A little more than a month after an injury in warmups prevented Giovanni Reyna from debuting in Borussia Dortmund’s lineup, the 17-year-old American made his first start for the German Bundesliga titan in Saturday’s match against RB Leipzig.
Reyna, the son of former United States World Cup captain Claudio Reyna and U.S. women’s national team winger Danielle Egan, has played in all but two of BVB’s games since breaking into the club’s first team in January. But until Saturday, all 16 of his appearances — including two in Dortmund’s Champions League round of 16 loss to Paris Saint-Germain — had come as a substitute.
Reyna was in manager Lucien Favre’s 11 May 16 versus rival Schalke, Dortmund‘s first match following the Bundesliga’s two-month coronavirus-caused hiatus. But after pulling up lame before kickoff, he was replaced by Thorgan Hazard, who kept his lineup spot after scoring a goal and adding an assist in a 4-0 win.
The former New York City FC academy product was also supposed to receive his first senior international invite from USMNT coach Gregg Berhalter in March, but scheduled European friendlies against Wales and the Netherlands were called off because of the global pandemic.
Reyna’s fellow American Tyler Adams began on the bench for Leipzig on Saturday.
