It's been quite a year for the Dortmund centre-back. Despite finishing second for his club in the league and runners-up in the Pokal to their bitter rivals, Mats Hummels had an amazing summer in Brazil when he picked in Joachim Low's 23 man squad for the German national team in the FIFA World Cup. Hummels scored the second goal in Germany's 4–0 win over Portugal in their first game and despite missing the team's round of 16 match due to illness, he returned to the team for the quarter-final against France, where he scored the winning goal in a 1–0 victory at the Estádio do Maracanã all the way to win the World Cup in the same stadium against Argentina thanks to a Mario Gotze goal.

This season however, took a completely different toll. Despite being named captain under Jurgen Klopp's side, he has played only 9 matches and scored 1 goal due in a part of suffering an injury during the season. Borussia Dortmund are in 17th and in the relegation zone of the Bundesliga with a unprecedented 30 point gap with leaders and rivals Bayern Munich.

In his interview with DFB, he hopes for a better second half of the season to see them out of the relegation zone and go to at least or dream of Europe once again, and as well to perform well in the UEFA Champions League.

''At the moment, everything looks very good. In winter, I was allowed to do a bit more and I am in good shape. If I get through something without injuring myself, then the foundation is laid for me to play, as I expect that from myself.'' - on his fitness condition

''At the end of the first half of the season, we had a problem with our self-confidence. That was evident from the fact that we were conceding so many goals. We are working on that simply by lifting our morale and trying to inject some self-confidence back into ourselves by playing matches.'' - his mental work

''Our willingness in training is now very good but our technical skills are also at a high level. You can see that every individual not only wants to improve themselves but also the part of the team in which they play. I therefore think that it should be possible to do that again. First of all, we have to try and get back on track in the first few games.'' - on his expectations for the second half of the season