Superb Spain take on distressed Germany

After their dominant opening win over Costa Rica, Spain will take on Germany, who are now in danger of consecutive group-stage exits, in their second tournament match.

Spain hit the ground running in their opening match as they did not give the North American nation one inch on the pitch and produced a magical display of possessional football to win 7-0, their biggest win in the World Cup finals.

They had six different scorers as Ferran Torres scored a brace while Marco Asensio, Dani Olmo, Gavi, Carlos Soler, and Alvaro Morata scored one each.

Their midfield trio of Sergio Busquets, Pedri, and Gavi completely dominated the game as Luis Enrique’s team completed 978 passes in that game with an accuracy of 94%.

While that was a display of absolute dominance, the question remains because it was against a side Spain expected to roll over. Whether they can impose a similar style of play against heavyweights Germany is a bigger question.

Also, there is the question of whether such a huge win would make the Spanish over-confident, something forward Asensio denied.

“Yesterday’s games reaffirmed to us that we have to stay on this path, playing in this way. It gives us a lot of confidence for what’s to come, and we want to keep going like this. We won’t get over-confident, because the coach won’t let us,” the Real Madrid forward said after their win over Costa Rica.

On the other side, Germany now face yet another group stage exit as they will now have to win their game, and also look at the result of Japan’s game against Costa Rica.

The Germans were dominant against the Japanese for the majority of the game, but a sudden storm from the Asian country saw the European side lose their lead and lose 2-1.

Germany received a big boost ahead of the match as they will have winger Leroy Sane back, but whether their midfield will be able to match Spain’s tight-knit trio remains a question.

There might be some changes in the German lineup in this game as coach Hansi Flick said following their defeat that nobody was safe from being dropped.

“You can understand that we are discussing every matter of personnel and every position. We do that before every game. It’s our job as a coaching team to set up the team in such a way that it’s top-notch,” he said.

Ahead of the match, German forward Kai Havertz said they can switch the situation around quickly.

“Now we are in a bad moment, but I think that can switch around quite fast if we win the game on Sunday,” he said.

His teammate Julian Brandt agreed, “Spain come to the stadium on Sunday on the back of a 7-0 victory but it is a chance, on Sunday, a chance to change the atmosphere.”