Sinsheim (dpa) – When Kai Havertz and his colleagues made their way back to Frankfurt in the two black, red and gold team buses around midnight, the young fans of the German national soccer team screamed enthusiastically in front of the arena in Sinsheim.
Goalkeeper Manuel Neuer should have been serenaded by the DFB entourage a little later on his 36th birthday. Only Hansi Flick was not in the mood for a cheering chorus. The national coach took note of the 2-0 win against Israel at the start of the World Cup year in a fairly controlled manner.
“On the whole I’m satisfied. The joy would have been a bit dampened if we conceded a goal from the penalty spot at the end. It showed that you always have to be highly concentrated for 90 minutes,” said Flick late on Saturday evening. The 57-year-old knows exactly: For a test against Israel, the performance was passable. But such a performance is far from enough for the big World Cup goals.
The bar is high
The national coach had raised the bar even before his eighth win in eight games. As his next opponent and first real football heavyweight in his still short tenure at the next Qatar test on Tuesday, the Netherlands will come in handy. Even if he didn’t want to say much about Oranje and the duel with his coach role model Louis van Gaal in Amsterdam in Sinsheim: “We’d do well to let this game affect us again. After that we’ll try to train the team like this set up that she can make a good, successful game.”
Flick wants to sort through the Israel findings at the DFB team hotel in Gravenbruch on Sunday. There were quite a few. The most important: The DFB-Elf urgently needs real benchmarks in order to acquire the hoped-for title. After Holland, Hungary, Italy and England will be followed in June by corresponding opponents in the Nations League.
It is also clear that against Israel missing or spared fixed sizes like Neuer, Antonio Rüdiger, Joshua Kimmich or Serge Gnabry will bring more quality with a view to the World Cup.
Room for improvement when exploiting opportunities
Havertz is indispensable as an offensive force, and not just because of his header. Although Flick generally did not like the permissible exploitation of chances – also from Havertz. “Unfortunately, we didn’t consistently take advantage of some scoring chances. We have to take advantage of them against opponents who are of a different caliber,” demanded the DFB head coach.
Timo Werner urgently needs the DFB orbit to get rid of the bad times at Chelsea. “We are there to give him the playing time. You can tell that his rhythm wasn’t really in the game,” said Flick about his second goal scorer, who with six goals remains the top scorer of his tenure.
And then there was the case of Nico Schlotterbeck as a prime example of the large personal test event. The Freiburg central defender impressed on his debut, played good vertical passes and spoiled himself with a clumsy penalty foul in added time, earning him a rating with a star. Kevin Trapp prevented a mood dampener with his penalty save. But Flick made it clear on ZDF. “Hopefully the last action is a good lesson for him.” Because: “At a World Cup, such a thing can be deadly in the 90th minute.”