Police investigate terrorist attack on top soccer team in Germany

DORTMUND, GERMANY

— German authorities arrested a suspected Islamic extremist Wednesday in their investigation into a bomb attack on a top German soccer team, while the team — missing a defender wounded in the blasts

— lost 3-2 to Monaco in a hastily rescheduled Champions League match.

Amid heightened security, the defeat for Borussia Dortmund in Europe’s top club competition came less than 24 hours after three explosions shattered a window of the team’s bus and rattled nerves across the gritty city in western Germany.

Dortmund coach Thomas Tuchel said after the loss that he felt European soccer’s governing body, UEFA, had not taken the attack seriously enough as it swiftly rescheduled the match.

“We weren’t asked at all at any time,” Tuchel said. “Basically, we had the feeling that we were being treated as if a beer can had hit our bus, and half an hour later the decision was there that (it would be) tomorrow at 6.45 p.m . ... That gives you a feeling of powerlessness.”

Armed police officers in body armor patrolled the streets around Dortmund’s stadium Wednesday night as locals and visiting fans mingled in a subdued atmosphere.

Supporters were banned from bringing backpacks to the match and some were frisked — with security officials even checking under their hats. During the match, small knots of armed police guarded access to the stands.

Earlier in the day, Frauke Koehler, a spokeswoman for German federal prosecutors, said investigators are focusing on two suspected Islamic extremists in the bus attack and searched their homes, arresting one of them.

But authorities said other motives are possible.

Investigators are still trying to determine how the metal-packed devices were detonated and what explosive substance was used.