The sporting situation might suggest that all efforts should be focused on football right now, but on Tuesday the club's players and coaches were glad to attend two appointments far away from the football pitch. In the afternoon the traditional advent time visit to the Dortmund Children's Hospital took place and in the evening there was the Christmas party with representatives of the fan club.

These were two events which coach Jürgen Klopp described, as always, in extremely positive tones. “What happened yesterday was not normal, it was extremely positive,” he said in reference to the Christmas party, adding, “People are full of trust, confidence and hope. We'll see one day that in this situation the club has grown even closer.” He continued, “All those who are sticking by us now can't ever be accused of being fair-weather fans.”

The visit to the children's hospital was described by Klopp as “one of the nicest work events of the year because we can sense how good what we're doing is. We get so much back from the kids. We're really happy to support the hospital. And we also saw that there are bigger problems out there than ours, though we still have to sort ours out.”