Dortmund effort earns kudos from Klopp

Coach Juergen Klopp said Borussia Dortmund produced a near-perfect performance to leave it on the verge of the Champions League's quarterfinals after routing Zenit St. Petersburg in Russia on Tuesday.

Poland striker Robert Lewandowski scored twice as Dortmund romped to a 4-2 win at Petrovsky Stadium in the last-16 first-leg clash.

Klopp was delighted as Borussia bounced back from Saturday's shocking 3-0 loss at relegation-threatened Hamburg in the Bundesliga.

Last season's finalist raced into a 2-0 lead on goals by Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Marco Reus inside the first five minutes to leave the Russians reeling.

The host pulled two goals back after the break as central midfielder Oleg Shatov scored, then Brazil's Hulk converted a penalty.

But on both occasions Dortmund responded almost immediately, as Lewandowski scored twice to give the German side a huge advantage ahead of the second leg next month.

"That was close to an optimal performance," said Klopp.

"In terms of pressing and counter pressing, that was a copybook performance from us against a dangerous team.

"We were incredibly active and aggressive.

"It is not easy to do that, and the team put in a fantastic performance.

"We played against a very talented side that showed the whole time that they wanted to play strong football.

"Even up to the end of the game, St. Petersburg didn't resort to hitting long balls and always tried to find ways of getting behind us.

"Zenit was always dangerous whenever Hulk had the ball."

But Klopp urged caution ahead of the return leg on March 19 by insisting nothing has been decided yet.

"Champions League has never been about blowing the final whistle after the first leg," said the 46-year-old.

"Overall, this is a very nice night for us, but we are not yet in the quarterfinals.

"We have still a lot of hard work ahead of us in the second leg."

Klopp was clearly pleased to see his team produce the perfect response after the Hamburg defeat left Dortmund in third place, 20 points behind Bundesliga leader Bayern.

"It was clear to me that my team would produce a reaction," he said.

"My team can never be accused of going about their business without showing some character.

"We didn't give 100 percent against Hamburg and played too little football at the crucial times.

"We conceded goals at the wrong moments and didn't get a result.

"Today we produced the correct reaction after conceding each goal."

(China Daily 02/27/2014 page23)