even made him captain at the CC, lol. Meh Stindl should have been the captain at the CC. He felt more like a leader than Draxler.
I wouldn't read to much into Werner's WC. He obviously put way too much pressure on himself after missing those two chances early against Mexico on throughballs that he regularly scores on for his club. I'm pretty sure that if he had buried those like he usually does for Leipzig, that he'd have gone on to fire us into the next round and we could well still be playing, despite Jogi's colossal ********-ups in the midfield. He's a major difference maker when he's playing with confidence, but the kid got shook by the Mexico debacle & let it get to him. That happens to kids, you let them play through it & grow tougher for their prime years. Plus Timo had a concussion last fall/winter, so he hasn't quite been as sharp this year as he was the season before. Moving forward I have no doubts about him though, especially with someone like Brandt playing next to him...someone who loves to drift into similar spaces to Timo & play quick sharp 1-2s. I like Arp, am still a huge Eggestein fan, and would have started Stindl at this tourney if I was the coach & he had been fit, but until those kids break out Timo is our best bet...with Stindl as his deputy for matches that are more...combative... Although we should've brought along Uth or Füllkrug instead of grandpa Gomez given that Stindl was injured & Jogi hates Kruse. I am crossing my fingers that FC VW doesn't do anything too dumb and lets G.L. Itter just play through any growing pains he has over these next two years, because if that kid hits...and our midfield isn't deployed completely idiotically...we could finally stop worrying about both FB positions.