“Then I get really scared for the German national team”
“If I lead 2-0 at Wembley Stadium in front of 90,000 spectators and then take a 3-2 lead in a few minutes, something can’t be right,” says Jimmy Hartwig. “They know they haven’t reached the standard of playing for a World Cup yet.”
The crisis of the national team and FC Bayern does not seem to affect a player. Jamal Musiala also delivered a convincing performance against England. The opposing coach sounds angry in the assessment.
Rreview. At the EM 2021, Jamal Musiala will only come on as a substitute in the round of 16 of the German national team against England (0: 2). The 18-year-old offensive player was a beacon of hope at the time. Now he is 19 – and meanwhile a promise for the future. Again in Wembley he was in the starting eleven on Monday evening and emerged as one of the best German players in the 3-3 group game of the Nations League against the English. Germany in crisis after the defeat against Hungary and 2-0 lead against the English, Musiala crisis-proof. Roughly.
In any case, there are two sides to this imbalance. One is that a few weeks before the World Cup kicks off, the DFB team is more skeptical than ever before under national coach Hansi Flick. Answers have to be found, otherwise Qatar could end sooner than expected.
The other is that Musiala appears to be able to provide one of those answers. That he is able to straighten out the imbalance in the storm. Some players in the national team call him “Bambi”. But Bambi has grown up faster than predictions predicted.
Flick praises Musiala’s “extraordinary talent”
The national coach was asked whether the FC Bayern attacker had now played his way into the starting eleven. There was still enough time to decide, so much could still happen, Flick replied: “But Jamal has shown why he is an extraordinary talent is. He won the ball in his own half on the second goal. Defensively and offensively he is a player who is very good for us. He can cause problems for the opponent and get situations like the penalty kick out of it. He outplays one or two opponents, then we have more space.”
lkay Gündogan with a penalty kick (53rd minute) and Kai Havertz (67th) ensured a clear lead. But England punished the following defensive mistakes and turned the tide through Luke Shaw (72′), Mason Mount (75′) and Harry Kane (83′, penalty kick) before Havertz managed to equalize (87′).
Flick’s English colleague was therefore a bit more emotional when assessing Musiala’s performance. “His performance was excellent. He’s an exciting player,” said Gareth Southgate, whose performance hurt in two ways. The 52-year-old told BILD: “Musiala is an extraordinary player. We had him playing with Jude Bellingham in our U16s. You know how much we liked him, you know how hard we tried to keep him. However, he trained at Bayern Munich with eight German internationals who had the opportunity to influence him. That’s a shame. He is a very special talent.”
Born in Stuttgart, Musiala moved to England with his family at the age of seven and played for Chelsea for eight years from 2011. Together with Bellingham, he played for the “Young Lions” from the U15s and even became captain of the English U16 team together with the current Dortmund offensive player. In the summer of 2019, however, a rethink took place. FC Bayern had signed the Chelsea talent and he came to Munich for training compensation of just 200,000 euros.
“The development is fantastic”
The national coach helped him make his debut as a former Bayern coach in June 2020. “My assistant coach at the time, Hermann Gerland, said to me: We have one on the Bayern campus, he’s really good.” He trained and you could see right away that he is an absolute talent. The development he has made is fantastic.”
Discoverer, sponsor – and now profiteer: national coach Flick with Musiala in the game against England at Wembley Stadium
Source: dpa/Christian Charisius
In November of the same year, Musiala was nominated for the English U21 and came on as a substitute in the 3-1 win against Andorra. A few days later he scored for England in a 5-0 win over Albania. Games in the U21 still leave open for players which country they will play for in the future. Only with duels in the senior national team is it sealed to which nation they have finally committed themselves.
As a result, the DFB will finally become active. The then national coach Joachim Löw and national team director Oliver Bierhoff tried very hard for Musiala. In March 2021, Southgate wanted to nominate him for the English national team, but the courted man chose Germany at the time. When he came on as a substitute against Iceland on March 25, 2021, he played for Germany.
What he expects for Musiala’s future, Southgate was asked after the draw against the DFB team. “I don’t care about his future…” he said. Because Musiala’s future belongs to the German national team – and the present will probably be significantly influenced by him in the future.
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