Christian Pulisic got a but of luck to end his four-month scoring drought and help Borussia Dortmund bounce back from their heavy defeat at Bayern Munich with a comfortable 3-0 home win against Stuttgart.
The 19-year-old from Hershey, Pennsylvania, ran onto a pass from Lukasz Piszczek, took a touch in outracing a defender on the wing and sent what appeared to be intended as a cross from about 25 yards.
But the ball sailed over the outstretched left arm of goalkeeper Ron-Robert Zieler and into the upper far corner in the 38th minute for the opening goal.
It was the fourth league goal of the season for Pulisic, who had not scored since Dec. 16 against Hoffenheim. The U.S. international also scored in Dortmund’s Aug. 19 league opener at Wolfsburg and on Sept. 20 at Hamburg.
Stuttgart arrived on an eight-match unbeaten run but have not won at Dortmund since 2007 and that continued as Michy Batshuayi doubled the lead three minutes after the restart with a neat finish after a one-two with Nuri Sahin for his ninth goal since joining the club on loan from Chelsea in January.
Pulisic then set up Maximilian Philipp made it 3-0 in the 59th minute, tucking away the rebound after his initial shot was saved by Ron-Robert Zieler.
Pulisic also might have made it 4-0 only to be denied by Zieler, whlie Stuttgart almost pulled a goal back late on but Mario Gomez’s long-range effort struck the crossbar.
The win moves Dortmund to within one point of second-placed Schalke following their surprise defeat at Hamburg on Saturday and ahead of a trip to Gelsenkirchen next weekend.
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