Stalemate edges Germany, Poland towards last 16

Northern Ireland were restricted to only 40 per cent possession against the Poles and 34 per cent in the Ukraine clash, and they are expecting the world champions to hog the ball again at the Parc des Princes.

Nevertheless, they remain favourites to secure top spot in the group with a victory over Michael O’Neill’s underdogs, and Muller told a news conference on Sunday that a healthy sense of perspective is in order. Winning Group C would set up a meeting with one of the best-performing third-placed teams while finishing second to Poland would see Northern Ireland face the runners-up from Group A, which contains France, Switzerland, Romania and Albania.

“If we had been beaten it was more or less done and dusted”. Northern Ireland’s defence has a similarly strong aerial presence so Low may seek to negate that by playing to a “false nine’ along the deck”.

“Anyway, you [the media] are never really happy with us”, he added. Then we won the World Cup and suddenly everyone was an awesome leader.

“I went, “What are you crying for?’ He said, ‘I don’t know, I can’t stop crying”. Goals will be important in the later stages of this tournament and I think at the moment they are lacking in that particular department.

Germany’s players had the day off Saturday and Loew said it was vital for their conditioning over a long tournament.

“The thoughts of the board, management, players and staff are with his family and friends at this sad time”.

Germany’s lack of cutting edge against both Ukraine and Poland has done little to suggest the side can emulate France and Spain’s feat of following a World Cup win with the European title. He admitted they “respect them”, but insisted there was no “fear”. The fact that we failed to progress to the round of 16 is definitely a bad result for us, as we wanted more.

Northern Ireland midfielder Jamie Ward has claimed that his nation’s high-energy approach could help them spring a major upset if complacency creeps into Germany’s team at Euro 2016. We’ll stick together and leave everything on the pitch.

The time spent on the Poland post-mortem had led to some radical tinkering for O’Neill, who knew his country’s fate would rest on his roll of the dice. Northern Ireland would go through with a win and will finish third in the group with a draw or loss. They have not conceded a few times in their last 15 internationals.

While Germany’s defensive operation will no doubt boost confidence going into its final group game against Northern Ireland next week, it struggled in attack with neither Mario Goetze nor Mario Gomez able to land a knockout blow.

– Thomas Muller has not scored or assisted a single goal in seven European Championship matches.