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Ex-Arsenal coach Arsène Wenger
Photo: RUNGROJ YONGRIT / EPA
For Arsène Wenger, the fact that the German national soccer team was eliminated after the group stage at the World Cup in Qatar is also due to the excessive focus on "political protest".
That said the former Arsenal FC coach, who now works for Fifa as director for global football promotion, at an appointment with the world association.
As an envoy of Fifa's "Technical Study Group", Wenger was to present the analysis results for the World Cup group phase in the media center in Doha together with ex-national coach Jürgen Klinsmann.
In addition to the presentation of the data, Wenger also included a dig.
"When you come to a World Cup, you know you can't lose your first game," Wenger said.
"Teams that have experience and have achieved good results in recent tournaments, such as France, England and Brazil, played well in the first game." The three nations mentioned had all won their opening game.
Wenger praised these teams as "teams that were mentally ready and had the mindset to focus on sporting competition and not on political protest."
"One Love" bandage caused discussions
A reference that, in addition to other nations that have already been eliminated, such as Denmark and Belgium, should primarily be aimed at the German national team.
Before the start of the tournament, DFB captain Manuel Neuer was briefly forbidden from appearing with the "One Love" bandage on his arm.
The seven other European teams that wanted to send a signal against discrimination in the emirate with the armband had to switch to the official FIFA armband under threat of sporting penalties.
The German team expressed their dissatisfaction with the ban by covering their mouths in the team photo before the opening game against Japan.
Germany lost the game 1:2 and was eliminated after the preliminary round.
However, Wenger, who is considered a supporter of Fifa President Gianni Infantino and who repeatedly praised hosts Qatar for the tournament during the event, was unable to prove the connection with the "One Love" controversy.
The tournament provided enough counter-examples for Wenger's thesis: The politically silent Argentinians were also defeated by outsiders Saudi Arabia 1:2 at the start, Asian champions Qatar themselves were eliminated with the weakest record of all preliminary round teams.
The DFB team, however, did not get past the group stage in Russia in 2018 – without any political gestures.
Klinsmann presented the more likely explanation: there was simply a lack of exploitation of chances.
The DFB team had by far the most shot attempts of all teams in the World Cup group stage, 67 shots are more than three times as many as the round of 16 teams Poland or Australia (20 each) managed.
"We in Germany are discussing whether a real nine, like Miroslav Klose used to be, would have been the more efficient solution," said Klinsmann.
There is a lack of real goalscorers who also use the chances.
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