France and Germany fail to live up to their heavyweight billing in drab Nations League encounter

If one of the factors behind the creation of the Nations League is to reduce the number of international friendlies, you wouldn’t have guessed it from this supposed curtain-raiser in Munich.

It was a mostly dull 0-0 draw that certainly didn’t fit the supposed context of a competitive match between the old world champions and the new world champions, where the former had so much to prove.

Germany instead proved nothing other than Jogi Loew actually has real problems to fix in this faded team now, and look so unimaginative without players like Mesut Ozil. They certainly didn’t look worth of the respect a very defensive France showed them.

Didier Deschamps’s side barely got out of first gear in attack, in their first match back as World Cup holders. The match was made all the worse by the respect that Germany evidently showed them, but the manager might have showed more than that.

It was difficult not to wonder from the starting line-ups whether there was more than deference from Loew towards their successors as world champions. Was there some fear?

How else to explain an abnormally defensive German side that began with four centre-halves, Joshua Kimmich at defensive midfield and a relatively conservative 4-1-4-1? Such rigid “boxiness” also felt such a far cry from the smooth and ever evolving movement that had been the mark of this Germany – and this entire German football empire – between 2010 and 2015.

open image in gallery

Perhaps that’s going to be the main cost, and main indication, of Ozil’s absence. Even allowing for the criticisms made of the playmaker’s general game, he has always been someone so sublimely supreme at moving between the lines and offering the kind of balls that further rub out those lines.

Instead, Germany were reduced to a lot of sideways passes without him, with their best attacks little more than low crosses or set-pieces. There was still sufficient warning there for France, though, even as Timo Werner squandered a few of the crosses and Antonio Rudiger wasted a set-piece.

The German approach, however, seemed all the more conservative because France remain so conservative themselves. Despite the confidence and sense of expression that should have come from winning the World Cup, Didier Deschamps seems in no mood to change from the manner of victory, keeping the side compact and countering.

That ensured this game was so often rather tepid, although the one element that means this French team are always worth watching is that they do have so many players who can suddenly break so excitingly, most of all Mbappe.

The teenage superstar embarrassed the much more experienced Toni Kroos in the first half, with one flick that showed he is at least one individual building on the confidence of the World Cup to express himself.

open image in gallery

Pogba was meanwhile still quieter on the pitch than he is off it, but did have a few encouraging moments. He forced Kroos into a foul after ghosting past him, and then later so easily bundled Werner off the ball to start a surge forward.

But France weren’t really committing men forward with him, which was in turn one reason why Alphonse Areola had barely been troubled for most of his debut until one exaggerated dive to keep out a Marco Reus long shot in the 63rd minute.

Deschamps’s side don’t exactly throw too much into attack, but that means they give up even less at the back. The big test for Loew, and something that looks like it might define this entire cycle for this Germany side, is to find a solution for when that happens, to find a new way to attack.

They just don’t look capable of pulling decent opposition teams all over the pitch any more, as they did in their pomp.

Deschamps did at least try to enliven things by bringing on the electric Ousman Dembele for the more lumbering Olivier Giroud, although the substitute’s first contribution to the game was a short circuit, as he badly snatched at the opportunity for a shot that went in the wrong direction.

Mats Hummels then decided to go in the other direction entirely, bursting up the pitch with an 80-yard run that eventually saw him chip a fine cross over for Thomas Muller, who the centre-half then berated for squandering the opportunity.

It was one of the stand-out moments of the game, but actually stood out all the more because this is what Germany were resorted to: individual moments, rather than collective build-up.

One of those set-pieces did almost pay off on 75 minutes as Matthias Ginter connected brilliantly with a corner, but Areola continued a solid debut with another good stop. Germany had built up some energy and momentum by then, with under-pressure substitute Leroy Sane then adding some more life, but it was just the French defence remained too well fortified.

One Ilkay Gundogan close-range shot was met with a thunderous block. Germany would not pass, and don’t pass the ball like they used to. France defend as well as ever, but it mostly made for a meeting of champions that entertained less than ever – and maybe less than any friendly.