Der Klassiker

Bayern Munich against Borussia Dortmund is the headline fixture of German football. Known to supporters as Der Klassiker, it brings together the country's two most powerful and widely followed clubs, and any meeting between them is treated as the centrepiece of the Bundesliga season. The stakes tend to run higher than three points, because in most seasons the race for the league title passes straight through this result.

Bayern Munich are the establishment of the German game. Based in the wealthy southern city of Munich, they have gathered league titles at a rate no rival has come close to matching, and they carry the calm assurance of a club used to winning. Bayern are also a regular presence in the closing rounds of European competition, and their squads are assembled to compete on every front at once. To much of the country they are the benchmark, admired and resented in equal measure.

Borussia Dortmund take their identity from the Ruhr, the old industrial heartland of western Germany. This is a club tied closely to a working community, and that bond is never clearer than on a matchday. The enormous standing terrace at their home ground, known the world over as the Yellow Wall, is one of the great sights in European football, a single bank of supporters that turns the stadium into a wall of noise and yellow. Dortmund have built their modern name on energy, attacking play and a gift for developing young talent.

The rivalry took on its modern intensity once Dortmund grew into a true challenger to Bayern's dominance. A period of bold, hard-running football carried them to the league title and forced Bayern to look over their shoulder, and the two clubs have measured themselves against each other ever since. That contest carries an extra edge because of the transfer market. Over the years Bayern have signed several of Dortmund's finest players, among them Mario Götze, Robert Lewandowski and Mats Hummels, a habit that Dortmund supporters see as their biggest rival quietly weakening them.

The fixture reached its grandest stage when the two clubs met in an all-German final of the Champions League, a night that underlined how strong German football had become at the very top of the European game. These days Der Klassiker is presented as the showpiece of the Bundesliga, followed by a worldwide audience and used to draw new fans to the league. Beneath the marketing the appeal is simple. It is the settled order against the restless challenger, the prosperous south against the industrial Ruhr, a match that still helps decide who leads German football.