National team is in crisis before the home European Championship
DFB vice-president attacks Kimmich and Co. with harsh words
December 28, 2023, 12:04 p.m
Ralph-Uwe Schaffert has many positions in German football, advising national coach Julian Nagelsmann is not one of them. Nevertheless, the DFB vice-president makes a sweeping attack: What the national team needs is a radical change in personnel.
Ralph-Uwe Schaffert rarely appears in the German football public. The 67-year-old is Vice President of the German Football Association, as well as President of the North German and Lower Saxony Associations. At the DFB, the former judge is responsible for social policy tasks and DFB foundations as well as statutory issues. He has also been a member of a UEFA legal affairs committee since August. But Schaffert also has an opinion on sporting matters, which he sometimes makes known in the media.
After the embarrassing World Cup in Qatar last year, he had already taken the men’s national team to task, and shortly before the start of the home European Championship year in 2024, he was attacking the football professionals again. His idea: “It would be time to radically change the playing staff.” Because Schaffert has the feeling that “with a not very small number of players currently active, they think they can get by with perhaps 85 percent of the possible effort on the pitch.”
In Julian Nagelsmann’s place, a national coach Schaffert would focus less on the highly gifted and instead more on those “who are ready to roll up their sleeves.” Nagelsmann recently declared that he would rely on more “workers” in the future. Schaffert clearly sees the players as responsible for the crisis: “I don’t think it’s the coach’s fault.”
Gündoğan also has to face criticism
In an interview with the “Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung” and the “Neue Presse”, the 67-year-old also gave very specific examples of national players who he considers to be overrated. Joshua Kimmich from FC Bayern, for example, who plays a central role in Nagelsmann’s planning for the home European Championship next summer and is generally recognized as a leading player. “He has so far failed to provide proof. Even in the club,” said Schaffert.
Schaffert cannot understand what, in his opinion, the different performances of national team captain İlkay Gündoğan in the selection and in the club, currently at FC Barcelona, previously at Champions League winners Manchester City. This could give you the idea: “Did he send his less talented twin brother? I don’t understand that.” In fact, Gündoğan has been a top performer in his clubs for years, while national coaches Joachim Löw and Hansi Flick could not find a comparable role for the now 33-year-old in the DFB team.
Incidentally, during his previous verbal attack on the DFB team in January 2023, Schaffert publicly backtracked. At the Hildesheim football district association’s New Year’s reception, he said, according to the “Hildesheimer Allgmeiner Zeitung”: “If the German national players cover their mouths like monkeys and order the hairdresser to the hotel, you don’t have to be surprised if they lose to Japan.” Shortly afterwards, Schaffert explained via “Bild” about the monkey comparison, which is often classified as racist: “The term ‘monkey’ is unfortunate, I wouldn’t say that anymore today. That was definitely not okay.”