Sebastian Kehl on Gio Reyna: “He could become important for us”

Gio Reyna’s long-term future with Bundesliga club Borussia Dortmund remains up in the air, but his present looks to be in Germany after all.

Reyna played nine minutes on Saturday in Borussia Dortmund’s 2-0 Bundesliga victory over Eintracht Frankfurt. The U.S. men’s national team playmaker didn’t play a large role in the opening weekend triumph, but still earned his first minutes under new manager Nuri Sahin.

After spending the second half of last season in the English Premier League with Nottingham Forest, Reyna returned to Germany with hopes of earning a larger role at club level. Despite being linked with a potential move away from Signal Iduna Park, the 21-year-old has battled during preseason camp to try and force his way into Sahin’s long-term plans for the 2024-25 campaign.

With Borussia Dortmund aiming to be part of the title challengers domestically, while also hoping to make a deep run in European competition, Reyna’s talents could prove important to the Black and Yellow achieving their goals over the next nine months.

“He has to accept his role and free himself from it,” Dortmund sporting director Sebastian Kehl said in an interview with Bild. It was clear when we held the talks in the summer that Gio wanted to take on this role. That there would be enough games where we would need him. We know that he has incredible skills.”

“Gio could become very important for us this season. There are no other thoughts. There’s nothing on the table and I haven’t heard that the player wants to leave. He worked on himself, worked on his stability, worked on his confidence. His clever movement between the lines and his goal threat, he’s developed that further.”

Borussia Dortmund visits Werder Bremen on Saturday in its final match of the August schedule before the September international break.