After the dismissal of Hansi Flick, the new captain Ilkay Gündogan does not skimp on self-criticism. But the restart also brings opportunities.
“We players are partly responsible for the whole development of the last few weeks. We made a big contribution to preventing things from going well.”said Gündogan in an exclusive interview with the ARD Sportschau. Each individual is now responsible and must question themselves whether they have done their best. “It’s not enough at this level,” said the captain.
A lot of thinking, a lot of uncertainty
He cannot answer for each individual why there are discrepancies between the performance of some players in the club and in the national team. But he has already noticed that a lot of things happen in the head, there is a lot of thinking and there is also a lot of uncertainty when the players join the national team.
Ilkay Gündogan is now hoping for improvement on this point and is counting on Flick’s successor. “Someone will definitely come along who will give us new impulses and bring in new ideas. Every new start brings with it opportunities, everyone starts from scratch and has to prove themselves anew.”
Gündogan: “We defended too carelessly”
In any case, the defensive approach must be taken into account. “We certainly weren’t focused enough in our actions recently and defended too carelessly”said the midfielder, “There was a slight lethargy, like okay, come on, nothing will happen.”
Gündogan did not want to confirm that there were problems between people within the team. But it is part of a group that people sometimes clash and there are confrontations. “Maybe we even need more of it”said the captain.