DFB team: Völler calls for good defense for EM 2024 – Kehrer wants to help

100 days before the start of the tournament

Despite disappointing results in recent major tournaments, DFB sports director Rudi Völler is optimistic that the German national team will have a successful home European Championship. A “top national coach” and “young talents” as well as “a lot of quality in the front area and midfield” made the 63-year-old optimistic, as he said on Wednesday at a joint media meeting with Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser, tournament director Philipp Lahm and tournament ambassador Célia Šašić said. “We want to get the people behind us with footballing elegance, fighting spirit and will,” added Völler 100 days before the start of the European Championship.

The DFB selection around coach Julian Nagelsmann will kick things off in the opening game in Munich on June 14th against Scotland. “We want to perform against Scotland the way the whole of Germany hopes. We want to create euphoria from the first game,” announced Völler. This is followed by the group games against Hungary in Stuttgart (June 19th) and on June 23rd in Frankfurt/Main against Switzerland. “We can’t underestimate anyone anymore anyway. Those times are over,” said Völler, looking at the national team’s past results, including in the last three botched tournaments, and added: “But we never did that.”

Völler hopes for a stable defense: “National coach has thought about it”

Völler sees room for improvement in the defense. “We have to become more stable. The national coach gave his nomination some thought,” said the DFB sports director, without giving any details. Nagelsmann wants to announce his squad for the next test matches on March 14th (March 23rd against France, 26th against the Netherlands).

According to the wishes of the organizers around former world champion Lahm, the European Championships should become the second summer fairy tale after the 2006 World Cup. “Of course it is helpful if there is a German team that appears as a team that the fan can identify with. When the enthusiasm spills over from the players to the spectators and vice versa, it can inspire a team,” said Lahm.

Defender Kehrer hopes for a comeback in the DFB team: “I would like to help”

One person who hopes to be able to ensure a more stable defense is Thilo Kehrer. “It is my goal to be at the home European Championships. I was part of the national team until June last year. After that, I didn’t play much at West Ham and therefore didn’t provide any arguments for nominations,” the defender told Sport Bild. The 27-year-old, who has been on loan to AS Monaco since the beginning of January, has fought for a regular place in his new team under coach Adi Hütter. According to his own statement, there has been no “personal contact” with national coach Nagelsmann since then.

Kehrer believes that the recently weak DFB team is underestimated. “I think that the team in Germany is given less credit than is possible. Dynamics can quickly develop during a tournament.” A good start to the European Championship can create positive energy. “Then there’s a lot in it. I would like to help with that,” said the 27-time national player. When asked whether he could imagine his former coach in Paris, Thomas Tuchel, who will coach FC Bayern until the end of the season, as Nagelsmann’s successor at the DFB, Kehrer replied: “With his quality, his competence and the way he leads a team Thomas Tuchel has more than proven that he would be a very good solution as national coach.”

However, Kehrer believes speculation about the successor to Nagelsmann, whose contract expires after the European Championships, is premature: “Now it’s just about playing a good European Championship in our own country. Julian Nagelsmann is also a very good national coach, and I don’t know how Thomas Tuchel thinks.”

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