The German footballers meet France and the Netherlands. These are no ordinary friendly games. A lot depends on the team’s performance before the European Championships in their own country.
Julian Nagelsmann is challenged after the sobering results of his German national team.
Benoit Tessier / Reuters
There are less than three months left until the German national football team plays its first game at the 2024 European Championships in Munich. When Scotland is the opponent on June 14th, perhaps some people will remember what the atmosphere was like in 2006, before the tournament that has gone down in the annals of German football as a “summer fairy tale”. The weather was great, as was the atmosphere, the team was inspired by the good atmosphere and played some good football.
At that time, expectations before the tournament were low, not much would have been missing, and national coach Jürgen Klinsmann would have been replaced before the World Cup after his team lost 4-1 in Italy. These dim expectations are a commonality with the present. Coach Julian Nagelsmann, who was only appointed last November, is facing a difficult journey: his team will play in France on Saturday evening, against the World Cup runners-up, and next Tuesday in Frankfurt against the Netherlands.
Nagelsmann’s record: four games, two defeats
They are opponents of stature against whom all sorts of things can go wrong, and the new man has already proven that things can get out of hand even under Nagelsmann: Since he took over the team, they have won one game against the USA and one against Mexico ended in a draw, Germany lost to Turkey and Austria.
After those defeats, Nagelsmann came under criticism because he had chosen somewhat strange formations: the formations were at best original, but at least risky. The fact that Nagelsmann couldn’t find the right words to explain his experiments at the time brought worry lines to the foreheads of more than a few football fans. Nagelsmann acted like a club coach in pre-season preparation, where little is important other than knowledge. This is different in the case of the national team. Unlike a club team, every so-called friendly game attracts a lot of attention. Every defeat, every weak performance depresses the mood.
Despite being just 36 years old, Nagelsmann has been a coach at three Bundesliga locations: Hoffenheim, Leipzig and Munich. Whether he manages to emancipate himself from the perspective of the club coach and discover the pragmatic part of his job will also determine whether the European Championship is a success or failure for the German team.
The Germans are not among the favorites
The Germans are certainly not among the favorites, and this in itself represents a new insight in the country of the four-time world and three-time European champions, where it was often believed that reaching the semi-finals of tournaments resulted from some kind of customary law. After Hansi Flick failed as national coach, people thought they had made the right choice with Nagelsmann. In the meantime, doubts arise – and this is not only due to Nagelsmann’s willingness to experiment with tactical questions.
Original lineups: Germany’s national coach Julian Nagelsmann.
Youtube
Anyone who describes Nagelsmann’s actions as meandering is behaving comparatively benevolently towards the coach. Because Nagelsmann announces things, but does the opposite. When he started, he said it was about stability for the team. He wanted to practice a few systems that the team could use easily. In principle, the coach is right when he assumes that his players are capable of this. Now the question is whether this will also work if the players suddenly find themselves in completely unfamiliar positions: The offensive force Kai Havertz had Nagelsmann play as a left-back, and the effect of the measure was of manageable success.
The coach Nagelsmann communicates offensively and transparently. At the squad presentation, he explained why he hadn’t called up this or that player. Such a willingness to provide information, which is unusual in the industry, is appreciated by media professionals, but it creates problems for the trainer if he behaves differently than he promises. After Pascal Gross’s decent debut on the USA trip in November, he certified that the player had done well: Gross would certainly not have done this for the last time. He was not called up for the following international matches, although the team could have used a player like him to provide security in midfield.
He’s now back at it, but the damage caused by the public praise and the opposite action remains: What can players rely on when the coach makes promises to them?
It took Nagelsmann a long time to make obvious decisions
At the beginning of Nagelsmann’s era, it also seemed as if Bayern players Joshua Kimmich and Leon Goretzka were placed with him. The coach’s mood has now changed. Kimmich is now supposed to play the right-back role, and Goretzka was no longer called into the squad. Such a decision is certainly justifiable; Goretzka’s best times are behind him in both the club and the national team. The only question is why it takes Nagelsmann so long to come to this relatively obvious conclusion.
By declaring the center a Bayern-free zone, Nagelsmann undoubtedly initiated a lot. He wants to bring structure to the team through a returnee, Toni Kroos, who, to a certain extent, said goodbye through the back door after failing at the 2021 European Championship. The most successful German foreign professional in history shines at Real Madrid with calm, overview and wealth of ideas. He brings great class – but he is not the type of player who drives a team forward and who provides orientation in difficult situations.
Added to this is the lurching course when it comes to the goalkeeper question. As Bayern coach, Nagelsmann tried to weaken Manuel Neuer’s position when he was injured. Nagelsmann ensured that Neuer’s confidant, goalie coach Toni Tapalovic, was replaced. But after almost a year off, Neuer came back stronger than expected. Marc-André ter Stegen from FC Barcelona promptly lost his status as the new number one.
Now Neuer has injured himself again during training. The question now is whether Ter Stegen formulates his demands offensively. Just from these details you can see: This team is so explosive that the coach has to be afraid of them. The DFB, meanwhile, has confidence in Nagelsmann’s abilities. As the “Kicker” reports, the association wants to extend the contract with the coach if he is not eliminated in the European Championship preliminary round.
