News: Germany, Double Pass, Peter Crouch

So there it was, the reaction demanded by the German national team. It felt more like the reflex of a cat swatting at a buzzing fly while lazily lying on the veranda on a Sunday afternoon. The final score was 3-1 against Northern Ireland, ranked 71st in the world. Julian Nagelsmann had demanded "energy," "power," and "emotion." But in reality, all of this was only evident in one place in the Cologne stadium for 90 minutes: his coaching zone. The national coach jumped around tirelessly, tried, thought, did, and instructed his players again and again. Beforehand, he had brought on five new starting eleven players, changed the system, and switched from a playful approach to a combative one. In thanks, the crowd blew their whistle at halftime (something you have to manage in Cologne first). Afterward, the fans applauded politely. At least. But after the second qualifying match, the national coach faces even more unanswered questions. What lessons can we learn from these two matches? Is Jamie Leweling set to play on the right from now on? Is the central defender duo of Rüdiger and Tah completely out of the question? Will the move to move Kimmich to the center work? Will Nadiem Amiri have to start every game from now on? The German national team is currently approaching a World Cup tournament that they desperately want to win, but they don't have the slightest idea of ​​which players they will use to achieve that. The next international match, against Luxembourg in October, will hardly shed any light on that. Incidentally, at the same time as Germany's crunch victory, Spain also won 6-0 away in Turkey.