Bundesliga preview: Title defence on the line for Dortmund

Borussia Dortmund will head to Munich to take on the Bundesliga leaders knowing anything but a win could end their title chase before Christmas.

Bayern Munich lead the Bundesliga by 10 points over second-placed Bayer Leverkusen with just 14 rounds gone, while reigning champions Dortmund are a further point behind.

While there are plenty of games left this season, Dortmund head coach Juergen Klopp will know Saturday’s game will be one of the clear opportunities his side will get to eat into Bayern’s lead.

One positive for Klopp is that Dortmund have won four of their past five meetings with Bayern, although the latter did claim the German Super Cup earlier this season.

But with Bayern having only conceded five goals so far this season, Dortmund will be up against it at Allianz Arena.

If Dortmund do win, however, Leverkusen should take advantage of Bayern’s slip-up as they host 13th-placed Nuremburg this weekend.

Stefan Kiessling, Leverkusen’s leading goal-scorer this term, heads into the game hoping to break a three-match scoring drought.

However, having hit the back of the net 10 times in 20 matches across all competitions this season, Kiessling will be expected to score again sooner rather than later.

In what looms as one of the games of the weekend, Hannover head to Mainz in a battle of sixth versus seventh.

Both sides bounced back from consecutive defeats to win midweek with Hannover knocking off Greuther Furth 2-0 and Mainz triumphing 3-1 away to Eintracht Frankfurt.

In a bad sign for Mainz, they have not kept a clean-sheet yet this season and will come up against one of the top scoring sides in the Bundesliga, with only Bayern and Dortmund having found the net more times than Hannover this campaign.

In other matches on Saturday, Schalke host Borussia Moenchengladbach, Stuttgart travel to Greuther Furth and bottom club Augsburg take on Freiburg.

Eintracht will head to Dusseldorf to take on Fortuna on Friday with the home side having grabbed an impressive 1-1 draw against Dortmund in their last match.

On Sunday, Werder Bremen will travel to Hoffenheim and Wolfsburg are up against Hamburg.