Soccer World Cup 2002 / Germany

This article covers the German national team at the 2002 World Cup .

qualification

Germany had to compete against England, Finland, Albania and Greece, trained by Otto Rehhagel - not an easy group, especially since only the first qualified directly.

The start was promising: Four wins in a row, including a 1-0 win over England at Wembley . Since the English only reached a draw in Finland, a direct qualification should only be a matter of form. In the next game there was only a 2-2 win against Finland, but that was ironed out by an away win in Albania. In the following home game against England a draw would have been enough for direct qualification.

Germany took the lead after nine minutes with a goal from Carsten Jancker , but England almost equalized in return with Michael Owen . The English succeeded in almost everything in the following. The stormy attacking Germans were mercilessly countered. In the end it was 5-1 for England. The direct qualification was a long way off.

On the last day of the match Germany played against Finland and England against Greece. The Germans were hoping for the help of the Hellenes, who would wrest at least one draw from the English. Greece led until the 90th minute before Beckham equalized with a controversial free kick. If Germany had won, first place in the table and thus direct qualification would have been guaranteed, but in an extremely weak game only a goalless draw was achieved.

Germany had to play two playoffs against Ukraine as second in the group. On November 10, 2001 a tie was reached in Kiev. Four days later Germany qualified in Dortmund with a 4-1 victory. Germany had already led 3-0 after fifteen minutes.

After the defeat against England and the missed direct qualification, there were many critical voices in Germany who viewed German football as not competitive. The convincing appearance of the Germans in the play-offs against Ukraine was hailed as a rebirth of German football.

Qualifying games of Germany
date	place	encounter	Result	Gates
2.9.2000	Hamburg	Germany - Greece	2: 0 (1: 0)	1-0 Deisler (17th), 2-0 Ouzounidis (75th, own goal)
October 7, 2000	London	England - Germany	0: 1 (0: 1)	0: 1 D. Hamann (14th)
March 24, 2001	Leverkusen	Germany - Albania	2: 1 (1: 1)	1: 0 Deisler (50th), 1: 1 Kola (66th), 2: 1 Klose (88th)
March 28, 2001	Athens	Greece - Germany	2: 4 (2: 2)	0: 1 Rehmer (6th), 1: 1 Charisteas (21st), 1: 2 Ballack (25th, penalty), 2: 2 Georgiadis (43rd), 2: 3 Klose (82nd), 2: 4 Bode (90.)
2.6.2001	Helsinki	Finland - Germany	2: 2 (2: 0)	1-0 Forssell (29th), 2-0 Forssell (43rd), 2: 1 Ballack (69th, penalty), 2: 2 Jancker (72nd)
June 6, 2001	Tirana	Albania - Germany	0: 2 (0: 1)	0: 1 Rehmer (28th), 0: 2 Ballack (68th)
September 1, 2001	Munich	Germany - England	1: 5 (1: 2)	1: 0 Jancker (6th), 1: 1 Owen (12th), 1: 2 Gerrard (45th), 1: 3 Owen (48th), 1: 4 Owen (66th), 1: 5 Heskey ( 74.)
10/6/2001	Gelsenkirchen	Germany - Finland	0-0
Playoffs
date	place	encounter	Result	Gates
11/10/2001	Kiev	Ukraine - Germany	1: 1 (1: 1)	1: 0 Subow (18th), 1: 1 Ballack (31st)
11/14/2001	Dortmund	Germany - Ukraine	4: 1 (3: 0)	1: 0 Ballack (4th), 2: 0 Neuville (11th), 3: 0 Rehmer (15th), 4: 0 Ballack (51st), 4: 1 Shevtchenko (90th)

Final result of qualification group 9
rank	country	Gates	Points
1	England	16: 06	17th
2	Germany	14:10	17th
3	Finland	12: 07	12
4th	Greece	07:17	7th
5	Albania	05:14	3

Finals

Squad

Contingent

Number / name		Association at the time	birthday	Caps / Goals (a)	Sp.	Gates
goalkeeper
23	Hans Jörg Butt	Bayer 04 Leverkusen	05/28/1974	02 ( 00)	0	0	0	0	0
01	Oliver Kahn	FC Bayern Munich	06/15/1969	45 ( 00)	7th	0	0	0	1
12	Jens Lehmann	Borussia Dortmund	11/10/1969	14 ( 00)	0	0	0	0	0
Defense
04th	Frank Baumann	Werder Bremen	11/29/1975	11 ( 02)	1	0	0	0	1
02	Thomas Linke	FC Bayern Munich	December 26, 1969	34 ( 00)	7th	1	0	0	0
21st	Christoph Metzelder	Borussia Dortmund	05/11/1980	06 ( 00)	7th	0	0	0	0
05	Carsten Ramelow	Bayer 04 Leverkusen	03/20/1974	25 ( 00)	5	0	0	1	0
03	Marko Rehmer	Hertha BSC	04/19/1972	27 ( 04)	1	0	0	0	0
06th	Christian goat	Tottenham Hotspur	December 01, 1972	66 ( 09)	5	0	0	0	2
midfield
13	Michael Ballack	Bayer 04 Leverkusen	09/26/1976	22 ( 06)	6th	3	0	0	3
18th	Jörg Böhme	FC Schalke 04	01/22/1974	06 ( 01)	0	0	0	0	0
22nd	Torsten Frings	Werder Bremen	11/22/1976	08 ( 02)	7th	0	0	0	1
08th	Dietmar Hamann	Liverpool FC	08/27/1973	40 ( 04)	6th	0	0	0	2
16	Jens Jeremies	FC Bayern Munich	05.03.1974	33 ( 01)	7th	0	0	0	1
15th	Sebastian Kehl	Borussia Dortmund	02/13/1980	08 ( 02)	2	0	0	0	1
10	Lars Ricken	Borussia Dortmund	07/10/1976	16 ( 01)	0	0	0	0	0
17th	Marco Bode	Werder Bremen	07/23/1969	34 ( 08)	6th	1	0	0	0
19th	Bernd Schneider	Bayer 04 Leverkusen	11/17/1973	09 ( 00)	7th	1	0	0	1
attack
14th	Gerald Asamoah	FC Schalke 04	10/03/1978	11 ( 02)	3	0	0	0	0
20th	Oliver Bierhoff	AS Monaco	05/01/1968	65 (36)	5	1	0	0	0
09	Carsten Jancker	FC Bayern Munich	08/28/1974	26 ( 07)	3	1	0	0	1
11	Miroslav Klose	1. FC Kaiserslautern	06/09/1978	12 ( 08)	7th	5	0	0	1
07th	Oliver Neuville	Bayer 04 Leverkusen	05/01/1973	30 ( 03)	6th	1	0	0	1
Trainer
	Rudi Völler ( Team Principal )		04/13/1960
	Michael Skibbe (national coach )		08/04/1965

^(a) A international matches (international goals in brackets) before the start of the tournament

Sapporo  (VR) Kashima  (VR) Fukuroi  (VR) Yokohama  (F) MiyazakI

Venues (red) and quarters (blue)

Seogwipo  (AF) Ulsan  (VF) Seoul  (HF)

Preliminary round

In the draw for the World Cup finals, Germany was "set". In other words, it was almost impossible to meet fellow favorites in the preliminary round. With Ireland, Cameroon and Saudi Arabia, the three-time world champions were drawn relatively easy opponents.

A tailor-made start was made against Saudi Arabia. The weak opponent was defeated 8-0. The top scorer was Miroslav Klose , who scored three times. Carsten Jancker scored a goal again for the first time after a long dry spell. A regular second hit from him was not recognized. It is the highest World Cup victory of the German national team to date (previously 6-0 against Mexico in 1978).

Germany had the game firmly under control against Ireland after an early lead by Klose before Robbie Keane equalized in stoppage time against a careless defense. Germany now had to draw at least one draw in their last game against the unpredictable Cameroonians in order to reach the round of 16.

At half-time the reigning African champions were still 0-0, but Germany had already lost a player by being sent off, as Carsten Ramelow had received a yellow-red card after an emergency brake. It didn't look good against the extremely strong Cameroonians, who put the German team under a lot of pressure at the beginning of the second half. Marco Bode , who had just been substituted , scored the somewhat surprising 1-0 on a counterattack after a wonderful pass from Miroslav Klose, which was voted goal of the month for June 2002 by the spectators of the sports show . Cameroon, trained by Winfried Schäfer , also lost a player in the middle of the second half by being sent off. From that moment on, Germany had jurisdiction over the place. Klose scored the 2-0 shortly before the end. Germany were first in the group in the round of 16.

Germany's games in the preliminary round
date	encounter	Result
June 1st	Germany - Saudi Arabia	8: 0 (4: 0)
6th of June	Germany - Ireland	1: 1 (1: 0)
June 11th	Cameroon - Germany	0: 2 (0: 0)

Final score group E
rank	country	Gates	Points
1	Germany	11: 01	7th
2	Ireland	05: 02	5
3	Cameroon	02: 03	4th
4th	Saudi Arabia	00:12	0

Finals

Round of 16:	Germany	-	Paraguay	1: 0 (0: 0) - Goal: Neuville (88.)
Quarter finals:	Germany	-	United States	1: 0 (1: 0) - Goal: Ballack (39th)
Semifinals:	Germany	-	South Korea	1: 0 (0: 0) - Goal: Ballack (75th)
Final:	Brazil	-	Germany	2: 0 (0: 0)

Web links

• dfb.de: "The 2002 World Cup in Japan and South Korea - Titan only wobbles in the final"

Individual evidence

1. ↑ kicker.de