analysis
The DFB is calling for euphoria among fans and politicians for EURO 2024. The national team in particular is lacking in that. Even players criticized after the 0-1 draw in Poland that everything was “sluggish and slow”.
Bernd Neuendorf, the President of the German Football Association, was silent. Rudi Völler also walked past the pack of reporters in the catacombs of the National Stadium in Warsaw, who would have liked to know from the sports director how things are going with the German national team, which has a big problem a year before the European Championships, especially with opponents from Europe.
Germany has only won one of the last eleven duels with European teams. In June 2022, they beat Italy 5-2 in the Nations League.
“No turning point in sight”
“There is no turning point in sight”, said Julian Brandt after the game against Poland, a rather conservative European team with an outstanding goalkeeper Wojciech Szczęsny that evening, lost 0-1 on Friday (June 16, 2023). The turnaround, according to the Borussia Dortmund midfielder, can only happen with victories, and after the success against Italy there were only victories against Oman, Costa Rica and Peru, i.e. global light to middleweights.
“We’ll get out of there”, said national coach Hansi Flick at the microphone of the sports show about the lean months.
inertia as a problem
“These perseverance slogans are not really my thing”, said Brandt, although he wasn’t referring to the trainer, but to his aborted attempt to formulate a slogan of perseverance. Instead, he referred to an analysis that was found to be a consensus among all viewers of the game: “We have to make sure we don’t get too sluggish. Our game is too slow, we have too many contacts.”
Joshua Kimmich agreed with his colleague: “In the first half, we were mainly focused on avoiding mistakes.” The uncertainty, triggered above all by the 3: 3 against Ukraine four days earlier, was responsible for this.
Havertz and Wirtz out of shape
Before the break, the German team was content with a high percentage of possession, lacking pace and dynamism, with the exception of a few dribbles by Jamal Musiala. The Munich player played in a 3-4-2-1 behind weak striker Kai Havertz and alongside weak Florian Wirtz, the other exceptional talent in German football who has yet to prove it in the national team.
It got better in the second half, that was also the consensus. The defeat, which dampens a bad mood even more, is all the more sobering. With the three games in June, the national team and the fans should get closer to each other again. There is still an opportunity with the game on Tuesday (June 20th, 2023) in Gelsenkirchen against Colombia, but even a clear victory is unlikely to cause the euphoria that the DFB and above all Rudi Völler from the fans and politicians are looking at who want EURO 2024.
Doubts about Flick?
However, the advance performance is missing, and that is the big problem of the DFB. The association’s flagship denounces inertia within its own ranks, but demands enthusiasm.
The question of whether Hansi Flick is still the right national coach to get out of the unfortunate situation arises with every weak game and result. “Of course” Flick will stay coach, Völler said after the game against Ukraine. Now he said nothing. That can, but doesn’t have to mean anything.
“Pretty Important”
“We all have a very close relationship with the national coach,” said Julian Brandt, internally the slightly flaming discussion about Flick was “not an issue”, even “if we get it from the media, of course.”
Hansi Flick said in Warsaw that September’s internationals against Japan and France mark the beginning of the “decisive phase” ahead of the European Championship, after predicting that the three tests in June would be quite important in order to regain fans’ trust.
No Gündogan, lots of Kimmich
Nevertheless, he made a lot of changes again, giving İlkay Gündoğan a longer breather, so that the captain of the Champions League winner had to postpone the search for a suitable role for him in the national team.
With the increase of his captain Joshua Kimmich (“attitude, always wanting to win like Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan”), the national coach also increased his attacking surface.
The coach, who won six titles in one season with FC Bayern and who also made a successful start with the national team, currently only has slogans to persevere.