Holders Germany crash out of World Cup

Being a defending champion at the World Cup has proven to be a tough challenge in recent years.

At the World Cup, one team’s loss is always another team’s gain.

The teams have a combined nine World Cup titles, Germany is the defending champion and Brazil is still trying to redeem itself from a humiliating 7-1 loss in the 2014 semifinals, in which it was the host nation.

The performance was summed up in a contrite tweet from the team’s official account.

There had been some worrying signs, though, in the buildup to the tournament.

Germany’s unexpected exit from a group that had no former winners will be the talk of the 2018 competition.

With victories over defending champion Germany and South Korea, Mexico has a chance to win its group with a ideal record for the first time in its World Cup history.

Sweden 1 South Korea 0. “Even when it was 0-1, I think we kept trying to turn it all around”.

He remained confident that all would be well by the time they landed in Russian Federation.

Mueller has scored 10 goals over two World Cups but was relegated to the bench after drawing a blank in Germany’s first two matches in Russian Federation, with attacking midfielder Leon Goretzka selected instead.

“Towards the end, we had to take a defender off and bring on Thomas Mueller, we had to take that risk because we needed a goal”.

“We’re sorry we didn’t play like world champions”.

‘So, we deserve to be eliminated yes’.

So, are Mexico and South Korea now the unlikeliest of best friends? I can not answer why that happened. “We had chances but didn’t take any of them and that sums up the whole tournament for us really”. “We screwed up, we screwed up together”.

Germany made a nervous start, playing slower than it usually does to avoid being vulnerable on the break. They are level on three points with Sweden with exactly the same goal difference. Maybe we invited the wrong players. They then lost to Austria in their penultimate warmup game and only narrowly beat Saudi Arabia before departing for Russian Federation.

Obviously, most responsibility lies with coach Joachim Loew, who never paid proper attention to the signs that were already visible a year ago.

“This is football”, said Ahn, who is working for Korean television at the World Cup. If they continue to play well the result will come.

“It’s too early to say”.

Bild said head coach Loew’s fate would be decided “in the coming days” following talks with the German football federation (DFB). “But there is not much time to sit and cry over what happened”. I’m thinking of the likes of Leroy Sane who missed out this time on the back of a great season with Manchester City.

“I don’t understand it”, said a disappointed Tim Mueller, a fan wearing a Germany T-shirt who lingered at the Fan Mile after many had left.