National team
Nagelsmann’s quick verdict: Emotions are missing on the EM route
National coach Julian Nagelsmann lacked emotion in the game against Turkey. photo
© Federico Gambarini/dpa
For Julian Nagelsmann, his line-up is not a reason for the defeat on his home debut. The national coach misses feeling and sharpness in some players. But he warns against pessimism.
When researching the causes of his first defeat as national coach, he fell Julian Nagelsmann makes a quick judgment. His unusual and unfamiliar tactics? No. It wasn’t because of that. The national soccer team lacked emotion, stated the noticeably dissatisfied DFB head coach.
“The tactics are secondary, it’s always the emotions first. If you’re at 100 percent, you can be significantly worse tactically. If the emotions aren’t the same, you have to be tactically brilliant in order to still make the game positive.” said Nagelsmann after the sobering 2:3 against Turkey in the emotionally charged Berlin Olympic Stadium.
A question of mentality?
Brilliant? Nagelsmann made precisely this attribution to the player whom he had surprisingly moved into a tactically new position. Kai Havertz, as left full-back. That sounded extremely unusual, but the national coach gave the Arsenal attacker the best possible rating for his interpretation of the very forward-oriented rail player: “world class”.
That seemed very high on the praise shelf. But Havertz’s understandable defensive deficiencies were not the cause of the defeat. “Individual players didn’t have the same 100 percent conviction and will as their opponents,” said Nagelsmann. A question of mentality? Seven months before the home European Championships. Of course, this does not allow any good conclusions to be drawn about basic character principles.
“We don’t want to analyze it completely. We won’t let ourselves get down now, that’s our job, that we carry on,” said Thomas Müller, who was not used. The veteran hit the nerve of the national coach, who almost reacted angrily when asked about a possible relapse into the automatisms of his predecessor Hansi Flick’s unfortunate era.
Difficult task in Vienna
“We can now start again to paint everything black and see everything as bad. We can do that, but we won’t get any further as a football nation,” said Nagelsmann. “I’m far from seeing everything negatively,” he said. Of course, the goals from Havertz (5th minute) and Niclas Füllkrug (48th) were superb. But three goals conceded again brought the annual tally to 20 in ten games. Too much for title ambitions in 2024, especially since Nagelsmann had been practicing defensive work all week.
Nagelsmann has practically no time to adjust things. On Tuesday, the duel with Austria in Vienna is an even more difficult task against the selection of tactics guru Ralf Rangnick. It is the last chance to get a positive push this year and shortly before the draw for the European Championship groups on December 2nd. “We are still in the phase in which we need a sense of success,” said Füllkrug.