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Jamal Musiala helps Germany to 2-2 against Hungary

AOn a Saturday in January, when it is cold in Munich, Joachim Löw is sitting with a woolen blanket in the FC Bayern soccer arena and watching the Bundesliga match against Hoffenheim when a boy with thin legs is substituted on. He sees how the boy, who is 17 years old, is immediately hit with the ball by his teammates from Munich. He sees how the boy almost never loses the ball. He sees how the boy guides the ball with the side of his shoe and caresses the sole of the shoe. He sees the boy kissing the ball with his feet.

Later, according to the Bild newspaper, Löw speaks to the boy personally. He wants to convince him to play for the German national team in the future. And if you fast forward to the third preliminary round match of the EM from this Saturday in January, you can probably say that the excursion in winter saved the national coach from the next embarrassment in summer.

A goal is missing when Löw comes on this Wednesday evening in Munich Jamal Musiala, now 18 years old. Hungary leads 2-1. The live table reveals: Germany is bottom of the table – and thus eliminated. In the 82nd minute, Musiala runs on the grass with his thin legs. In the 84th minute he grabs the ball on the baseline and pushes with a quick step into the penalty area. There are now three defenders from Hungary in front of him.

Self-confidence? Confidence!

He dances out the first with a body illusion, looks in the middle – and discovers the gap that none of his teammates has yet discovered in this game. Five seconds later, Leon Goretzka shoots the ball into the goal. “I was really happy,” says Musiala, as he sits in front of a camera in the catacombs of the arena after his first few minutes in the European Championship and answers the reporter’s questions. He tells how Löw told him before coming on that he should dare to play with the ball. So he dared to do something. “I came in with Confidence.”

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