P. Köster: Cabin Sermon
Löw’s European Championship team is a solid selection – with a decisive catch
Ostentatiously relaxed: Joachim Löw presents the team for Euro 2021 at the DFB headquarters in Frankfurt am Main
© Thomas Böcker / Getty Images
Joachim Löw has presented his squad for the Euro 2021. A solid selection with few surprises. Drawback: The title of Germany’t get it. Scrive star– Voice Philipp Köster.
Press conferences at which German squads are announced for major tournaments are often spectacular. Unforgotten, for example, how national coach Jürgen Klinsmann conjured Dortmund’s David Odonkor out of his hat in 2006, who was only known to flit on the wing like the fastest mouse in Mexico.
Judging by such entertainment value, the presentation of the squad for the Euro 2021 by Joachim Löw was rather a disappointment. Because it is a travel company without big surprises. Joachim Löw will take with him almost exactly those who have already travelled with the national team in the last twelve months, from Manuel Neuer to Toni Kroos to Timo Werner.
It is remarkable, whom Löw does not take to the European Championship
They were joined by a couple of replacements such as the Frankfurt keeper Kevin Trapp and the two experienced players Mats Hummels and Thomas Müller, who had been picked up in honour shortly before the tournament. However, their pardon had already been leaked in the last few days, so that at most two more nominations caused a bit of excitement: Christian Günter and Kevin Volland.
Günter, the Freiburg defender, prevailed against the also highly traded Philipp Max from PSV Eindhoven and possibly also benefited a bit from the short journey of the national coach to the Dreisamstadion. Kevin Volland, on the other hand, scored 16 goals for AS Monaco last season and thus radiates something that the national team only knew from television, namely goal danger. One does not approach Volland with the assumption, however,that he would not have gone along without the expansion of the squad from 23 to 26 players.
It is therefore especially remarkable who does not take everything to the European Championship. Julian Draxler of the Champions League semi-finalist PSG is not there, the previously so praised Julian Brandt is not there either. BVB attacker Marco Reus had already cancelled last night halfway voluntarily. In addition, it had already been leaked that Jerome Boateng would not be brought back as the only one of the previously sorted out experienced drivers.
This, in turn, was less Boateng’s fault. Instead, the non-nomination followed Löw’s insight that his previously so vociferously announced upheaval would have completely entered the history of the national team as a farce. Because as much as Müller and Hummels hold back every gloomy comment, their appointment is also a defeat for the national coach. He had believed that he could close the gap with fresh forces and build a stable framework, especially in the defensive area. To bring back in the end petty Hummels, who apparently is the only one who knows the positional game not only as an erotic variant.
Germany has no chance of winning the title
In addition, the calculation goes on, Hummels is also a figure of identification in the midst of a national team whose distance from the common football audience was rarely greater. This is due to the lousy performances of the last time, but also to the many good football workers in löw’s squad, all the neck tenbergs and Klostermann, which would generate in a German pedestrian area, a larger crowd. That’s why Löw needs the world champions of the past and a few young stars whose faces the audience recognizes. The responsibility, and this is new at least, rests on the shoulders of the younger stars, on Kai Havertz from Chelsea, on Leroy Sané from FC Bayern and perhaps also on Timo Werner, if at some point he also shoots resolutely on goal, instead of surrounding the opponents on the edge of the penalty area.
Otherwise, much was expected. This time, the position of the hopeful youngster is not occupied by Florian Wirtz from Leverkusen, but by Bavarian up-and-coming Jamal Musiala. This is a safe choice for lion. The 18-year-old has not played a single Bundesliga game for Bayern this season, but he also travels with them as a trainee willing to learn. Hopefully his big time will come.
And perhaps also the great time of a retreated national team. With a new coach who does not cover such press conferences as ostentatiously as Joachim Löw. With a stable defense that may only be found after this tournament. And with a midfield that combines as rapidly as the English, Spanish and French already do.
Because that has to be stated: Joachim Löw could have nominated another four players, one thing would not have changed: Germany will not be European champions. No chance.
