The secrets to Germany's World Cup success | Daily News

The secrets to Germany's World Cup success

They stand on the brink of history, ready to add a record fifth star to the badge and become the first nation to retain the World Cup since Brazil in 1962.

It's business as usual for Germany.

Head coach Joachim Löw has guided Die Mannschaft to at least the semifinals in each of his last five major tournaments. The current team qualified from Group C with a perfect record of 10 wins from 10 and a goal difference of +39.

Few would bet against them once again in Russia.

After all, football's a simple game. As former England striker Gary Lineker once put it, 22 men chase a ball for 90 minutes and at the end the Germans win.

But that hasn't always been the case.

Around the turn of the millennium, it was a footballing nation in crisis. An aging squad exited the Euro 2000 group stages in ignominy without a single win to their name.

"The Germans were always believing in power and mentality, but not quality in the teaching of their youth teams," former captain Lothar Matthäus tells CNN Sport, speaking of the prevailing attitude at that time.

"This was maybe the reason that, after the 2000 European Championship, Germany went a new way -- a better way for the future."

A task force of the German Football Association's finest minds gathered with a view to revolutionizing the game from top to bottom.

No stone would be left unturned in the search for talent. The national team, as Bayer Leverkusen CEO Wolfgang Holzhäuser put it, would henceforth be regarded as "the 19th and best team in the Bundesliga."

"It was very much the watershed moment," German football journalist Archie Rhind-Tutt tells CNN Sport. "We can see the fruits of that labor now."

DEPTH

Looking at the wealth of talent available to Löw in Russia, it's quite possible to pick at least four entirely distinct starting XIs capable of advancing to the latter stages of the tournament.

It is testament to such riches that neither André Schürrle nor Mario Götze, the players that combined to win Germany the last World Cup in extra time, even made the preliminary squad this time around.

"We have in Germany a lot of good, young, talented players," former captain Bastian Schweinsteiger tells CNN Sport. "It's not easy for our head coach to choose the starting 11 or even the full squad."

That German football fans engage in fierce debate over who should be their third-choice goalkeeper typifies the present situation.

What they've done "is not rocket science," though, according to football journalist Rapha Honigstein.

"They've taken ideas from France; they've taken ideas from England; they've taken ideas from Holland; and they've just put lots of firepower, know-how and of course a very strong infrastructure behind that," Honigstein tells CNN Sport. "And the result is you're just pumping out talent."

YOUTH

Both Honigstein and Rhind-Tutt contrast the invaluable education German players receive with that of their English counterparts, pointing to the Premier League "bottleneck" that often prevents youngsters from getting first-team football.

Having talent is one thing; actually deploying it is quite another.

Former defender Christian Ziege, a World Cup runner-up in 2002, puts Germany's success down to the domestic game's reliance on youth.

"I played myself with the Germany youth team against England in the past and I think they have so many good players," says Ziege, who has since gone on to coach the likes of Marc-André ter Stegen, Matthias Ginter and Timo Werner while working with Germany's Under-18 and U19 teams.

"The only problem is they're not going to play in the Premier League because the top clubs are more or less only using players with experience that cost a lot of money.

"The good thing is when you can't spend too much money, you can put young players into the teams. They get that experience; they can play.

"We sent a team for the Confederations Cup without nearly all the main players and ended up winning that trophy as well."

The squad that Ziege speaks of boasted an average age of just 24 -- the youngest at the tournament -- but rallied to win the World Cup warmup in style.

Instilling a winning mentality at an early age can only be beneficial, according to Matthäus, who led Germany to glory at Italia 1990.

"From these academies, the national team profits," says the former defensive midfielder, who remains the only player to appear in five different World Cups. "They are ready when they get the invitation.

When they get the chance to play, they will show the quality of men."

MENTALITY

Rival fans talk enviously of the so-called "German mentality," using the phrase as shorthand for ruthless efficiency in the will to win.

"You can see it not only in football, but in the cars," jokes Matthäus. "We have the best cars around the world -- with BMW, Audi, Volkswagen, blah blah blah! We like to always do the best, and for this you have to work very hard.

"We are never satisfied. We always do the next step. And I think this is the German mentality."

But for Ziege, who amassed 72 caps between 1993 and 2004, "something has changed a little bit ... and that's the reason we have so much talent now in our football."

The new generation is cut from a different cloth, the former Bayern Munich defender suggests, with an increasingly cosmopolitan squad adopting a more cultural approach both on and off the field.

Is the "German mentality" a myth? It depends who you ask and what you mean.

Both Schweinsteiger and Matthäus, Germany captains who have lift the coveted trophy, put their triumphs down to intangible qualities within the camp.

"I would say it's to have a feeling for everyone -- to understand every single person, exactly how they are," says Schweinsteiger, when asked for the secret to Germany's success during his time in the side. "Their character, their personality, which things they like, which they don't like.

"You have to oversee everything, which costs a lot of energy. But if you have experience and you know how to handle it, it's also kind of fun."

It's an answer echoed by Matthäus, who also -- perhaps surprisingly -- singles out the importance of fun in the long weeks away.

"First you need the quality of the players, the right system, but the team spirit is very important," the 1991 World Player of the Year explains.

"From the first day we began preparation, two weeks before the World Cup, we had a feeling that we were working with 23 players together, and this is the most important thing.

– CNN


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