Jogi Löw

Some interesting points brought up.

I personally think Jogi has stagnated a bit. I think other NTs are finding Germany out, as tends to happen when a coach sticks with the same system for too long. The players have changed of course, but many teams know now that Germany just aren't solid defensively. They know how to pressure that backline and due to lack of experience playing together, it often cracks under the pressure.

McLewis wrote:The players have changed of course, but many teams know now that Germany just aren't solid defensively. They know how to pressure that backline and due to lack of experience playing together, it often cracks under the pressure.

Hm. I guess you have a point there - Löw has played a different backline in almost every match. I think it would be advisable for him to try and stay with a fixed backline for some matches. I guess his main problem in that respect is the fact that there will always be some discontents.

Normally he should just chose the Bayern backline (Lahm, Boateng, Badstuber) plus an LB as they are used to play together. But that would mean leaving out Hummels and/or Höwedes, which gets many people upset. Unfortunately, using Hummels or Höwedes means putting them between Lahm (RB) and Badstuber (LCB), which nullifies their experience of playing together at Bayern (moreover as currently Dante is in the mix, too).

Of course right now it is mote anyway as Badstuber won't be back from his injury until April or May 2013, so I guess we might see Lahm - Boateng - Hummels - Schmelzer which probably makes some sense even though Höwedes is probably better than Boateng, but NTs always have the problem that they have very limited time to allow players to actually develop a blind understanding.

The Franchise wrote:Getting the most out what he has.

Is he doing that though? Klopp's Dortmund basically consists of Germany's bench and second string players (Weidenfeller, Schmelzer, Gündogan, Kehl, Bender, Großkreutz, Götze) and he's getting a lot more out of them than Löw does with supposedly better players which he picks for the national team.

I don't rate Löw. Since he went away from the 2010 counterattacking outfit to a more proactive possession-based approach, the team is leaking goals left and right. I'm not even talking about the Sweden or Switzerland games. Conceding 2 goals in the Euros to a busparking team like Greece was even weirder in my book. Persisting to play the likes of Podolski and not Reus, the Bundesliga player of the year, against Italy was comical. Persisting to play an unfit Schweinsteiger throughout the tournament made no sense.

Reaching the semis with Germany is really a non-achievement. Germany would reach the semis in a World Cup if a monkey were sitting on the bench. Proof: Klinsmann 2006. And the "attractive football" is a result of the German youth policy.

futbol wrote:

The Franchise wrote:Getting the most out what he has.

Is he doing that though? Klopp's Dortmund basically consists of Germany's bench and second string players (Weidenfeller, Schmelzer, Gündogan, Kehl, Bender, Großkreutz, Götze) and he's getting a lot more out of them than Löw does with supposedly better players which he picks for the national team.

I don't rate Löw. Since he went away from the 2010 counterattacking outfit to a more proactive possession-based approach, the team is leaking goals left and right. I'm not even talking about the Sweden or Switzerland games. Conceding 2 goals in the Euros to a busparking team like Greece was even weirder in my book. Persisting to play the likes of Podolski and not Reus, the Bundesliga player of the year, against Italy was comical. Persisting to play an unfit Schweinsteiger throughout the tournament made no sense.

Reaching the semis with Germany is really a non-achievement. Germany would reach the semis in a World Cup if a monkey were sitting on the bench. Proof: Klinsmann 2006. And the "attractive football" is a result of the German youth policy.

I didnt include Low on that list of great coaches. He isnt quite yet a great coach in my opinion.

futbol wrote:Is he doing that though? Klopp's Dortmund basically consists of Germany's bench and second string players (Weidenfeller, Schmelzer, Gündogan, Kehl, Bender, Großkreutz, Götze) and he's getting a lot more out of them than Löw does with supposedly better players which he picks for the national team.

You make one mistake there. Löw only has his players for a handful of days or weeks (which is especially valid for friendlies and qualification games), while Klopp, Heynckes etc. have them day in and day out. Moreover, "Germany's bench" at Dortmund are integrated in a nicely working complete team that has some very important players not from Germany additionally, especially in defense and attack. If you only take the BVB-Germans and put them together with the Bayern players and a handful others, you can't really expect them to work as homogenous group right away.

futbol wrote:I don't rate Löw. Since he went away from the 2010 counterattacking outfit to a more proactive possession-based approach, the team is leaking goals left and right. I'm not even talking about the Sweden or Switzerland games. Conceding 2 goals in the Euros to a busparking team like Greece was even weirder in my book. Persisting to play the likes of Podolski and not Reus, the Bundesliga player of the year, against Italy was comical. Persisting to play an unfit Schweinsteiger throughout the tournament made no sense.

Well, again this is very much a problem of the players simply not playing often enough together. I would love to see more NT matches, but even now the club people howl in desperation if their precious players are forced to play for their NTs. How do you expect everything to work like clockwork and with blind understanding when they simply can't train often enough together?

futbol wrote:Reaching the semis with Germany is really a non-achievement. Germany would reach the semis in a World Cup if a monkey were sitting on the bench. Proof: Klinsmann 2006. And the "attractive football" is a result of the German youth policy.

Your proof is in fact a non-proof as practically everybody in Germany got the impression that Klinsmann was only the figurehead while Löw actually ran the show from behind. In 2006 the team wasn't far enough in their development yet as it was more or less a team in transition still. But nonetheless, they already looked pretty good.

Your proof is in fact a non-proof as practically everybody in Germany got the impression that Klinsmann was only the figurehead while Löw actually ran the show from behind.

And what proof do you have for this? Loew is literally using the same fast break counter attacking system and its formation requisites that Klinsmann used which is why Bierhoff even credited Klinsmann for creating an effective blueprint which would suit Germany.

@Arqui

Unfortunately none I could link. I just listened to quite a lot of discussion rounds and interviews etc. where this was discussed quite thoroughly.

rwo power wrote:@Arqui

Unfortunately none I could link. I just listened to quite a lot of discussion rounds and interviews etc. where this was discussed quite thoroughly.

Ok I trust your opinion of this so don't bother finding a link. While Loew has done a far better job then Klinsmann, he cannot be credited for running the show given Klinsmann brought the tactical blueprint to the German squad.

Well, in Germany the conviction is far-spread that Jürgen Klinsmann was mostly the motivator and frontman, while Jogi Löw was responsible for the tactical approach. If you look at the mess Klinsmann caused on his own in Bayern, this idea is probably not so far-fetched.

rwo power wrote:Well, in Germany the conviction is far-spread that Jürgen Klinsmann was mostly the motivator and frontman, while Jogi Löw was responsible for the tactical approach. If you look at the mess Klinsmann caused on his own in Bayern, this idea is probably not so far-fetched.

Like I said, Bierhoff worked closely with him along with hailing his tactical blueprint along with Sieganthaler adhering to his blueprints on scouting within 2005 before the World Cup.

Klinsmann's mess has little to do with Germany given he formulated a different system based on the squad within that time as it simply was not practical. Same case with Loew's Stuttgart where he formulated a different system based more on possession and not similar to the current Germany system. Therefore both cannot be judged by their teams managed outside the German NT.

Well, to get back to the start of the thread, there have probably been a couple of aspects that have to be taken into account when you judge Jog Löws performance:

1) Team building.
Here he is utterly boss. Although he is a bit biased towards Southern Germany (which used to mean Stuttgart and Bayern, but now mostly means Bayern), he does not shy away from introducing young players to the squad very, very early. The fast-paced attack isn't his making, but ingrained in the German academy system, but he does manage to make it click.

2) Tactics.
Here he is lacking. His team crumbling under pressure funnily almost always happens when the defense starts to sit deeper. As long as Germany try to run the show, they're fine. Once they try to react, they sink. Löw hasn't understood this yet. This hybrid of possession and a deep line does not work for Germany.

The team worked well in 2010 as a counter-attacking team, and it worked well after that maintaining possession, and waiting for openings in the opposing defense, but every time he switched the team to be more defensive, the defense collapsed. Ironic, but true.

I also believe he f*cked up in 2010 and 2012 against Spain first, then Italy. Both times he made the same mistake, demonstrating a lack of balls: he switched our team, which had been working reasonably well in both tournaments, to a more defensively-oriented outfit before both deciding matches, and we went on to lose both of them.

At least in 2010 we were lacking Müller, though any decision would have been better than trying to replace him with Trochowski, of all people, especially considering Marins form back in that year, and basically the same mistake again in 2012 - he takes off Müller, the closest thing Germany has to a big-game player besides Neuer, for Kroos, who is great, but, and take notice here, not a winger - Germany loses all width on the field, Italys oberlapping FBs and wingers laugh at us, they cross to Balotelli - 1 - 0, and this is where I lost my patience with Löw.

I apreciate what he did for the team, how he built it up from the ground, and I'd rather keep him than replace him by a mediocre coach, but if we could get someone like Hitzfeld, Klopp, or even Heynckes or Rangnick, I'd fire Löw like that.

That being said, there was another point raised:
3) Lack of trophies.
This actually only became a concern for me in 2012.
I, like basically all Germans, had no illusions before most tournaments. I was sure we wouldn't go deep in 2006, considering our team consisted half of scrubs, and half of kids, and was pleasantly surprised.
In 2008 our injury list made it absolutely clear to me, we wouldn't go deep. I was frankly shocked that we made it to the final.
Though that was mostly due to the switch to 4-2-3-1 mid-tournament which took a lot of pressure off our defense.

In 2010, we played all-kids. This time I expected us to go quite deep, Semis at least, unless we met Brazil or Spain, I figured. Before Argentina I thought we were 50-50 to go past them. Turned out better than expected. But this was an incredibly young team, our main playmaker was a 20 year old Özil with 0 international experience, our #1 goalkeeper had been injured, our captain and best player, Ballack, was out, then came Westermann who was posed to be heading our defense - yes, Khedira and Piggy stepped up big time, but we missed one of the best players in the world in that tournament, when Ballack got his foot stomped.

In 2012... We should have won. Or at least gone out to Spain. This one was on Löw, and it bugs me.

So Löw is a great coach, he's a great team builder, but I actually think he's probably more suited for a club, where he has more time with his team. I don't think his vision is doable with the time he's got at a NT, also his aversion to risk-taking works brilliantly in a league system, it just killed us in the knockouts when he made the wrong call.

I really think he's a world class coach, I just think we can do better, and I think his one flaw is pretty fatal.

The post above me pretty much says it clearly, i think the players germany have are too talented for them to do too bad, and maybe some of Low's credit can be depreciated there, he has managed though to be unable to fight to expose his team's strengths in order to win, opting to try to close down the opponent and failing in the end by making his team look weak when compared to other performances...

Reminds me of mourinho's madrid against barcelona in the semi finals of the cl two years actually, he was betting to close down the opponent and didnt do enough with his own team's strength..Heck to get to what he wanted to do, the inter team would have arguably done better...And did...

My problem with Loew is that his team usually plays great football, and then they reach a semi-final and he subsequently sets up the team to play in a more conservative fashion that the team is not used to playing at all, which inevitably leads to a loss. If he had the confidence to play the same way throughout the tournament then he would fare better.

Well, I still hope Löw is able to learn. If he lets the boys play fresh and attacking from begin to end in 2014, I have high expectations.

Well, that was basically the whole point of my wall of text on the last page: Löw doesn't play to our strenghts, which is a shame.