A new beginning that was worth it: in game one after the Hansi Flick era, the German team wins the audience back. Image: picture alliance / SVEN SIMON
Because Rudi Völler makes things easy, the national team and their audience enjoy a film-worthy night. Is there more to this unique liaison than just a pleasant retro feeling?
This evening did something to the national soccer team. To see more clearly what that was, it was best to look at two of the many faces on Tuesday evening. First in that of Thomas Müller. The Munich native stood in the interview zone of the Dortmund Arena and looked as if he had not come from 90 minutes of football (of which he had played 64), but from a recovery trip: taut posture, effervescent sentences, infectious smile, you could have him through space and time able to teleport into the Müllermilch advertising of his early career phase, World Cup year 2010.
A little later Rudi Völler passed by the same place. The team boss also didn’t look like he had 90 minutes of football behind him, more like it had been at least 120, at the end of a long tournament in, say, Mexico: exhausted, sweaty, happy when he was finally able to get on the bus . This glutton definitely couldn’t have been sent through space and time to the 1986 World Cup year.
