It’s 53 centimetres tall and weighs 5.5 kilograms – and on Saturday evening (20:30 CEST) FC Bayern and Borussia Dortmund will be playing for the DFL Supercup trophy. It’s the first official title of the season and it pits the two sides with the best record in the competition against each other. FCB and BVB have both lifted the trophy five times – and there have only been 18 editions of the Supercup. The winner on Saturday will therefore claim the record for themselves. To get you in the mood for the first competitive game of the season, here are a few more facts and figures from fcbayern.com.
Defending the title
The German record champions lifted the trophy in 2016 thanks to a 2-0 win in Dortmund. Now Bayern are looking to defend the title for the first time. They have already broken one record before kick-off, as it’ll be their sixth successive appearance in the final. No other team has managed this.
Old hands
Like Bayern, Dortmund are also regulars in this match. This will be the fifth time in six years that the two teams have contested the Supercup. The trophy went to Munich in 2012 and 2016, and to Dortmund in 2013 and 2014.
Ancelotti wants to be the first
Last year’s triumph was Carlo Ancelotti’s first title as FCB coach. If he repeats the feat this year, the Italian will become the first foreign coach to win the German Supercup on two occasions.
Long tradition
The statistics don’t look bad for the defending champions. Bayern have won five of their last 10 competitive games against Dortmund, drawing three times and losing twice. Their overall record across their 116 competitive meetings with the Black and Yellows since 1963 is similarly positive. 54 of those have gone the way of the Reds, with 30 ending in draws and Dortmund winning 32.
Special debut
Tobias Stieler will make history on Saturday evening as the first video assistant referee in a competitive German match. Using a monitor he will support Felix Zwayer, who is the main referee. Zwayer has officiated 26 FCB games in his career to date, but only one ‘Klassiker’ against Dortmund. That was the 3-0 defeat on Matchday 30 of the 2013/14 season when Bayern already had the title secured. The 36 year-old from Berlin will also have Thorsten Schiffner, Christian Gittelmann and Sascha Stegemann as his assistants for the Supercup.
Topics of this article