Momentous Kroos return
After the European Championships, the German national soccer team collapsed
By Till Erdenberger and Sebastian Schneider
February 22, 2024, 5:55 p.m
Toni Kroos returns to the DFB team. That’s good news, the 2014 world champion is still one of the best football players in the world in the autumn of his career. Kroos’ comeback has radical consequences, parts of the future of the DFB team have been canceled for the time being.
They have really tried everything to get the German national football team back on track: national coaches Hansi Flick and Julian Nagelsmann have gotten bogged down in endless tactic variations over the past three years. A chain of three, four or five? Nothing brought lasting stability to the German game.
Germany’s elite footballers have long since said goodbye to success. Nagelsmann and Flick threw themselves into the race man by man. In the meantime, Dortmund’s Marius Wolf was seen as a great hope, and Kai Havertz was suddenly promoted to left-back. A resilient formation was never found. 16 debutants under Flick, 4 already under Nagelsmann. Test matches were lost in droves, the fans turned away: the DFB team sank deeper and deeper into depression at the wrong time – with the disastrous desert World Cup in Qatar on its back and the home European Championships in sight.
With the return of Toni Kroos it seems inevitable: with the final whistle of their last tournament game, the German national football team will collapse. Julian Nagelsmann, who only has a contract until the end of the tournament, will mercilessly sew up his European Championship squad. This structure has no future. There is no vision for what will happen after that, all that matters is the home tournament.
“Everyone can say goodbye to this”
Goalkeeper Manuel Neuer fought his way back into the German goal after his serious leg injury through rehab, while captain İlkay Gündoğan had flirted with leaving the DFB team several times. The 2014 world champions Mats Hummels, Thomas Müller and now Toni Kroos, who were reactivated in the growing desperation to give a little fuel to the dreams of a halfway conciliatory tournament, are not the future of German football.
There is strong evidence that the highly talented generation that was supposed to take over after 2014 is already a thing of the past. Leon Goretzka, Joshua Kimmich, Serge Gnabry, Leroy Sané – the much-celebrated 1995/96 vintage – they are all great footballers, but all of them were damaged as national players by the DFB team’s collapse. Their crisis is closely intertwined with that of FC Bayern. The German soccer record champion has been navigating troubled waters for at least a year and a half. He ate two coaches – first Nagelsmann and finally Thomas Tuchel.
The return of Toni Kroos manifests the doubt. At first glance, it is a very German kind of optimism to hand over the DFB team to a 34-year-old national team retiree. There is also an admission that the idea had only worked out reasonably well with the much-celebrated return of Thomas Müller before the 2021 European Championship. He is “definitely not the savior. Everyone can say goodbye to that straight away,” said Kroos himself: “You shouldn’t think that this trick will make us favorites. That’s nonsense.”
There is a great danger
With him comes someone back who at least was hardly damaged by the DFB team’s crippling last years of crisis. Someone who has a huge reputation around the world – especially at Real Madrid. Nobody has played for the Royals for ten years without being a world class player themselves. In Spain they are raving about the guy who coach Carlo Ancelotti recently described as “top class”. With perhaps the biggest club in the world, he won the Champions League four times and is well on his way to triumphing in the premier league for the fifth time. It would be his sixth title, with the Bayern title from 2013 being the Spaniard’s all-time record Francicso Gento would be set.
With Kroos’ return campaign, Nagelsmann shows that he subordinates everything to the performance principle for this tournament. On June 14th against Scotland the best team that German football currently has to offer should be on the pitch. No matter what was. No matter what might happen. And yet: the last resurgence of the Rio heroes presents the national coach with a difficult puzzle. There is a great danger that there will no longer be any space for those who will own the future of the DFB team.
Under world champion coach Joachim Löw, Kroos was one of the most powerful national players on his team. The 34-year-old will immediately take on a leading role in the German midfield. With the comeback of the world champion, the hierarchy and statics in the German team changed radically. And especially in the control center of the German national team: on the six. There, where he also directs the games at Real Madrid like a general.
Where to go with Wirtz and Musiala?
But that’s where things get complicated. Nagelsmann has indicated several times that there are three places in the central midfield – and most of them have already been taken. Despite his current lack of form, captain Ä°lkay GündoÄŸan will be selected. A double six Kroos/GündoÄŸan is almost impossible. GündoÄŸan will move up a position and play at eight or ten. This leaves only one free spot: that of one of the defensive sixes. Joshua Kimmich’s time in the German midfield may be over, the Bayern professional will move to the right side of defense.
If GündoÄŸan gets the most attacking position in midfield, he will be driving away at least one of the two most exciting footballers the country currently has to offer. Where to go with Florian Wirtz and Jamal Musiala? The football magician Wirtz is currently on his way to breaking the eternal tyranny of FC Bayern with Bayer Leverkusen. Musiala, who had been suffering from acute poor form for a long time, had recently regained his composure. The puzzle will also get new pieces if Rio hero Müller gets another leading role at the home European Championships.
But all of these tactical things fade into the background. There is no alternative to Nagelsmann’s plan: the national coach had hit Kroos hard until he gave in to the wooing and announced his comeback. The Real Madrid playmaker is without a doubt the best German player in his position; even at 34 years old, the passing king embodies absolute world class. It would have been negligent to give up on the veteran without a fight. “Because I’m up for it,” he’s returning, says Kroos. Toni Kroos is part of the German football scene again, which is good news for the constantly shaky German team despite all the unanswered questions. If the present is over, the future is up in the air.