Foals suffer setbacks in World Cup qualifiers

Matthias Ginter & Florian Neuhaus (Germany) and Stefan Lainer & Valentino Lazaro (Austria) were all on the losing side in qualifiers for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.

GERMANY

Germany’s third qualifier of the campaign ended in their first defeat. Matthias Ginter was in the starting XI in Duisburg as they lost out 2-1 to North Macedonia. Goran Pandev put the away side ahead in added time of the first half, before Ilkay Gündogan equalised from the spot (63’). However, Eljik Elmas scored a late winner to shock Germany (85’). Borussia’s centre-back came off in the 88th minute, while Florian Neuhaus didn’t feature. “We’re extremely disappointed after this game. We were simply really tired tonight. We weren’t fresh enough in some situations and made too many mistakes up front. We were dangerous whenever we upped the tempo. They sat deep but we didn’t find a way of breaking them down. Overall, it’s disappointing,” said national coach Joachim Löw. Germany are now third in group J with six points behind North Macedonia on the same points and group leaders Armenia (9 points). Romania (4) and Iceland (5) sit behind Germany, as well as Liechtenstein who are yet to pick up a point so far.

AUSTRIA

Austria also suffered a setback in their bid to reach the 2022 World Cup. They lost 4-0 at home to Denmark in Vienna. Stefan Lainer started once again for the Austrians, whilst Valentino Lazaro came off the bench in the 65th minute. After an even first half, the visitors enjoyed a dominant period after the break, scoring four goals inside 16 minutes. Andreas Olsen (58’, 74’), Joakim Maehle (63’) and Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg (67’) got their goals to seal a convincing victory. Lainer, Lazaro & Co. are now in fourth in group F with four points, having drawn 2-2 in Scotland and beaten Faroe Islands 3-1 previously. Denmark top the group with nine points on the board ahead of Scotland (2nd, 5 points) and Israel (3rd, 4 points). Faroe Islands (5th, 1 point) and Moldova (6th, 1 point) make up the rest of the group.

SWITZERLAND

The Swiss played a friendly to round off this international break, beating Finland 3-2 in St. Gallen. Borussia’s Nico Elvedi and Denis Zakaria both started, coming off in the 46th and 55th minute respectively. Switzerland took the lead thanks to Mario Gavranovic (21’), however the away team turned the game around thanks to a Joel Pohjanpalo brace (30’, 40’). Nevertheless, Ruben Vargas (57’) and Haris Seferovic (86’) grabbed second-half goals to secure the win for the hosts. Breel Embolo was an unused sub and Yann Sommer had already left the national team due to family reasons after the wins against Bulgaria (3-1) and Lithuania (1-0).