Lothar Matthäus describes letting Andreas Brehme take the penalty in the 1990 World Cup final as “the best decision he ever made”. He didn’t take the penalty “because I had new shoes on,” explained the 62-year-old in the podcast “Playmaker – The European Championship Talk with Sebastian Hellmann and 360Media”.
Brehme, who died on Tuesday night at the age of 63, converted the penalty kick in Rome for a 1-0 win against Argentina and shot Germany to their third World Cup title. He decided not to take the penalty “in order not to risk the team’s success,” emphasized Matthäus.
The podcast was recorded before Brehme’s death. The Hamburg native and Matthäus had played together for many years in the national team, at FC Bayern Munich and for Inter Milan. “We were roommates, with the national team and with Inter Milan. We often spent 100 nights a year together,” Matthäus told the “Augsburger Allgemeine” (Wednesday): “This friendship wasn’t over even after our careers. It’s really, as if a family member had died.”
