Pascal Groß

Pascal Groß has been with Borussia Dortmund since 2024, a club he supported as a child. The midfielder can change a game and is excellent on the ball. He plays with his head up, has a great shooting technique and is also often able to pick out the perfect final ball. One special feature is his signature move: faking a shot or a cross with a feint, then pulling the ball back to the right or left behind his standing leg, giving Groß an all-important half-a-yard of space – enough for him to do something decisive.

In his first season in Black & Yellow, he became a key figure: getting on the ball 86 times per 90 minutes, running the most of all first-team regulars (12.4 km per 90 minutes or 322.4 km in total) and always had a picture of the pitch in his mind, misplacing just 13 percent of his passes. In the 6-0 win against Union Berlin, he laid on four assists, and picked up an outstanding total of 15 assists for the season across all competitions.

Born in Mannheim in 1991, Pascal Groß made his first steps in football at the age of four at VfL Neckarau, where he was partly trained by his father Stephan (a legend of Karlsruhe SC with 113 Bundesliga games and 121 appearances in the Bundesliga II). Groß remained with his youth club until the U17s, then joined the TSG Hoffenheim youth team, scoring in the U17 German Championship final in 2007 (a 6-4 defeat to none other than Borussia Dortmund). In May 2009, he made his Bundesliga debut with a brief appearance against VfL Wolfsburg.

After a brief spell at Karlsruhe SC in the second tier, Gross was taken to FC Ingolstadt, where he achieved his breakthrough as a professional in 2012. In the 2014/15 season, he guided the team to Germany's top tier. In addition to seven goals of his own, he also created 23 goals for his teammates. After suffering relegation in 2017, he moved to England to join newly promoted Brighton & Hove Albion. Groß became the face of the club and the team's record Premier League scorer with 30 goals. The Seagulls developed from relegation candidates to Europa League participants, and the set-piece specialist played an important role in Brighton's rise. In total, he played 261 competitive games for the English club, scoring 32 goals and setting up another 52. The club's own YouTube channel said goodbye to Groß with a highlight video after he announced his switch to BVB. The title: “Pascal Groß – A Brighton Legend.”

At the age of 32 years and 87 days, Pascal Groß made his debut for the German national team against Japan in September 2023. In the summer of 2024, he fulfilled a great personal dream by representing his country in the European Championship in Germany.