Baby steps
Germany suffers a shock 2-0 loss to Slovakia in World Cup qualifying. That German slump from 2015-2025 is really baffling to behold. This was one of the mightiest and most feared teams in the world, for decades.
Yeah. I mean, I can point to some reasons, including a downgrade in many positions since the 2014 side, but changing coaches isn’t going to fix this.
To put into perspective how much of a disgrace it was: it was the first ever away defeat for Germany in a WC qualifier. And with all due respect for Slovakia, they are not even European B level.
We had begun gaining confidence in Nagelsmann’s work after a strong Euro that ended in a close defeat vs later champion Spain in the quarterfinals and a good Euro Nations League performance that brought us to the semi finals. But since these final defeats against Portugal and France, the team’s performances have deteriorated from game to game. I really wonder if the team will be able to rehabilitate themselves tomorrow against Northern Island, but I doubt it.
ETA: the crazy truth is that even if we’ll play a catastrophic qualifying group stage and rank last in the end, we’d still make the play-off games because of our good result in the Nations League. But of course Nagelsmann wouldn’t survive such a scenario as coach.
It might be one of those where they come roaring back for one game and then subside again. It’s hard to really say with this team. I was watching on ARD, and Schweinsteiger’s mix of disgust and resignation after the match was really something (and I can’t blame him).
Yeah, looking at the rosters vs 2014 I think Kimmich is the only starter with Rudiger and Wirtz as maybe. That was an extremely good roster though with really only 2 (maybe 3) positions that a top club team wouldn’t try to replace, which is pretty rare for a national team.
You mean the German team of 2014? Yeah, there was exceptional quality in that roster.
I feel your pain @Maserschmidt , @EinsteinsHund , just remember that these things never last forever.
The best thing is try to keep calm and not to change managers hysterically at every bad result. Alternatively you can lose your head, blame everybody, change managers at the drop of a hat until you don’t have any more money and get forced to put an inexperienced assistant in charge in which nobody believes and, in a series of events proper of a Hollywood sports movie he gets together a group of misfits and wins absolutely everything.
But for the later method to work I strongly suspect you need God on your side, so I thing the former is more your style…
Yeah, I know, we had such slumps before, for instance between 1992 and 2002 (with the exception of winning the Euro in England 1996, but that was a very lucky championship). But the current disease has been going on since the 2014 WC title, and when you think it can’t get any worse, we lose in Slovakia.
At least this has always been the policy of the DFB, they very rarely fire coaches, and never on a whim. Let’s see, how many did we have since 1950?
Sepp Herberger
Helmut Schön
Jupp Derwall
Franz Beckenbauer
Berti Vogts
Erich Ribbeck (he was the worst and the least successful)
Rudi Völler
Jürgen Klinsmann
Jogi Löw
Hansi Flick
Julian Nagelsmann
Those are 11 coaches in a span of 75 years. Try finding another national football association with that stability.
Things can always get worse, you could lose 6-1 against Bolivia for example…
I agree, that’s why I said keeping calm and letting coaches do their work was more your style, I don’t think changing it would be a good idea.
I think that claiming that losing a match against another team is a shame is disrespectful to the other team, and when I hear the words “die Schande von Córdoba” (the Córdoba shame, refering to a match that Germany lost against Austria in the Argentina (ha!) World Cup in 1978) I always think of the real shame, that is, the game against Austria in Gijón, Spain, four years later, that the two teams fixed to draw to pass to the next round, grossly cheating against Algeria, who would have gone through to the knock-off round as first African team ever had Germany (most probably, if they had even tried) or Austria (yes, can happen, see Córdoba four years prior) won*. That was a shame, not losing against Austria, Slovenia, or even Albania (another game that is called a shame in German football lore). The game in Gijón still makes me mad, after all those years. And the Germans did it out of cowardice, for fear of repeating the wrongly called “shame of Córdoba”. The Austrians did it because it was their best chance to pass to the next round.
*Ever since, the last two games of the group round have been played simultaneously to avoid those shenannigans. And ever since, I gloat when Germany loses. Austria has purged this sin in my personal view after losing 9-0 against Spain in the qualifying to the 2000 European Championship. Yes, I am that generous. Took long enough. Bonus point because Spain only shot 8 times on goal and scored 9. One goal was an own goal. All shots got in. Plus one.
Any concern about sticking with German coaches? I kinda think Klinsmann is a shit coach and that he wouldn’t have gotten the job if he wasn’t a national team legend. There isn’t a shortage of good German coaches, but the set of all coaches is strictly larger than just Germans. I think the domestic bias has harmed England, for one.
Ok, put into perspective with that disgusting match, the defeat to Slovakia was just a minor glitch, I concur. And I didn’t want to be disrespectful to Slovakia, really.
That’s a good point. I don’t know why the DFB hasn’t ever signed a foreign coach, probably it goes hand in hand with their tradition of not firing and hiring and giving the job to honored former players and/or assistants. About the time Hansi Flick was about to get sacked, Louis Van Gaal was discussed as a successor, but that never materialized and Nagelsmann got the job.
I am sure of that, no reproach intended. But when talking football a lot of clichés creep in, and I wanted to point that out. Germans have a tendency to take football too seriously and then they flagelate themselves with a shame that is not shameful at all! Argentina, of course, is in its own league in that respect.
Thank Godott they have won the last World Cup, poor @Frodo would be in a bad place if not. BTW: How is the tattoo going?
Perhaps “Shame” is not the right word, as you say shame is for when you do something truly shameful, “humiliating” though may be it, like a Grand Master level chess player losing against a novice.
Ya think? 
Thank Diego.
It would have been very grim, not that there would’ve been suicides or anything like that but definitively a shitty 2022 Christmas.
Furthermore, having the memory of Leo raising the cup has definitely helped us survive all the shit that happened afterwards, it’s like a having a small room in your mind were you can go, relax and energize when the news get to be too much.
On hiatus until later this month, we had a health scare last month and everything got bumped to September.
I truly hope everything turns out right!
Humiliation is indeed a much better word, it just does not have the ring to it. Not in German, at least. “Die Erniedrigung von Córdoba” sounds meh, too many syllables. Schande! sounds like a double whammy: Schan-de! bum, bum! So the wrong word has prevailed. A shame, really.
Pun intended, of course.
I actually used the word disgrace for the Slovakia game, I’d better have called it humiliation or embarrassment.