Today, on June 12, the Ukraine national team will play a friendly charity match as part of their preparation for Euro-2024 qualification. We present our opponent — the German team.

Germany

General Information

As of April 2023, the Germans held the 14th position in the official FIFA ranking. The national team of Germany played its first match on April 5, 1908 against Switzerland (5:3), their biggest victory was achieved on July 1, 1912 over Russia (16:0), and their worst defeat occurred on March 13, 1909 to England (0:9). The team is known by nicknames such as bundesliga, "German machine," "The Team," and "Eagles."

Germany's national team has won the World Cup four times (1954, 1974, 1990, 2014), three times the European Championship (1972, 1980, 1996) and is also the winner of the Confederations Cup (2017).

Squad

Goalkeepers: Bernd Leno ("Fulham," England), Marc-André ter Stegen ("Barcelona," Spain), Kevin Trapp ("Eintracht" F).

Defenders: Robin Gosens ​​("Inter," Italy), Malick Thiaw ("Milan," Italy), Antonio Rüdiger ("Real," Spain), Timo Kehrer ("Wolves"), Matthias Ginter («Freiburg»), Benjamin Henrichs, Lucas Kluthmann, David Raum (all — "RB Leipzig"), Nico Schlotterbeck, Marius Wolf (both — "Borussia" D).

Midfielders: Ilkay Gündoğan ("Manchester City," England), Kai Havertz ("Chelsea," England), Leon Goretzka, Joshua Kimmich, Leroy Sané, Jamal Musiala (all — "Bayern"), Julian Brandt, Emre Can (both — "Borussia" D), Jonas Hofmann ("Borussia" M), Niklas Füllkrug ("Werder Bremen"), Florian Wirtz ("Bayern Munich").

Forwards: Kevin Schade («Freiburg»), Timo Werner («RB Leipzig»).

The most representation in the German national team comes from the Bundesliga. 18 players represent eight clubs of the country's championship: "Bayern," "RB Leipzig," "Bayern Munich," "Freiburg," "Werder Bremen," and both Dortmund and Mönchengladbach "Borussias" as well as Frankfurt "Eintracht."

Head Coach

Since August 1, 2021, the 58-year-old German specialist Hans-Dieter Flick has been coaching the national team of Germany. He replaced Joachim Löw in this position.

Prior to this, Flick worked with "Bamberg," "Hoffenheim," and "Bayern." From 2006 to 2014 he was Löw's assistant in the national team, and from 2014 to 2017 — sports director of bundesliga.

Leader

Currently, there is no clear leader in the German national team. Several players are vying for this title — Joshua Kimmich, Mario Götze, Serge Gnabry and Leon Goretzka. But let's highlight the best striker of the current bundesliga — RB Leipzig forward Timo Werner.

At 27 years old, Werner has played 57 matches for Germany, scoring 24 goals. With bundesliga, he won the Confederations Cup (2017), and was awarded the "Golden Boot" of the tournament.

Besides "RB Leipzig," Werner also played for "Stuttgart" and London's "Chelsea." In RB Leipzig, he became a silver medalist (2016/2017) and bronze medalist (2018/2019, 2019/2020) of the German championship, won the German Cup (2022/2023). With Chelsea, he won the Champions League (2020/2021), UEFA Super Cup (2021), and Club World Cup (2021).

Recall that today's match against Germany will be played by Ukraine in Bremen at "Weserstadion." This is a charity friendly match, which will mark the 1000th game in bundesliga history (start time — 7 PM Kyiv time).