Skip TTS playerContinue reading article
That’s it! Germany is out! The team lost in the 1/8 finals to Paraguay with a score of 4:5 (0:1, 1:1) on penalties – and, despite short-lived hope, said goodbye to the World Cup tournament with a disastrous performance. Of all that was in the first VMIn the knockout match after the 2014 title, national coach Julian Nagelsmann’s team (38) showed complete ineffectiveness over long stretches. Slow. Boring. Lethargic. This is another nightmare of German football!
At the 120th minute the score is 1:1 and the drama of the penalty kick:
0:0 Germany starts, Havertz misses
0:1 Mauricio gives Paraguay the lead
1:1 Kimmich converted
1:2 Gomez hits low to the right as Paraguay take the lead again.
2:2 Musiala scores the ball into the goal
2:3 Galarza keeps his cool and sends Neuer into the wrong corner
2:3 Voltemade misses, Gill takes the corner
2:3 Sanabria wins on his feet, but shoots the ball wide of the goal from the left
3:3 Amiri scores to keep Germany in the game
3:3 Balbuena fails to win, Neuer takes the corner
3:3 But Tah shoots over him…
3:4 Canale converts the third match point, Germany is eliminated!
After the game, Havertz apologized to all the fans: “My second World Cup, I screwed up twice! The only thing I can say is: sorry! If you’re eliminated against Paraguay, there’s something wrong with us.”
Nagelsmann summed it up: “Overall we were very slow in possession. At some point we switched to scrap. At the end of the day, you still have to beat Paraguay.” And further: “We had control, but the blow was not enough. We were almost not in the penalty area with two leaders. Especially in the first minutes, we didn’t win a single duel in the opponent’s penalty area.” On his future: “I’m ready if you want it, and if not, you have to tell me.”
Previous: Germany largely have possession from the start, but the DFB side show shockingly little success against the low-lying Paraguayans. The first shock came in the 41st minute: Germany failed to clear the ball after a corner kick. Miguel Almiron leaves Nathaniel Brown reeling and continues to play Galarza. He crosses into the penalty area, where Julio Enciso runs in perfectly and heads the ball into the net. Encizo of all people! The Paraguayan star is only 1.68 meters tall.
Julio Enciso (22) heads freely and the score is 1-0.
The big dream of a long summer World Cup is teetering uneasily. Before the game, Nagelsmann made a surprise decision: Jamal Musiala (23) had to come off the bench first, but Deniz Undav (29) was allowed to attack alongside Kai Havertz (27) to ensure greater impact. DFB director Rudi Völler explained before the start of the ZDF match: “The nation has wanted this for quite some time and now it has happened.” Nagelsmann said: “Denise deserves it.”
Undav plan doesn’t work
But the dual-leadership plan doesn’t work at first. Undav completely dropped out of the game in the first half. Before the drink break, the Stuttgart player had only four contacts with the ball, and during the break he had eight. Jurgen Klopp demanded at half-time: “Undave can try his best for the ball.” But in the 63rd minute it was all over for the striker and he was replaced by Musiala.
Nagelsmann also reacted during the break and replaced Felix Nmecha with Leon Goretzka. And nine minutes later Germany returns: Florian Wirtz crosses from half the field, Havertz is perfectly positioned in the penalty area and simply misses the ball through his skull – 1-1! Nothing much else happens as it goes into overtime. Additional stats: Germany goes to extra time for the 12th time at the World Cup, more than any other team!
The DFB presses and achieves the supposed rescue: after Brown’s corner, defensive boss Tah rises highest and suddenly the ball is in the goal (102nd). But VAR reports and takes away the goal; The reason for this decision was a nice block by Waldemar Anton against the Paraguayan goalkeeper. Even Dirk Nowitzki writes on X: “It’s not a foul.”
“Never foul!”: Our goal should have been counted
06/30/2026
After 120 minutes the penalty shootout begins and the omens are good: Germany have won all 4 penalty shootouts in their World Cup history! But in the end, Canale scored the decisive penalty, and this goal finally knocked Germany out of the tournament. As in 2018 and 2022, the German team failed in the 1/8 finals – at the last two World Cups this was the group stage, now the first knockout round.