DFB coach Flick rejects criticism of nominations

No performance principle?

National coach Hansi Flick has clearly rejected the criticism of his nomination criteria for the national team, which is deep in crisis. “I think it’s very cheeky, to be honest, to claim that the national team doesn’t invite players based on performance,” said the 58-year-old on Monday at the International Coaches’ Congress in Bremen.

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“What’s in it for us when players play who can’t perform like someone else? That’s why I sometimes find it outrageous how people report it,” says Flick. The DFB selection had disappointed in the June international matches against Ukraine (3: 3), in Warsaw against Poland (0: 1) and against Colombia (0: 2), the coach was then heavily criticized. Former national players had accused the 58-year-old of not relying on the principle of performance when selecting his squad.

The managing director of the Bundesliga club Union Berlin, Oliver Ruhnert, had publicly complained that professionals from the Köpenicker squad had been dispensed with. In the “Sport Bild” he suspected that “Union has no lobby at the DFB” and added: “I have the impression that the performance of our boys is not evaluated appropriately.”

Flick on criticism of squad selection: “You have to be able to deal with it”

With such statements, the bow is stretched for Flick, but “you have to be able to deal with it,” said the national coach, for whom the exchange with the coaches of his protégés is primarily important. And this works well: “The coaches are my contacts, not sports directors or whatever.” Flick generally knows and also supports to a certain extent that club managers “want to position players” or see decisions differently, “but we travel a lot, get an idea and I talk to every coach about the players who are there and about potential candidates.”

He was also surprised by the general harshness of the criticism. “Of course we didn’t think that the results would be so bad. That’s why we have to put up with the criticism in the end,” said Flick about the June international matches, which he had declared as an experimental phase for a three-man defense.

In principle, Flick can understand criticism of recent performances. “Where there’s clapping, there’s also whistling. As a coach, you have to face that,” said the national coach, who has averaged 1.79 points per game from 24 games since August 2021.

In September, the DFB selection will face World Cup terror Japan in Wolfsburg and runners-up France in Dortmund. Flick again announced that from these games onwards he would like to focus much more on the professionals, who should play a key role in the home European Championship next year. He will then “say clearly: This is number one, there is a battle for this position.”

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