‘Definitely nothing new’, insist Borussia Dortmund as Haaland misses first preseason friendly

It’s Tuesday, July 13, 2021. Do you know where your 20-year-old superstar striker is? (Surely he’s done feeding the cows by now?)

Borussia Dortmund played their first preseason friendly today, but did so without Erling Braut Haaland. It’s unclear if he was supposed to be there. (Chelsea players are coming back in a staggered fashion as well.) He was not training on the first day of preseason on Monday, which led to BVB sporting director Michael Zorc laughing off the fresh bit of €175m Chelsea speculation. Sky Deutschland added that Haaland would be back Tuesday for the game, but that has turned out to be incorrect as well.

So now it’s the turn of BVB future sporting director (taking over next summer) Sebastian Kehl to say there’s nothing to see here, and we should just move along.

“There is definitely nothing new on the subject, I have only read the speculation. Nothing has changed in our attitude, we are planning firmly with Erling, that is also clearly communicated to him and his advisor.

“He [will] score a lot of goals with us this season”

-Sebastian Kehl; source: Sky Deutschland via SPORT 1

So, there you have it. Kehl added that they now expect Haaland back later this week. I guess once that happens, we can probably move along indeed. (Then again, Manchester City were just linked anew as well, so this might go on to the end of August one way or another.)