The German national team has played twice in the Nations League with Joshua Kimmich and once without him. And it was precisely the game in which Kimmich did not play that the DFB team won. That sparked another round of discussion.
In any case, there was criticism of the midfielder’s performance. Several experts felt that the midfield looked significantly better with Tom Bischof, Aleksandar Pavlovic, and Florian Wirtz.
This is, of course, a topic that national team coach Jürgen Klopp would prefer not to bring up at all. He reiterated this at the press conference ahead of the German team’s match against Greece on Sunday.
Klopp Speaks Plainly on the Kimmich Debate
One of the questions from the journalists present concerned Kimmich and the criticism directed at the midfielder.“Themidfield putina very good performance againstSerbia . But why should any one player always playin the future ? You also have to be in good form to play,” Klopp explained by way of introduction.
He then continued:“Youdon’t play for yourclubeither if you’re not in form . You need differenttypes of players: you need leaders, you need players who runa lot , you need allkinds of players. Fortunately, we have more than just three good midfielders. Just imagine if we only had three. No one who’s good needs to worry about anything here.”
Addressing the media present, the national team coach added: “Do whatever you want. I’m totally happy.” This implies that Klopp knows that, in theory, a story can be made out of anything, but he recognizes Kimmich’s qualities and wants to integrate them into his game for the long term.
Above all, it’s about properly integrating Kimmich when he plays and strengthening the structure of the entire team so that everyone benefits.
