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Jürgen Klopp refused to allow Germany’s failure to beat Greece on Sunday evening to overshadow what he viewed as a significant step forward for his national team.
Germany were held to a 0-0 draw in Thessaloniki despite dominating large stretches of the contest, particularly during an excellent first half in which Jonathan Burkardt also saw a potential opening goal disallowed. The result leaves Germany three points behind both Greece and the Netherlands in their Nations League group.
Klopp nevertheless emerged from the final match of his experimental XXL international camp sounding considerably more encouraged than frustrated.
“If someone had told me a week ago that after one week you could play a first half like that, I wouldn’t have believed it because I’ve never seen anything like it,” Klopp told RTL. “The lads played an incredible game of football that was top in every area, really top.”
Germany’s aggressive work without the ball was particularly pleasing for a coach who has repeatedly placed counterpressing at the centre of his early tactical work with the national team.
“The counterpressing worked outstandingly 90 percent of the time,” Klopp continued. “From the 60th minute onward, we became a little more unsettled. The patterns were no longer as clear. That’s not unusual. The lads put in an incredible amount of work.”
Klopp remains “impressed” with his team
Germany failed to convert 21 shots and 70 percent possession into a goal, but Klopp was unwilling to allow the missed opportunities to define his assessment of the performance. For Klopp, the defensive commitment shown by his players was not merely something to celebrate in isolation. He views it as the foundation upon which Germany can begin expressing themselves more freely with the ball.
“But I’m very, very impressed by the team and by the way we did it,” Klopp said. “I’m more surprised than disappointed standing here right now. If we defend collectively the way we did today, then the lads can really play football. And the fact that they bought into it [the system] like that makes me genuinely happy. That will be the foundation.”
Derry Scherhant provided perhaps the clearest individual example. The Freiburg winger again impressed after already emerging as one of the understated winners of Germany’s victory over Serbia, while captain Florian Wirtz produced another influential first-half performance.
Klopp described Wirtz’s display as “outstanding.”
Klopp rejects claims Germany lack talent
The Bundestrainer expanded considerably upon the broader meaning of the past two weeks during his post-match press conference.
“I could say more, but I don’t want to drive the interpreter crazy,” Klopp joked.
He proceeded to say quite a bit more anyway.
“A couple of months ago and even a couple of weeks ago, all the talk was about German football being stuck in the basement,” Klopp said. “[The talk centered around] the fact that we didn’t have talent and what we were missing here and what we were missing there. I just spent two weeks with 44 German footballers. Plenty is missing, but certainly not talent.”
Klopp’s XXL squad was specifically designed to expose a much broader pool of players to his methods before Germany return to a conventional-sized squad in November. The experiment produced mixed results on the scoreboard, but Klopp believes it also provided ample evidence that the raw talent required to rebuild the national team is present.
“All of them want to work hard and have the desire to succeed in football,” Klopp continued. “We’ve found our path and just have to see it through. While we’re still not better than some nations, we can still beat them. As the old rule of thumb goes, if one isn’t on someone else’s level, [football] tactics are there to level the playing field.”
That sentiment closely reflected another of Klopp’s post-match assessments.
“All the things that were said about us Germans, about how we play and what we can do and what we can’t do,” Klopp remarked in his RTL interview. “We sent a few signals that there are various things we can do a little better than people currently think. I’m very happy for the lads about that, I’m very happy for everyone, to be honest. Because we wanted that signal too. We want to change something, we want to get something moving, and I definitely saw that.”
