Germany Euro 2024 Preview | Tactical Analysis & Pick
BJ Cunningham, Cyriel Klitsie/Action Network. Pictured: Jamal Musiala.
Germany look to win their first Euro title since 1996 on home soil. The last two international tournaments have been a complete disaster for the German National Team. They were bounced in the round of 16 in the previous Euros and then failed to make it out of the group stage at the 2022 World Cup.
Former Hoffenheim, RB Leipzig and Bayern Munich manager Julian Naglesmann is now in charge and has all of the pressure of his country on his shoulders to bring the Germans back to the promised land.
Because they are the host nation, Germany did not take part in qualifying and have only been play friendlies in the lead up to this tournament. However, this team is perfectly set up to win the Euros on their home soil.
Tactical Analysis
Nagelsmann has always been a build out of the back, possession-dominant type of manager and he does it successfully by interchanging between a 2-3-5, 3-2-5 and 3-1-6 build up structure depending on the type of team they are facing out of possession. He’s always put a premium on dominating and overloading the middle of the pitch and with the personnel he has in the midfield it’s fascinating to see how teams will actually slow Germany down.
Playing out of a 4-2-3-1, he will most likely play a midfield three of Florian Wirtz (Leverkusen), Jamal Musiala (Bayern Munich) and Leroy Sane (Bayern Munich). Those three can move around and play different positions on the pitch to find space in between the lines or out wide. All three are not only great passes and chance creators, and they are also tremendous ball carriers, so if they want to provide width to stretch the opposing defensive block they can get into a lot of 1 v 1 situations.
The problem that has existed for Germany for a long time is they haven’t had a consistent striker up top. With Nagelsmann at the helm, he’s probably going to play Havertz up top, which gives Germany another deep lying playmaker in build up and if you’ve watched Arsenal at all, you’ve seen not only how comfortable Havertz is in this role, but also how well he plays in it.
Pick
Because Germany are the host nation, their theoretical path in this event is really favorable. They are big favorites to win Group A and if both England and France win their respective groups they would be on the opposite side of the bracket of those two teams, which is massive because those are the only two teams in this tournament that have more talent than them.
Germany would get a third place team in the round of 16, most likely Spain in the quarterfinals (who they outplayed at the World Cup), and then at worst Portugal or Netherlands in the semifinals.
If we are being honest, there isn’t a better tactical manager in this tournament than Nagelsmann and he has all of the pieces and has already implemented a lot of his in possession tactics that made him so successful and Bayern and RB Leipzig.
Because of the failures in recent tournaments, I believe the price on Germany has been suppressed too much. Taking into account home field advantage, the manager and the path to the final, German should be in the same price range as both France and England to win the Euros.
Pick: Germany to Win the Euros (+550 via bet365)
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