Borussia Dortmund retained their seven-point lead atop the Bundesliga with a come-from-behind 4-1 victory at home on Saturday night over Borussia Moenchengladbach.
Dortmund fell behind after 33 minutes when Marco Reus struck for ’Gladbach, but Neven Subotic equalized in first-half stoppage-time and Shinji Kawaga then gave Dortmund the lead in the 52nd minute.
’Gladbach briefly pressed to get back on terms, but Kevin Grosskreutz ended all doubt as to the outcome by netting in the 77th minute and Lucas Barrios got his name on the scoresheet with the fourth in the 88th minute.
PHOTO: EPA
The victory was Dortmund’s fifth in a row and Juergen Klopp’s players have collected 12 wins in their 13-game undefeated streak for 37 points.
“We wanted to make it too pretty in the first half and we got caught with the goal, but we were more level-headed in the second half and scored the goals and deserved the win,” Dortmund goalkeeper Roman Weidenfeller said.
FSV Mainz 05 had pulled briefly to within four points of Dortmund with a convincing 3-0 victory at home over Nuremberg on Friday to consolidate second place.
Bayern Munich, meanwhile, are back in contention after they cruised to a 4-1 victory at home to Eintracht Frankfurt on Saturday, leaping into the top five as they target a strong finish to the first half of the season after a poor start.
During the week, Bayern’s bosses had demanded a minimum 10 points from the final four matches before the winter break and Louis van Gaal’s men gained the first three in extending their unbeaten streak to seven matches.
The reigning Bundesliga champions moved onto 23 points — five points from the Champions League qualification spot of third place and 11 points behind Dortmund.
Anatoliy Tymoshchuk’s goal in the 29th minute for Bayern was swiftly canceled out by Theofanis Gekas, but Thomas Mueller scored in the 59th minute and Mario Gomez made it 3-1 two minutes later, before Tymoshchuk doubled his goal tally in the 88th minute.
Third-placed Bayer Leverkusen lost ground on Mainz, who they trail by four points, after a 2-2 draw at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim, who equalized four minutes into stoppage-time with a penalty by Gylfi Thor Sigurdsson.
Hannover 96 are fourth with 25 points after a 3-0 victory at home over SC Freiburg with Jan Schlaudraff, Didier Ya Konen and Mike Hanke on target.
Hamburg SV are seventh, one point behind Hoffenheim, after a 4-2 victory at home over 10-man VfB Stuttgart.
At the wrong end of the table, Schalke 04’s struggles continued with a 5-0 loss at Kaiserslautern, with Srdjan Lakic scoring two goals.
Schalke remained on 13 points in 15th place after their worst loss in 18 years, while Kaiserslautern jumped to 17 points and 11th place.
“I can’t really explain what happened. We cannot look for excuses. We are responsible for what happened. That was a catastrophe,” Schalke skipper Manuel Neuer said.
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