DOHA, Qatar — “Everything is at stake against Spain,” Germany coach Hansi Flick said. Lose at Al Bayt Stadium on Sunday, and his team will be out before they have even reached the third game. That is catastrophic enough, and tends to bring consequences, but it might not only be about their place at the World Cup; it might be even more profound. There is something about the meetings between these sides that shapes them. Defeat at the hands of the Seleccion helped redefine Die Nationalmannschaft more than a decade ago; another one here in Qatar and that identity might face an inquisition.
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“I was on the pitch in the final of Euro 2008 and I just couldn’t get near the ball,” Thomas Hitzlsperger recalls. The former midfielder can laugh now; then, it was hard enough even to breathe. “In addition to them being superior in tactics, I was also very slow, so not only did I not anticipate the passes, but even if I had, I was never going to get there,” he said. “You very quickly realise that they had found a way to totally outplay us, to have overloads everywhere. We understood that this team was on its way to being the best team in the world, but on the pitch it’s tough, and you think: ‘Pfff, what are we going to do?'”
Follow them, as it turned out.
The shift had already begun with Jurgen Klinsmann around the 2006 World Cup, but 2008 accelerated everything. Hitzlsperger recalls Joachim Low — who had been Klinsmann’s assistant before becoming head coach — being in “love” with Spanish football. Barcelona and the national team were conscious models to follow, the inspiration for a cultural shift.
“My last game was in 2010; they got rid of me just in time. They had to make sure I left for them to get better,” Hitzlsperger said jokingly. “Spain was always the team they looked up to. Low used to say constantly: Keep the ball on the floor, keep the ball on the floor. If you go long, it is harder to control, you lose time. German football had focused on what you do without the ball; now it came to think about what you do with it. Low’s [tactical] background was 1990s Italy, but everything changed.
“It wasn’t just about winning tournaments; the way we looked at developing young talent changed. It used to be that we went into tournaments and it was all based on mentality. We will win because we’re Germany. We needed to play. Low loves Spanish football, keeping possession, and they won the 2014 World Cup.” A new identity was forming.
