germany...well well...beaten
i must say it probably wasnt that unexpected, but at the same time, germany were the favourites for euro08
germany will take heart from this defeat though, bit of luck with one goal, a few misses and a dodgey red card for schweiny...BUT
germany lack a real...playmaker, a person in the middle with FLAIR and a good passing game, ballack is good, but hes not going to unlock defenses like...Ronaldo with his runs, or Iniesta with his passing, germany today were shown to be lacking in terms of attack, decent strikers-gomez,podolski,klose and kuranyi, but no real quality deliveries to get there, croatia probably didnt deserve the 3 points, but germany didn help their own causes today, 19yr old TOni Kroos should be a good addition for future tournaments, he was a real startlet at the last U17 world cup
are germany tht short on keepers than jens Lehmann iis in goals? hes not the safest bloke on the planet, and given the young talents of Rensing and co. was lehmann REALLY the no.1? i know its hard to compare to someone like oliver kahn, but the bloke has no positional play and really didnt take command too well, some nice shots but the parry is a worry
in terms of the tournament and what this means, germany are NOT the force everyone was expecting them to be, no real directness in their attack(other than lahm, who toiled hard all day for no reward), their midfield lacks penetration and their goal did come seemingly from nowhere, while no doubt a threat to anyone who will face them, they certainly dont deseve the favourites tag at this stage, like holland(who have exceeded expectations) however, theyve got 1-2 games left to prove me wrong
right now its holland,spain and portugal who look most likely, but france,italy(assuming either of these 2 make it out of the group of death), germany wont be too far behind if they get their act together, one trend that has been set among the contenders and the also rans is the PACE of ball movement and directness and flow in attack