Guirassy scored at both ends on his 100th Dortmund appearance, and Villarreal still lost

Borussia Dortmund needed 53 minutes to score, and once they did, the goals stopped behaving. An own goal put them ahead, Villarreal headed level, Serhou Guirassy scored twice in five minutes, and then in the third minute of stoppage time Guirassy put one past his own goalkeeper. Dortmund won their Champions League opener 3-2 at Signal Iduna Park on Tuesday night in Germany, and their centre-forward finished up on the scoresheet for both clubs.

A hundred games, and three goals in one night

It was Guirassy’s 100th appearance in black and yellow. He got the first of his two from close range at the back post on 80 minutes, after substitute Fabio Silva had already dragged a save out of Peter Gulacsi. Five minutes later he tangled with Santiago Mourino from a corner, won the penalty himself, and put it away.

At 3-1 with five minutes left, the night looked settled. It was not. Deep into stoppage time a Villarreal ball across the box came off Guirassy and went in, and the last seconds were spent defending a one-goal lead he had cut himself.

The opener had been just as scruffy. Gulacsi failed to clear, Maximilian Beier chased it down, and Renato Veiga turned the ball into his own net on 53 minutes to break a first half that had produced almost nothing. Villarreal were level by the 66th, Mourino heading in a corner. For the next quarter of an hour the visitors looked the more likely.

Karetsas went down with nobody near him

The part of the evening Dortmund will worry about had nothing to do with the scoreline. Konstantinos Karetsas went to ground before the half-hour mark with no opponent close to him, was treated on the pitch and could not continue. Dortmund put it down afterwards to a circulation problem rather than a muscle or a joint, which is its own kind of unsettling.

He is 18, he arrived from Genk last month for a fixed 30 million euros with another two in bonuses, and only Ousmane Dembele in 2016 has cost the club more. Niko Kovac was reshaping his midfield around that signing inside half an hour of the campaign.

Ethan Nwaneri came on for him and was one of the better players on the pitch, going close twice early in the second half. Dortmund took the 19-year-old on a season-long loan from Arsenal on deadline day, with no option to buy, and he has now put in two useful shifts in three days: his debut came off the bench on Saturday at Hoffenheim, where his cross forced the own goal that completed a 3-2 comeback from two down.

Villarreal go home with nothing again

Inigo Perez, in his first season in charge after leaving Rayo Vallecano, will not have hated much of this. His side answered going behind rather than folding, made Dortmund defend properly, and were still attacking at the final whistle. What beat them was the stretch between the 80th minute and the 85th, when Guirassy had been quiet for an hour and then got two chances and took both.

It is also the second time in under a year that Guirassy has scored twice against them. The clubs last met at the same ground in November 2025, when Dortmund won 4-0 and Guirassy scored either side of half-time. Two visits, seven goals conceded, no points.

What Dortmund actually took from it

Three points and a to-do list. The 36-team league phase rewards sides who bank wins against opponents in their own tier, and this was one of those. But they conceded a header from a corner and let a two-goal cushion become one in stoppage time. They also lost their most expensive summer signing inside half an hour. Kovac has the squad for a long run in this competition and a habit of making the evenings harder than they need to be.

Guirassy will not mind. A hundred games in a Dortmund shirt, and a night he is going to get asked about for years.

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