Lothar Matthäus and Wolff Fuss apologize to the DFB during the Netherlands’ European Championship match. Because Sandro Wagner complained.
During the Netherlands’ match against Poland (2:1) on Sunday, viewers were taken aback: MagentaTV commentator Wolff-Christoph Fuss suddenly apologized to the German national team. And pundit Lothar Matthäus joined in: “It wasn’t meant to be negative.”
What had happened? Before the break in the match, the two had spoken about the offensive problems of the Oranje team and made a comparison with the German team. “That’s the only thing, Lothar, that the Dutch are perhaps lacking at the moment to be the absolute best in the world. We’ve discussed it before: a center forward of international caliber – the Germans know the problem.” However, the German team watching at the team camp in Herogenaurach did not take kindly to this, especially Kai Havertz. Hadn’t Germany previously won 5:1 against Scotland in the European Championship opener? And so assistant coach Sandro Wagner contacted Fuss with a warning WhatsApp message.
He then said during the broadcast: “We’ve received news from the German camp. There was some slight irritation that we were comparing the problems in the Dutch national team’s forward line with those of the German national team. That’s nonsense, of course. With Havertz or Füllkrug or Undav or Maxi Beier, the German team has completely different options in width and up top. Best wishes to Herzogenaurach.”
All of this was done with a wink. “It was a nice bit of banter between the lads in Herzogenaurach and us. After I got the news from the camp, I promised that I would put it right in the second half,” Fuss told Bild. “We have very good strikers up top and out wide, which I also said live on air. The cheering in the home ground was reportedly loud. I now hope that the boys will return the favor on Wednesday and deliver a world-class performance.”
Matthäus also made it clear: “It wasn’t a dig at Kai Havertz or Niclas Füllkrug. It’s just that we don’t currently have the world-class strikers of the past. But both can shoot themselves in the tournament…. “