Dortmund Boss Claims it Will 'Take Time' for Young Stars to Gel After Narrow Champions League Win

Borussia Dortmund manager Lucien Favre has warned fans not to expect too much from the club's pool of young talent after his youthful side scraped past Club Brugge in their opening match of this season's Champions League group stages.

Despite dominating possession, Dortmund struggled to assert themselves at the Jan Breydel Stadium and the German side only secured three points thanks to a slice of luck late in the match.

Substitute Christian Pulisic saw an attempted clearance ricochet back of his leg and loop over goalkeeper Karlo Letica to give Borussia Dortmund a 1-0 win against Club Brugge, where Jadon Sancho became the youngest ever Englishman to play in the Champions League for a foreign club.

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Head coach Favre was eager to point out that his young squad hadn't walked past Tuesday's opponents like many fans expected they would, insisting that it will take time for his younger players to really kick on this season.

"It was difficult," Favre said after the match, quoted by Goal. "They are Belgian champions and they worked hard.

"In the end, they were tired, but it was difficult - it was very, very hard for us. We did not move enough in the first half, which is why we struggled to create chances.

"We are satisfied that we have won our first away game. But we have had trouble and we have much to do.

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"It is a very good thing that we won, but we should not exaggerate expectations. We have many young players, it takes time to play well."

Borussia Dortmund will be hoping they can maintain their unbeaten record across all competitions this season when they travel to TSG Hoffenheim on Saturday, although the club will already have one eye on their next Champions League group stage match against AS Monaco.