Berlin: Borussia Dortmund's creative midfielder Mario Goetze has been sidelined for at least six weeks with ankle ligament damage, the troubled Bundesliga club said on Monday.

Since establishing a five-point lead at the top of the Bundesliga in September Dortmund have not won a league game, and infamously threw away a 4-0 lead over bitter rivals Schalke this weekend.

One bright aspect of their season so far had however been the gradual return to form of the man who scored the winning goal in the 2014 World Cup final, the now 25-year-old Goetze.

"Bad news everyone: Midfielder @mariogoetze sustained partial ligament tears in his upper and lower ankle in the Bundesliga match against on Saturday," the club said on Twitter beneath a photo of the baby-faced former Bayern Munich man clutching his right ankle in agony.

Since Goetze returned to Dortmund from Bayern he has struggled with a serious and debilitating metabolism disorder he discovered he had in March and from which he only began to recover fully in August.-APP