Euro Aftermath: Critical Players, Uncritical Fans

 
Following the Euro final defeat against Spain, around 100.000 fans at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin tried their best to cheer up the national team. This will probably have helped soothe the pain a bit for the players and the fans got some free merchandise.

We won’t have to worry though, that this reception could cloud the players’ judgement. Basically all of them are determined to improve, iron out mistakes and go one better in two years. Selected Quotes:

“We still have a very young team and I don’t think that in this tournament we were able to show the quality that we did in 2006 and qualification.” - Christoph Metzelder

“We have to improve in almost every part of our team, but that doesn’t mean that everything was bad - we reached the final of the European Championship. We hope that we can improve from these games and learn from them. We are still a young side and a good squad that wants to improve.” - An improving Torsten Frings

“We still have a considerable amount to learn both technically and tactically.” - Michael Ballack

So, the players are ready to learn and improve. Jogi Löw is ready to analyse the tournament in more detail. This should bode well for the upcoming World Cup qualifiers.