Colombia and Morocco progressed at the expense of the two-time world champions, who couldn't beat South Korea. What on earth happened?
The biggest shock in the history of the Women’s World Cup. That’s what Germany’s group stage exit on Thursday was. The two-time champions had never tasted failure like this, always reaching at least the quarter-finals of the tournament. But after they could only muster up a 1-1 draw against South Korea, and Morocco beat Colombia, the unthinkable happened. They were out.
Only 12 months ago, Martina Voss-Tecklenburg’s side were in the final of the Euros, so close to winning a ninth title on the continent. With a young side that was a year better and a year more experienced, they were one of the biggest favourites to win this World Cup. They were the favourites to win their group, at the very least, sat 15 FIFA world ranking places higher than South Korea, 23 above Colombia and 70 above Morocco.
But an uninspiring performance in Brisbane, which followed a dramatic 2-1 defeat to Colombia, was their downfall. The stunned looks on the faces of Germany’s players at full-time said it all. A handful were reduced to tears but most simply stood there in disbelief, unable to fathom their fate.
How do you go from being the front-runners to win the World Cup to crashing out in the group stages for the first time in history?
GettyHigh expectations
At Wembley last July, Germany were so close to a ninth European title. Exciting winger Klara Buhl had to miss the final due to Covid and Alexandra Popp pulled out with an injury in the warm-up but it still took an extra-time goal for England to come through and win their first major tournament.
With the likes of 23-year-old Giulia Gwinn, 20-year-old Lena Oberdorf and 19-year-old Jule Brand starting the game, while several young talents also came off the bench, it felt like Germany were in a good place. Voss-Tecklenburg certainly thought so.
"We’ve already said this tournament is a stepping stone in our development," she said afterwards. "It wasn’t enough now but this leads us to the next step.
"At the World Cup, I think we will be able to look back at today’s game because such a game changes personalities. These situations make you grow no matter the result – but even with a negative result, that’s why we will continue on this path."
As well as those talented youngsters, several in this Germany team came into the World Cup in a wonderful place. Wolfsburg, who had more players in the squad than any other club, just reached the Women’s Champions League final, after all. No wonder expectations were high.
AdvertisementGettyInjuries
But one thing that did hinder Germany at this tournament was injuries – all of them in defence.
At right-back, they were missing Gwinn, who tore her ACL last October and didn’t recover in time for the trip to Australia. On the opposite flank, Carolin Simon suffered an ACL rupture in the team’s final friendly before the World Cup, a surprise defeat to Zambia, and Felicitas Rauch picked up a knee problem in training after the team’s opening game.
In the heart of defence, there were also problems. Marina Hegering, who shone at the Euros last summer, was unavailable for the first two games due to an ankle injury and Sara Doorsoun had to come off at half-time in the shock defeat to Colombia because of a muscular issue.
None of this was ideal, of course, but with the depth in Germany’s squad, surely there would be a solution…
GettyMakeshift full-backs
The solutions that Voss-Tecklenburg opted for, though, were certainly questionable.
Despite trialling both Sarai Linder and Sophia Kleinherne at right-back in the build-up to this tournament, she opted to start experienced winger Svenja Huth there in all three games instead. Kleinherne was in the World Cup squad but didn’t see a minute of action. Linder was left at home. Maximiliane Rall, the Bayern Munich right-back, was also not called up.
Meanwhile, Chantal Hagel, a left-footed midfielder, was deployed at left-back in a four-player defence. It meant that Germany had just two recognised defenders in their starting line-ups for the defeat to Colombia and the draw against South Korea.
Was this really the best solution? It seemed slightly baffling that Voss-Tecklenburg had not opted for a change of formation to mask her team’s weaknesses. After all, holding midfielder Lena Oberdorf has a lot of experience at centre-back and could’ve easily slotted in there to form a back three, with there plenty of strong options in the squad for wing-back roles.
But the flat back four left the two centre-backs exposed and resulted in a dysfunctional back line, something which both Colombia and South Korea exposed.
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GettyFlaws on show
These weaknesses were not exactly a secret, either. South Korea boss Colin Bell certainly knew about them, anyway.
“Our strategy was to press and get behind the full-backs if we could,” he explained after the game, adding that he started Casey Phair and Chun Ga-ram, two young forwards, specifically to expose Germany’s defence with their energy. “We knew we could put the centre-backs under pressure and that mistakes were possible if the pressure was there.
“[Huth and Hagel] are not full-backs. They are not learnt full-backs and don’t have the schooling of a full-back. We wanted to target those areas and it worked. We wanted to target both full-backs because they are very good players, but they are not full-backs.”
“That’s some input we will accept and think about alternatives but we created the formation in the way that we thought was best,” Voss-Tecklenburg said when told of Bell’s comments. “If the result is not what you want you have to accept the responsibility.”