FIFA World Cup: Germany gunning for glory

The Germans have lost just once in 23 games since their Euro 2016 semi-final defeat, cruising through the qualifiers with 10 wins in 10 matches and conceding just four goals in the process to advance to the World Cup. 

Coach Joachim Low also had the luxury of being able to field a second-string team at last year’s Confederations Cup and still come away with the title, further adding to an already deep German bench. 

The coach, in charge for his third World Cup, has a pool of at least three dozen players to choose from before his Group F campaign against Mexico, Sweden and South Korea. 

A core of 2014 World Cup winners, including Thomas Muller, Mats Hummels, Jerome Boateng, Sami Khedira, Toni Kroos and Mesut Ozil, will form the team’s experienced backbone. But not everyone’s starting spot is guaranteed, with world-class players such as Leroy Sane, Timo Werner, Julian Draxler, Ilkay Guendogan, Mario Goetze and Marco Reus among those battling for their places. 

There are still some question marks regarding the fitness of World Cup-winning keeper Manuel Neuer, who missed the season due to a foot injury and only recently returned to training. 

Neuer was an unused substituted as Bayern went down to Eintracht Frankfurt in last Saturday’s DFB-Pokal final, meaning only friendlies against Austria and Saudi Arabia remain either side of Low’s June 4 squad deadline. 

Nevertheless, the coach is confident a player who had a key role in Germany’s World Cup success in Brazil four years ago is on track. “I’m optimistic and I assume that Manuel Neuer is able to make it,” he said. 

Neuer was given squad number one in Germany’s party earlier this week. “He has now been back in Bayern’s training for more than two weeks and has reached the maximum load of physical demand. I think he can maintain this load in our training camp.” 

“Only Manuel himself can evaluate in the end if he still has subconscious fears. He promised us that we’ll talk about that honestly. He is aware of his responsibility for himself and the team as well.” 

Despite this confidence, Low reiterated that the onus remains on Neuer to prove his fitness. 

“Manuel goes to the World Cup as a player who is a 100 per cent ready to play - otherwise he won’t,” he added. “It won’t be that he only goes with us as a captain who just sits on the bench.” 

Only 21 have experienced the joy of claiming the FIFA World Cup Trophy twice. Not surprisingly, as five-time world champion, Brazil account for the largest contingent of multiple winners. Fourteen of the players who contributed to the nation’s first world title in 1958 also played a part in the second in 1962, among them the iconic figures of Garrincha, Didi, Vava and Nilton Santos. Eight years later, only one member of that legendary side remained: Pele, the only player in World Cup history to have won it three times. As for Ronaldo and Cafu, they both took part in the victorious campaigns of 1994 and 2002.

Aside from the Auriverdes, four Italian players have also hoisted the Trophy aloft twice. Goalkeeper Guido Masetti, defender Eraldo Monzeglio, midfielder Giovanni Ferrari, and fabled forward Giuseppe Meazza were all involved in La Nazionale’s first World Cup win in 1934 and helped retain the title in 1938. The final member of this elite multiple winners’ club is Argentina’s Daniel Passarella, who captained La Albiceleste to its maiden world crown in 1978 and was part of the squad that secured its second at Mexico 1986. Of the thousands of players who have graced the event on 20 occasions it has been held to date, only a very select band of 422 have had the honour of winning the Trophy.