Patrik Schick bags first-half brace as Leverkusen edge win at Borussia Dortmund

Patrik Schick scored a brace as Bayer Leverkusen blitzed Borussia Dortmund with three first-half goals to earn a narrow 3-2 Bundesliga victory.

Dortmund found themselves behind with less than a minute on the clock courtesy of Nathan Tella and Schick’s 10th and 11th goals of the season – either side of Jamie Gittens’ reply – which gave Leverkusen a two-goal cushion heading into the break.

Serhou Guirassy netted a penalty, 11 minutes from time, but it was not enough to stop Dortmund from falling to their first home league defeat of the season.

Leverkusen’s ninth-consecutive victory in all competitions closed the gap on leaders Bayern Munich to just one point as they have started to find their form that won them the title last term.

With just 25 seconds on the clock, the visitors struck the front. Leverkusen suffocated Dortmund into giving possession away high up the field and the ball fell for Tella, who volleyed beyond Gregor Kobel.

Leverkusen doubled their advantage in the eighth minute after Piero Hincapie’s cross was diverted home by Schick.

The breath-taking start to the contest was not finished there and Dortmund had a leg up into the contest, four minutes later.

Yan Couto’s pass into the area was diverted into the path of Gittens by Robert Andrich and the winger expertly lifted the ball over Lukas Hradecky to make it 2-1.

Leverkusen regained their two-goal advantage seven minutes later – this time, Jeremie Frimpong put a teasing delivery into the area and Schick was on hand once again to tap home.

Dortmund went in search of a second in an attempt to cut the deficit back to one and Karim Adeyemi was twice denied by Hradecky from outside the box, firstly his deflected effort was palmed over by the Leverkusen stopper before his swirling rocket was saved a couple of minutes later.

The hosts had the chance to set up a grand-stand finish after Edmond Tapsoba appeared to bring down Julien Duranville inside the area and Guirassy made no mistake from 12 yards and slotted the resulting spot-kick into the bottom corner.

Leverkusen thought they regained their two-goal cushion for a third time in the match late on. Martin Terrier dispossessed the ball in the Dortmund box and passed across to Florian Wirtz, who turned home but celebrations were cut short after the ball went out of play.