Borussia Dortmund will not extend Mario Gotze's contract and he will leave Westfalenstadion after this season, confirmed the club's sports director Michael Zorc on Saturday.

"This week I had a long and clarifying discussion with Mario. We agreed that we will not continue our collaboration after this season," said Zorc before Dortmund's Bundesliga game against Wolfsburg.

Gotze used to be the poster boy of Dortmund's youth academy. In 2009, he was named UEFA European Under-17 Football Championship Golden Player. Two years later, Gotze won both the Bundesliga Young Player of the Year award and the Tuttosport Golden Boy awards.

In summer 2013, Bayern Munich confirmed Gotze's value with a 37-million-euro (about 40.3 million U.S. dollars) deal that moved him to Allianz Arena. Dortmund could have received more but they only had themselves to blame for not setting a higher price for Gotze's release clause.

In 2014, 22-year-old Gotze was recruited into the German national team for the FIFA World Cup in Brazil. In the final against Argentina, he replaced Miroslav Klose at the 88th minute and scored the game-winning goal for Germany in overtime.

That goal not only helped Germany win their fourth World Cup championship, but made Gotze the youngest game-winner in World Cup Final in almost 50 years.

However, the glory also became a burden for the young man and finally broke him. After Brazil, Gotze's performance declined season by season. Returning to Dortmund failed to help, either. Not only did he miss the World Cup in Russia, Gotze gradually retreated almost entirely from the spotlight.

The good news is that he is only 27 years old and thus has enough time to start over. Of course, first he needs to find a new team for his next destination.