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Ascona Diary: Jogi’s got a Temper

June 19th, 2008 | By: Jan | 14 Comments »

Bastian Schweinsteiger At least UEFA thinks so and decided to ban Joachim Löw and his Austrian colleague Joseph Hickersberger for one match, following their comedy moment in Monday’s match. One match bans can’t be appealed and neither were either of the two coaches questioned about the incident. Instead UEFA trusted the referee’s account. Manuel Mejuto, the ref in question, gave an interview to Reuters and stated: “It was the first time I ever seen trainers doing this, standing up to each other, push each other, abuse the fourth official.” This account is in stark contrast to what Joachim Löw had to say after the match: “All I said to the fourth official was that my colleague and I had every right to use the technical area. You won’t catch me criticising referees. I tried several languages to try to get him to leave us be (in the technical area). Perhaps I overstretched my politeness a bit.” Hickersberger, who also denied that he had an argument with Löw, even went a bit further and slammed the referees account as a lie. Wherever the truth lies in all of this, the fact that Mejuto thought among other things that the two coaches pushed each other discredits his view on the matter. Then again, as he also pointed out, it’s all about the kids: “All the young kids are watching and the players look to the trainers to set an example.” So, good thing all the young kids aren’t watching the referees, otherwise they might come to the conclusion that it’s OK to screw up because your employee will back you up.

In other encouraging news: Lukas Podolski took a knock to his calf and Torsten Frings suffered a fractured rip in the Austria match and both are doubtful for tonight’s quarter-final against Portugal. This could give Mario Gomez yet another chance to prove his qualities, while either Simon Rolfes or Thomas Hitzelsperger could replace Frings.

National team manager Oliver Bierhoff has promised that the team will meet with their fans after the Euros, to make up for the absence of public training sessions this tournament. An exception from the rule was made for 100 school kids from a nearby town, who were allowed to see a training session of Germany’s bench-warmers on Tuesday, while the players who were involved in the Austria game nursed their bruises in the gym. With the benefit of hindsight and judging by the lacklustre displays of the team during the group stage, you might wonder whether the odd public training session with enthusiastic Germany fans would have helped to get some Euro vibe going inside the squad.

While Germany hasn’t even been eliminated yet, Bernhard Peters - advisor of the national team and former candidate for the DFB’s sporting director position - already started criticising the tournament preparations by stating: “I’m not sure whether all possibilities have been exhausted during the pre-tournament training camp.” Whatever that means, but at least he can claim to have said it first.

Meanwhile Portugal’s coach Felipe Scolari pulled off a little psychological warfare stunt by reading out the height of some German players and comparing it to his Portuguese dwarfs, presumably demonstrating his knowledge of Germany’s game plan. The English press is loving it in anticipation of his Chelsea days. Germany had to rely on Mad Jens and his secret recipe to deal with Ronaldo for their share of mind games.

Tags: Euro 2008, Felipe Scolari, Germany, Germany National Team News, Joachim Löw, Lukas Podolski, Mario Gomez, Portugal, Simon Rolfes, Thomas Hitzelsperger, Torsten Frings

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Comments

By goose | June 19th, 2008 at 10:52 am

i never thought i would ever say this;

GO germany!!! beat them hand-bags tonight

and hope well meet in the final!!

grusse aus Holland

Posted from Netherlands

By FengFox19 | June 19th, 2008 at 10:55 am

oh well, as someone I read on the net stated that, Gomez needs mushroom to become the Super Mario he’s used to be… So all I want is that, right now, he can find the DAMN mushroom, again, once and for all.
Frings outs? Shiit, so maybe it is the chance to change, god knows? Maybe it is the day of Hitz/Rolfes (it’s like a pray than a fact)
But, at least, we won’t see Loew doing nasty things and Frings’ bullshit long passes!
Weiter Deutschland!

Posted from Australia

By diana | June 19th, 2008 at 10:59 am

Since when Jogi ever critcised referees? Not that I remember of. Even Reuters reported he does not have a track record of it. As what Reuters had said very well - ‘Joachim Loew, the mild man of German football, is the last coach you would expect to pick up a UEFA ban for blowing his top on the touchline.’

http://sports.yahoo.com/sow/news?slug=reu-eurogermanyloew_newsmaker&prov=reuters&type=lgns

Like Bierhoff, the German football officials, I’m not happy with the verdict. I can probably go forever but, Reuters Soccer Blog probably said it best - ‘To stunned Germans, it feels like an innocent bystander got whacked around for trying to help. It seems like Loew first got arrested and has now been convicted for being a Good Samaritan.’ (http://blogs.reuters.com/soccer/2008/06/19/germans-incensed-by-another-harsh-penalty/)

It doesn’t pay to be nice all the time. I used to be wronged before in life (actually this happens back in school) and so I can kind of understand the position Jogi is in right now. I was once accused of something I never committed and I was not able to defend myself. I was really hurt and angry then. I tried to state my case but it fell on deaf ears.

Okay, the teletext on the living room TV screen (where I am typing this from) reported that he never insulted the fourth official. I don’t feel like replaying the event in Vienna in my head all over again… I felt sick when I saw it again when watching the preview show on the pay-TV when the incident was played. I even felt like slamming the newspapers I was reading today when giving the reason for Jogi’s ’suspension’ - bickering. Or something like that.

Posted from Singapore

By diana | June 19th, 2008 at 11:02 am

Goose, thanks. Nice of you…

Posted from Singapore

By Beethoven | June 19th, 2008 at 12:46 pm

Compliments, Diana, many compliments. AND THANKS.

Posted from Germany

By Beethoven | June 19th, 2008 at 12:48 pm

Goose:
Thanks !
I think you will win the Cup.

But I hope against Germany…

Posted from germany

By Bingo | June 19th, 2008 at 4:27 pm

It was a pity that Portugal lost the game but Germany did it pretty good, well done guys!

By FengFeng | June 19th, 2008 at 4:32 pm

Well, Loew is gaining love again.
He is the man, and the team is so well consolidated! Rolfes, Schweini have a decent game. Hitzl is well enough to do his job but not spectacular.
But in the end, I think it is a positive sign. Hey “cup”, we are going to you….

Posted from Australia

By Goethe | June 19th, 2008 at 5:59 pm

If wr should be forced to bow out from now on e will certainly have gathered enough honours in order not to hide our heads in shame.

P. fr. Germany

By Nobody You Know | June 21st, 2008 at 10:14 am

Well Diana, it is not the first time that FIFA decided to ban a critical German player or this time coach from a very important game. Remember 2006 and Frings having to sit on the sidelines against Italy? Sure they banned the other culprits as well. The others just didn’t have game in the cup left. What will FIFA ban next time it matters?
Can you think of something? I think they should take the ball away from the German team in the next big game, so they can top their own biased decisions. Hey you guys from Germany, don’t touch that ball in the next game or you will be banned from future events, as long as we are FIFA.

By Hosrt | June 21st, 2008 at 11:37 am

… next one will be Volkan to be back in team at semifinal. I bet.

Posted from Germany

By diana | June 21st, 2008 at 2:04 pm

‘Remember 2006 and Frings having to sit on the sidelines against Italy?’
I still remembered that very well. Actually when I learned about Loew’s ban from the dugout, Frings’ incident just came back to me straightaway. I was worried something bad may happen like it did two years ago but in the end, Germany beat Portugal.

I was reading Reuters Soccer Blog on the day of the match (this was before the kick-off) and it was asking are there influential people who don’t want to see Germany succeed again (given in view there’s three European Championship titles, three World Cup titles to date for Germany). I don’t like to think of conspiracy theories but that got me thinking ahead of the match against the Portugese.

This was what I was referring to (I have posted the link here earlier but for those who have not seen it) - http://blogs.reuters.com/soccer/2008/06/19/germans-incensed-by-another-harsh-penalty/

Posted from Singapore

By Nobody You Know | June 21st, 2008 at 2:43 pm

thanks for the link, Diana

By Horst | June 24th, 2008 at 4:22 pm

… and again UEFA tries to interfere a concentrated preparation:

http://google.de/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.kicker.de%2Fnews%2Ffussball%2Fem%2Fstartseite%2Fartikel%2F380116%2F&hl=en&ie=UTF8&sl=de&tl=en

Posted from Germany

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