Mesut Özil cowardly and characterless to Joachim Löw? Why Bild should look firstly at their own behaviour….

Tags

Arsenal, Bild, Germany, Joachim Löw, Mesut Özil, Oliver Bierhoff, Unai Emery

Joachim Löw and Oliver Bierhoff have been in London this past week and it was reported in Bild yesterday (unsurprisingly behind their paywall) that they were refused a visit to meet with Mesut Özil at Arsenal’s London Colney training ground.

This has been denied by at least one Arsenal correspondent and therefore we currently have no real idea of what took place, although it is known they both had lunch with Per Mertesacker and met with Bernd Leno and Shkodran Mustafi.

However in a move of breathtaking hypocrisy Bild have seemingly taken up the mantle on Jogi’s behalf and now consider themselves his prime defender in the keyboard stakes (no, that’s me actually….), today publishing an article speaking of the ‘cowardly’ and ‘characterless’ behaviour of Mesut towards his former international coach.

While I feel it regrettable than Mesut does not wish to speak to Jogi at the present time, I understand and respect Mesut’s decision and refuse to condemn him for his actions, despite the obvious disappointment it has caused Jogi. I naturally dislike the opportunities it has given the midfielder’s supporters to, deliberately or otherwise, paint all from within Germany with the same proverbial brush, but nasty comments on social media are not, of course, of Mesut’s making.

But let’s just sit and think about Bild’s words for a moment. Mesut Özil’s behaviour towards the Bundestrainer, it would seem, has sent this upstanding organisation into a frenzy of moral tut-tutting. Bild have become the experts in etiquette, quick to condemn anyone who fails to live up to their own high standards. This is exemplified by Mesut’s weak behaviour, they tell us, so abhorred are they at his desire to, for the moment, concentrate solely on his club career

So shall we now discuss what is really cowardly and characterless?

How about photographing a man’s personal possessions dumped in a rubbish bin in a private hotel room to generate sensationalism following a failure in a football tournament?

Or ambushing him in an aeroplane gangway in front of his players and their families to demand his resignation?

How about the proof that positive comments posted by his supporters are deleted (ensuring the appearance is that he is totally disliked) and instead allowing the most appalling abuse to remain unchecked on your website?

Or indeed, as recently as this week, believing you have the right to follow and photograph a couple in the most intimate and private of moments simply because one of them coaches your national football team?

I think we are all getting the ‘picture’ here…

While opinions on the issue may continue to divide, I do hope we can all agree on one thing, and that is Bild have absolutely no right to adopt any moral high ground in how Joachim Löw is treated by others.

Really, believe me, they relinquished that right a long time ago.

———————————————–

Update later the same day:

Sky Sports have now revealed that Unai Emery did NOT block Joachim Löw from the Arsenal training ground. Mesut was not in attendance, and Jogi and Oliver Bierhoff were there at the invitation of Per Mertesacker. This was later confirmed by Unai Emery in a Sky Sports interview.

And to think there are still people out there that still doubt there was/is an agenda against Mesut in the German media.

Advertisements

Germany 1 – 2 USA, Friendly, Cologne, 10 June 2015

Tags

DFB, Germany, Joachim Löw, Jurgen Klinsmann, USA

As usual in friendlies, Joachim Löw rested several of his main stars, and with others unavailable, there were both positives and negatives to be found in Wednesday night’s defeat to Jurgen Klinsmann’s confident USA team who were fresh off the back of a victory against the Netherlands.

While a defeat is never desired, it is often more important to learn what does and doesn’t work and Jogi also chose to give star players such as Thomas Müller and Toni Kroos a longer summer break ahead of the European Championships next summer.

Visit my match page for more about last Wednesday night:

Germany 1 – 2 USA

However there are always chose who chose to read too much into a friendly defeat and perhaps they would do well to consider Joachim Löw’s record against Argentina since he became Bundestrainer.

He has faced the South American team five times with three defeats and two victories.

The defeats were all in friendly games.

The two victories?  A World Cup quarter-final and, of course, a certain game in Rio de Janeiro last year!

Winning when it matters!

A Pledge to all Diego Simeone and Carlo Ancelotti fans

Tags

Atletico Madrid, Ballon d'Or, Carlo Ancelotti, Coach of the Year, Diego Simeone, FIFA, Germany, Joachim Löw, Real Madrid

On Monday the FIFA World Coach of the Year award will be decided.

We all have our favourites, and we all have our opinion as to who should win, and why. You may or may not have read mine in my article Who Built the Rocket, why Joachim Löw deserves to be FIFA Coach of the Year. You may or may not agree with me.

However this is a democratic vote, decided by world coaches, captains and selected football journalists, people with great knowledge of the game, the peers of those candidates involved. Names that are respected and admired throughout the world.

I would therefore now like to make this pledge to all fans of Diego Simeone, Carlo Ancelotti, Atletico Madrid, Real Madrid and football in general.

Should either Diego Simeone or Carlo Ancelotti win FIFA Coach of the Year award on Monday, I will immediately come onto twitter and congratulate them as rightful winners, having collected the most votes in an election process.

I will not come on whinging, complaining or even childishly insulting the right of those voting to have an opinion different to mine, or, worse still, inferring that a decision I disagree with must somehow be tainted.

I now hand you, in return, perhaps the biggest challenge of all. And judging by what I have been reading lately it may prove one far greater than winning La Liga or the Champions League.

If Joachim Löw wins, let’s see if you have the grace, dignity and maturity to do likewise.

“A Whole Lotta Löw“

my Joachim Löw website

September 2014 – a busy month

Tags

Argentina, Bundesliga, Dreamball, Freiburg, Germany, Joachim Löw, Kicker magazine, Scotland, UEFA Coaches Conference

Plenty going on for Jogi last month, so a nice large Archive Month:

A Whole Lotta Löw – September 2014 Archive

My page covers his Freiburg Civic Reception, Dreamball 2014, the UEFA Coaches Conference in St Petersburg, plenty of Bundesliga watching and a major interview with Kicker magazine of which you can link to a full transcription.

Enjoy – and I have a feeling the remaining months of 2014 are going to be just as busy! In October we have two more Euro 2016 Qualifiers to look forward to, a new book and a reception in his home town of Schönau on 17 October, plus I am sure much, much more!

Bias, Criticism and showing Jürgen Klopp how to behave

Tags

Borussia Dortmund, Bundesliga, BVB, DFB, German National Team, International Football, Jürgen Klopp, Joachim Löw, Marcel Schmelzer, Mats Hummels, World Cup Qualifiers

In the absence of anything else negative to report following the two successful World Cup qualifiers and two clean sheets, the main talking point in the press on German national team matters this week has been Borussia Dortmund coach Jürgen Klopp’s ‘attack’ on Joachim Löw. The Bundestrainer has, in his opinion, ‘singled out’ his Dortmund players for criticism. This ‘singling out’ appears to originate from just two incidents, the dropping of Hummels, going through a run of poor form, from said qualifiers, and criticism of Schmelzer a year ago.

Yes, just two incidents. In twelve months.

Conveniently forgotten appear to be the numerous times Löw has praised Dortmund players, such as Ilkay Gündogan: and indeed Klopp and the club themselves, in addition to his stressing Hummels’ ‘important role’ within the national team as recent as last week.

I hope the supporters of Klopp will not mind if I feel the action of making unsubstantiated allegations of favouritism against a colleague direct to a media always eager to exaggerate a story, well aware of the effect they would have in undermining his fellow professional in the run-up to what will be a very challenging year in his career, not a particularly admirable trait. Far better surely, the behaviour of Freiburg’s Christian Streich who recently refused to take the bait of a media desperate for another “XYZ kritisiert Jogi” headline, refusing to comment on the usual loaded questions against the Bundestrainer.

If the day ever comes when a coach cannot drop and select players as he feels fit, and is not allowed to comment on a poor performance or respond to a lack of form for fear of accusations from others within his profession, I seriously fear for the future of football.

I have found in my experience that all those allied to any particular club adopt an approach best suited to the most neurotic of soap opera teenagers, feeling that their club is somehow being ‘picked on’ if the left out player comes from within their ranks. They remain, of course, conveniently silent on the matter of bias when one of their players is the one to benefit on another occasion.

As someone who sees the whole picture from another viewpoint, I see absolutely no favouritism whatsoever towards or against any club from Jogi. Any coach has the right to pick the players he wants, those he feels are in form, and those who best suit what he requires on any particular match occasion. To structure his team, and to replace and call-up as he sees fit. And that is the way it should stay. For any sport. At any level.

And those who provide the media with ammunition to fire at others should be careful. One day the tables may be turned and that metaphoric gun might just be pointing at them.

At the press conference after the Austria game, Jogi explained his reasons for selecting Boateng over Hummels were purely down to the form both has exhibited in the early Bundesliga games. While match reports and player ratings don’t always tell the full story, reading them makes it very hard to counter his opinion.

Every week throughout every land, coaches in schools and in youth sport make difficult decisions that involve selecting ‘a’ over ‘b’. For someone in such a prominent position as Klopp to accuse Löw of “favouritism” gives every schoolkid the chance to do likewise.

I have a talented 14-year-old daughter who has competed in youth sport at a national level. She was recently ‘dropped’ from her school’s ‘A’ hockey team, by a new coach who wanted to try out different defensive formations and rotate his squad. So what did I do? Did I go running and screaming into the school and accuse him of ‘singling out’ my family’? No, I told my daughter to play her best-ever game for the B’s, and make herself invaluable for the A team when she was re-instated the next week.

Guess what? She did, she was and she has been in the A’s ever since.

Perhaps those at grass roots level can sometimes teach the ones higher up the sporting ladder how to behave.

As for the resurrected comments about Schmelzer, those of us with good memories might just recall that in the days immediately following the criticism he appeared to up his game threefold, so much so that he won two man-of-the-match awards for his club within the following ten days and universal praise for his rejuvenated performances.  The predictable yellow-and-black wall of smug self-satisfaction cried out: “Jogi is being proved wrong”.

Oh no he wasn’t.  Jogi was being proved right.

——————-

Revised 19 September 2013

As it is not possible to subscribe to German Sky TV in the UK and such interviews are not available online, I am only able to refer to what Klopp is quoted as saying in the press. It is believed a later interview with ZDF, he appeared to back away from any criticism.

However the reported critical comments from Klopp’s Sky interview have been repeated in the media, with numerous discussions on social networks, particularly from Dortmund fans endorsing the alleged claims. I therefore feel I have every right and make no apology for giving my opinion and defending Jogi and his management team against what is being reported and subsequently discussed.

Netherlands 0 – 0 Germany, Amsterdam, 14 Nov 2012

Tags

Amsterdam, Deutschland, Fixtures, Football, Friendlies, Germany, Internationals, Joachim Löw, Netherlands, Niederlande, November

My match page for the last international of 2012 can be found here:
Netherlands 0 – 0 Germany.

Much was made of these November friendlies being ‘meaningless’. Clubs, with heavy schedules of domestic and Champions League games were naturally worried about possible injuries to stars, in matches that it was suggested meant little to the countries themselves, and the players’ motivation for such matches, often involving overseas travel, was questioned (except, obviously, in the case of Zlatan Ibrahimovic!).

Germany themselves lost several players with injuries ranging from the clearly genuine to the questionable. When certain ‘ill’ players are seen back in training even before the game has taken place, you wonder if a flu remedy product placement isn’t in the pipeline!

It is certainly good for any international set-up when such games can be used to give a chance to players who may not be selected in the do-or-die of an international tournament. Ultimately however the decision whether or not to experiment with line-ups must always and only be the choice of the international management teams themselves. As such coaches will have the results of such games discussed for months or even years to come, anything else can only be regarded as totally unfair.