerves, but he also knows that one win will be no guarantee of a successful second half of the season, any more than a defeat would make such a scenario impossible from the outset. “The development of our game will take place in the second half of the season, we can't do that in the winter break.” He continued, “Our play will develop as we gain successful match experience.”

For around three weeks he was able to rely on having a more or less full-strength squad (Kagawa, Aubameyang, Bender and Durm were unavailable, and Mkhitaryan only joined the training camp quite late on), giving him the opportunity to work on a range of training moves. The warm-up matches showed up both good and bad points. “Our training sessions went much better than the matches,” the coach said, adding, “Physically we're much stronger than in the first half of the season. We've achieved a lot and much of that has made us better.”

“I'm reasonably optimistic and looking forward to the match”

The team faces one of the toughest opponents in the league and will then have two three-day turnarounds before they play Augsburg followed by Freiburg, during which time they'll have to prove they're “in better shape than before the winter break”. “We need to deliver,” said Klopp. “We have to put the first half of the season down to experience and not let it weigh us down.”

“I'm reasonably optimistic and looking forward to the match,” Klopp explained on Thursday, adding, “Leverkusen is a quality side. We need to prove that we have quality too. The opponent's attacking play, “where they push a lot of people forward very quickly”, has to be countered with the “highest concentration levels”. Even though Leverkusen are averaging two goals a game at home, “they can be defended against, and that's what we intend to do.”  Augsburg, Schalke, Gladbach and Frankfurt have shown the way by only conceding one goal. Mainz even kept a clean sheet. There's a flip side to the coin it seems.