Klopp refuses to get carried away with the thought of leading Dortmund to their first title since 2002 and, when confronted with the statistic that 67% of sides who have ended the first half of the season at the top of the table have gone on to become champions, he still would not entertain the idea.

"I have never been good at calculating percentages," he joked.

While his mathematical skills may require some honing, his literacy is not a problem.

"Of course I can read the league table," he said. "But all it says is that we have had a very successful season so far, and we would like to continue that.

"To be honest, it surprises me that no other club in the Bundesliga has ever won eight away games in a row."

Yet he still will not talk about winning the title, purely because it is new territory for him and his team.

"Never in my life have I had to deal with a title battle," he said.

"If we had the same quality as the sides which won the league in 1995 or 1996, then we would be talking about the title, but we are only talking about the quality that we are working on."

And Klopp's players share the coach's philosophy with two games to go until the midway stage of the season, despite clinching the unofficial title of autumn champions yesterday.

"You can't buy anything with that and nobody has ever been given a trophy as autumn champions," said goalkeeper Roman Weidenfeller.

"Of course it is important, but it does not mean anything.

"We want to take things one step at a time and now Bremen [on Saturday] is our most important game."