Germany made it a chastening start to Euro 2024 for Scotland with a 5-1 thrashing in the opening game in Munich after Ryan Porteous’s red card
Let’s rock! Germany’s players were clearly paying close and diligent attention to Julian Nagelsmann’s pre-tournament press conference on Thursday night. At the Munich Football Stadium the hosts kicked offwith a kind of pomp-metal power surge, a first half display that produced three goals, a red card for Ryan Porteous, a series of lovely supple passing moves fed through the rhythm section Toni Kroos, and evidence of just how well Nagelsmann has balanced this talented team.
In the event this turned out to be a genuinely full-throated occasion. Before kick-off the pitch was draped with a miraculous white plastic vinyl Uefa floor covering, while joyful gnome-like flag-bearing figures of no discernible nationality gambolled and pranced to give a sene of inoffensive pageantry. The anthems were intense and moving. This felt real, authentic, those occasions where memories of early tournament goals, the first eruption are minted and never quite forgotten.
Kimmich had time to lay an easy pass across the empty channel of green at the edge of the Scottish area. Wirtz was also unmarked, with time to essay a lovely running first-time right-footed shot that Gunn got a hand to, but couldn’t keep out. It felt like a training ground goal, with cones for defenders, lovely geometry, the ball travelling in a perfect wide zig-zag then into the Scottish net.The Munich Arena erupted.
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