“Where is the courage, the playfulness?”
Ex-national coach brings Klopp into play for DFB
6/20/2023 9:54 am
The record of the DFB team in the recent past is sobering. Former national coach Berti Vogts sees few reasons why things should get better for the home EM. Vogts is at odds with both Joshua Kimmich and trainer Hansi Flick – and already has a successor in mind.
Former national coach Berti Vogts has little hope that the German national soccer team will triumph at the European Championships at home next year. “I’m very worried about the national team and the performance at the European Championships. It would be important to be successful again after three weak tournaments. But I don’t see that,” said the 76-year-old to the “Rheinische Post”.
Vogts, who led Germany to their third and last European Championship title in 1996, misses an identity in national coach Hansi Flick’s team. “Where has German football gone? Where is the courage, the playfulness, where are the German virtues that you can smile about, but that have always made us strong?” he explained, looking at nur’s sobering DFB record four wins from the last 15 international matches. “No German team plays like that, I can understand that the fans can’t identify with this type of football and are alienated from the national team,” added Vogts.
“Disappointed” by Kimmich
He sees “no axis, no players who take responsibility,” said Vogts. He was particularly “disappointed” with Joshua Kimmich: “He has the ability to be a leader like Lothar Matthäus used to be. But for that he would have to concentrate on the essentials. I have the feeling that he wants to be something he wants to be is not.”
He addressed Flick before the international match against Colombia at the end of the season (8.45 p.m./RTL and in the ntv.de live ticker) the appeal to stop experimenting. “The time until the European Championship is short. He should settle on 18 to 22 players and then form a team from them – with a clear hierarchy,” said Vogts, who basically hopes that Flick “makes the turnaround”.
Nevertheless, the German Football Association must keep an eye on alternatives: “I’m sure that Jürgen Klopp could get enthusiastic about the national team if it were necessary,” said Vogts about the successful Liverpool FC coach: “He would definitely be part of the national team do well.”