Borussia Dortmund are top of the Bundesliga again, and they would probably rather not dwell on the last time it happened. That was in May 2023, when black and yellow Deutscher Meister shirts were on sale on the approach to Signal Iduna Park and cold beers were at the ready — right up until the moment their title dreams imploded. That afternoon is no longer the most recent occasion on which Dortmund have led the pack.
Four games, four wins to start the season, and Niko Kovac’s programme is hitting the spot. Saturday night’s single-goal win at Stuttgart carried the gravitas of a genuine Topspiel even if it did not quite match one for entertainment. Kovac’s fingerprints were all over it. The debate over whether his view of the game fits Dortmund’s swashbuckling image will no doubt continue, but this was a case in point for how good he has been both for the club and for the team.
The contrast with recent meetings is stark. Dortmund took four points from their two games against Sebastian Hoeness’s Stuttgart last season, which was in itself a huge improvement on the 2024-25 encounters, when they were well beaten twice — once under the short reign of Nuri Sahin and once in Kovac’s first game in charge, a night on which the scale of the task ahead of him must have been obvious. What happened at Stuttgart in September 2026 was the clearest marker yet of how far Dortmund have come under the former Croatia midfielder and how deeply his ideas have taken root.
To see a Dortmund side patient, poised and defensively competent enough to grind a game out is still a novelty. They did not have a shot on target until Maximilian Beier prodded in the winner from an inviting ball delivered by substitute Jobe Bellingham. That they then dealt with everything the home side threw at them, with street smarts and limited fuss, was laudable; an accomplished attacking force was made to look ordinary. “In a top match,” Hoeness reflected afterwards, “decent and okay aren’t enough.”
The identity of the goalscorer and the creator was noteworthy in itself. Bellingham has frequently been dismissed for failing to be the equal of his generationally talented elder brother, while Beier is simply underrated. Both were brought in for big money and have accordingly been viewed with little patience. Their adaptability stood out: Bellingham made his impact off the bench, Beier thrived in a more advanced role. Both are Kovac’s type — young, willing, athletic and adaptable.
Should Dortmund be called contenders? That is perhaps a bit strong. But there is talk of reducing the 16-point gap to Bayern that remained at the end of last season, and there were signs here that they may at least be capable of doing so. “It’s about annoying Bayern a bit,” was how the club’s managing director, Lars Ricken, framed it after the win at Stuttgart.
Dortmund were never going to return to relevance and consistency by trying to relive the Jürgen Klopp years, or by trying to ape Bayern — and both of those approaches have been attempted. Getting back into a position where they can face the hurt, and the potential rewards, of 2023 will take a while, and it does not depend on them alone: it will require Bayern falling down a rung or two. They are at least climbing the right ladder, slowly, steadily and diligently.
Elsewhere on matchday four, Harry Kane reached 100 Bundesliga goals in his 98th game — far faster than anyone in the league’s history — with a double in Bayern Munich’s 7-0 dismantling of an ailing Union Berlin. Michael Olise scored a dazzling hat-trick, with Jamal Musiala and Ismaël Saibari also claiming their first league goals of the season. Bayern later mourned Peter Hermann, Jupp Heynckes’ popular assistant during the 2013 treble-winning season, who died on Saturday aged 73. Hermann was also commemorated emotionally at Leverkusen before kick-off, having played in their 1979 promotion-winning team and later served as assistant to Klaus Toppmöller at the helm of the celebrated 2002 Champions League finalists. Die Werkself paid fitting tribute on the pitch too, beating RB Leipzig 2-0. The margins were fine: Christopher Nkunku had an opener ruled out for the visitors before Patrik Schick put the home side ahead from a Miguel Gutiérrez cross, and Gutiérrez, Álex Grimaldo’s nominal replacement, scored the second himself. Carles Martínez praised his team for “good balance between keeping the ball and playing forward”, while his opposite number Martín Demichelis has plenty to think about after a fourth straight away defeat.
No team had ever scored three times in successive Bundesliga home games and lost both of them, but Borussia Mönchengladbach are managing to find a ledge beneath the edge. Gladbach made a bright start against Mainz — who are under interim coach Jan-Moritz Lichte — with Florian Neuhaus scoring the opener on his return to the line-up, his first goal since May 2024, but they ended in defeat again and sit bottom without a point. Alexander Blessin, a former St Pauli coach famed for his defensive work, is expected to arrive in an attempt to plug the leaks. Hamburg had gone into matchday four pointless and goalless but squeezed past a Köln side who dominated them, Yussuf Poulsen’s second goal for the club since arriving in summer 2025 proving decisive. It was an endorsement of their faith in head coach Merlin Polzin, who signed a contract extension this week despite that bad start and successive 5-0 defeats. Werder Bremen continued a surprisingly good start to the season by coming from two goals down to win 3-2, Niclas Füllkrug levelling before Mitchell Weiser rattled in a perfect left-foot winner deep into stoppage time in his first home appearance after 16 months out with injury. It brought the former Bayern man to tears and his coach Daniel Thoune described it as “a goosebump moment”. Paderborn’s shock victory over Hoffenheim in Sunday’s late game means all three promoted teams now have a win, veteran substitute Steffen Tigges sealing it with a header for his first top-flight goal since 2024. It was a third loss in four for Hoffenheim, who had also suffered an embarrassing Europa League reverse at OFI Crete on Thursday.