Success in Plattenhardt's final outing before Confed Cup

Germany and substitute Marvin Plattenhardt celebrated a 7-0 rout over San Marino in their World Cup qualifier against San Marino on Saturday evening (10/06/17).

Berlin – Germany started the game without Hertha’s Marvin Plattenhardt on Saturday evening (10/06/17). Worthy of note is that Joachim Löw selected eleven players from eleven different clubs in the starting eleven for the first time in 57 years. The Germany manager brought on Plattenhardt in place of Jonas Hector to play at left-back, and the Hertha player put in a solid performance defensively. Offensively, ‘Platte’ had a direct free kick that missed the target in the 65th minute.

Germany were in total control of the game from start to finish and consistently created chances to break through their opponents defence. Former Hertha player Sandro Wagner bagged three goals, whilst Brandt, Mustafi, Younes, and Draxler all added their names to the score-sheet. Löw summed up the game, saying: “It was a test for us because San Marino aren’t on our level. We implemented a lot of the tactics that we worked on in training.” Germany continue to dominate at the top of Group C with 18 points. In second are Northern Ireland (13 points), and on June 19th they will play their first Confederations Cup game against Australia, before they take on Chile (22/06) and Cameroon (25/06) in the group stage.

Other Hertha players in action

Two Hertha players were on the pitch together in Oslo in the second of Group C’s games on Saturday evening – but they were not on the same team this time. Rune Jarstein was in net for Norway, whilst Vladimir Darida was representing his national side of the Czech Republic. The World Cup qualifier ended in a 1-1 draw. Werder Bremen’s Gebre Selassie (36’) put the away side ahead, before Norway equalised in the second-half thanks to a goal from Söderlund (56’). “The game went well in the first half, but the second half was tougher,” analysed Czech Republic manager Karel Jarolim after the game. The Czech Republic are in third place in ‘Germany’s’ group with nine points – good enough to put them ahead of Azerbaijan (7 points), Norway (4 points), and San Marino (0 points).

Finally, Lithuania squared off against Slovakia in Vilnius, where Peter Pekarik and Ondrej Duda started the game for Slovakia coach Jan Kozak. Goals from Weiss (32’) and Hamsik (58’) saw the Slovakian’s win the game comfortably, although Sernas managed to grab a goal back in the 90th minute. Slovakia are third in Group F with 12 points behind group-leaders England (14 points).