Aubameyang on fire as Dortmund crush Gladbach

BERLIN ( Reuters) - Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang scored twice as Borussia Dortmund crushed Borussia Moenchengladbach 4-1 on Saturday to bounce back after last week's defeat and continue their pursuit of the Bundesliga's pace-setters.

The Gabon international cancelled out Raffael's sixth-minute opener for Gladbach a minute later and Lukasz Piszczek headed Dortmund ahead in a hectic opening 15 minutes.

The hosts scored their third on the hour when Ousmane Dembele picked up a pass from Marco Reus, who was playing his Bundesliga game of the season following injury, and shook off two markers before firing home.

Reus provided an even more impressive assist with a backflick for Aubameyang to score his 15th goal of the season. Out-of-form Gladbach have now gone eight games without a win and drop to 13th.

Dortmund's victory lifted Thomas Tuchel's team to fifth place on 24 points, one behind fourth-placed Hoffenheim, for whom Sandro Wagner scored twice in the 4-0 win over Cologne, and three off third-placed Hertha Berlin.

Hertha needed a stoppage-time penalty from Salomon Kalou after Wolfsburg's Paul Seguin was sent off with a second booking, to snatch a late 3-2 win.

Champions Bayern Munich are top of the table on 30 points after their 3-1 win at Mainz 05 on Friday. RB Leipzig, just behind them on goal difference, host Schalke 04 later on Saturday.

(Reporting by Karolos Grohmann, editing by Neil Robinson)