LISBON: Borussia Dortmund forward Serhou Guirassy scored one and set up another in a 3-0 victory at Sporting in their Champions League playoff first leg on Tuesday to put last year’s finalists in the driving seat for a spot in the last 16.
Champions League top scorer Guirassy headed in his 10th goal of the competition on the hour mark before providing Pascal Gross with a perfect assist to double the lead in the 68th.
Karim Adeyemi added another in the 82nd minute, completing a five-touch textbook counter-attack, to mark a winning European debut on the Dortmund bench for Niko Kovac, who took over last week and saw his team lose at home to VfB Stuttgart in the league on Saturday.
The Portuguese side hit the woodwork in a solid first half but quickly ran out of gas after the break. The return leg in Dortmund is on Feb 19.