Captain and goalscorer Alexandra Popp posed at the marketing days in the DFB academy in Frankfurt while celebrating a goal, surrounded by beaming teammates.
National coach Martina Voss-Tecklenburg would of course also like to see her national team in the endurance tests against the Netherlands this Friday (8 p.m. / live stream on sportstudio.de) in Sittard and against Brazil next Tuesday (6 p.m. / ARD) in Nuremberg.
DFB team before stress tests
“These are two teams that will stress us out,” predicted the 55-year-old. “Our players need this experience. We are also willing to accept mistakes.” In any case, Voss-Tecklenburg is entering the important phase of the World Cup preparations strengthened: On Monday, the German Football Association announced that their contract had been extended until the 2025 European Championships, which UEFA has since awarded to Switzerland.
“We absolutely feel that the World Cup is now on the way,” said Wolfsburg goalkeeper Merle Frohms. “We don’t have that much time as a national team. Every day together here is very valuable.” Against the Netherlands, with coach Andries Jonker, who also coached the men at VfL Wolfsburg and has been responsible for the Oranje women since September, they want to appear “dominant”. On June 24th and July 7th there are still two home games against previously unnamed opponents as part of the World Cup preparations in Herzogenaurach. Departure for Australia is on July 11th.
After the somewhat sobering 0-0 draw against Sweden in Duisburg in the first international match of the year, ex-European champions Netherlands and especially Brazil offer interesting position determinations. The Vice World Champions from 2007 won the final of the Copa America last year against Colombia – preliminary round opponents of the German selection alongside Morocco and South Korea at the World Cup from July 20th to August 20th in Australia and New Zealand.
Upcoming games as a location determination
After the 2019 World Cup in the quarter-finals against Sweden and missing out on the Olympics, second place at the 2022 European Championships in England only gives limited information about where the German team is now in a global comparison. In the test matches in the USA in autumn, Popp and Co. landed a remarkable victory against the American World Cup title holders, but lost the second game. Olympic champion Canada is also one of the World Cup favorites. And Brazil could be Germany’s opponent in the round of 16 at the World Cup.
“They are two really cool games,” said Sydney Lohmann from FC Bayern about the double pack around Easter. Voss-Tecklenburg will have to postpone the comeback of Melanie Leupolz first: The midfielder from Chelsea, who gave birth to a son six months ago, is being operated on for a broken nose, but is not leaving. The long-term injured Giulia Gwinn and Linda Dallmann from Munich and Lena Lattwein from Wolfsburg (broken collarbone) are also missing.
