At least in terms of results, his debut as national coach could not have gone better. After the 4:1 against Armenia, however, Hansi Flick named points where he still needs to make a start.
Just a few minutes before Germany’s 1:0 in Armenia, a very decisive sentence had been uttered – it came from the coaching zone. “Better play flat “ should the German national team, according to national coach Hansi Flick, because they had hardly been able to get through decisively in their dominant opening phase.
Flick’s instruction was implemented – and led directly to a goal: Hofmann and Müller played a low one-two on the right, and the Gladbach player’s subsequent cross was at best half-high. Havertz, the target player, scored with a technically impressive finish.
The starting record is extended
In the seventh match under Flick – that is a starting record for a national coach – Germany celebrated their seventh victory, which was quite clear in the end with 4:1. Nevertheless, there were other points besides the height in the passing game where Bayern’s “sextuple” coach (“It wasn’t all good”) wants to tackle by the World Cup in about a year’s time.
The national coach criticised “positioning and precision” in the game with the ball, but much more glaring was the switching after losing the ball. Again and again, Armenia exposed this weakness in a German team that was weakened in terms of personnel on Sunday evening.
Weak spot in the rest of the defence
“It’s normal that this can go right through to your own goal with such strong opponents,” Flick appeased, but it was “important when we press so high that we have a good remaining defence – that wasn’t the case today.”
Part of the truth of the seven wins in seven games is, of course, that the opponents were not of a calibre that would be a real test for an ambitious DFB team. So Flick (“We will analyse carefully”) and his coaching team still have work to do, but the 56-year-old, whose satisfaction is not always apparent, emphasised with a good dose of confidence in his voice: “We still have time. “
