Klopp: Ich unterstütze die Personalveränderungen zu 100%, aber ich kann mir vorstellen, dass außen jetzt schon große Aufregung herrscht

Germany lost 0-1 to Greece at home in the second matchday of UEFA Nations League A. After the match, Germany's head coach Jürgen Klopp was interviewed by German broadcaster Sportschau. Below is the second part of that interview.

Interviewer: Bastian just mentioned that the team currently lacks players who can be match-winners. In other words, that kind of player doesn't seem to exist in the current squad.

Bastian Schweinsteiger: Yes, match-winners who can deliver the decisive blow. As I just said, people usually think of forwards, attacking players in the final third. But in my view, defenders and the back line also have creativity. If the defense could move the ball better when in possession, attackers would receive it in more comfortable situations. We didn't do that well enough today. That naturally makes it harder to create good scoring opportunities. Of course, as Jürgen Klopp said, if Joshua Kimmich's free kick had gone in—the opposing keeper made a brilliant save—the score would be 1-0. Felix Nmecha also had a very good chance after that; if he had converted it, the score could have been 1-0 or even 2-0. That was very possible. But after that, as the coach showed, we didn't create any real threats. To put it mildly, there was hardly any substantive attacking play. But Greece always believed they could win. These are the moments we need to improve on. But this is a learning process and continuous refinement; it can't happen overnight.

Klopp: Over the next two and a half weeks, our plan is to gather as much real-world information as possible. Imagine if we fielded the exact same squad from the World Cup this summer today, without any changes whatsoever. I don't know if the game would have looked much different, and that would actually be a worse sign, with everyone still saying it was just an average performance. So we've now committed to opening the door to many new faces.

To be frank, these new players didn't make major mistakes on the pitch. The focus now is clearly not on blaming anyone. Besides, it's not easy for the older players to quickly build chemistry with this new group. But I see many positive flashes in our play; they just didn't manage to control the match today. And controlling a match requires game chemistry that accumulates over time. We also need to be mentally prepared: when facing opponents who only play long balls, we don't need to concentrate all our energy on high pressing.

Similar situations will happen to us frequently in the future, but that's also not my main concern. My challenge is simply that we have to be tested at the highest level after a very short training camp. I have no complaints about being tested; what's affected is the atmosphere outside the dressing room. I personally can keep the team's morale up—that's not a problem at all. The difficulty is dealing with external public opinion.

Bastian Schweinsteiger: As everyone can see, Greece is a very organized team, very tactically skilled, and the whole team operates smoothly. A newly restructured national team often experiences conditions like this in their first two, three, or four matches. Things will be very different in November, but for now, this is an objective reality.

Klopp: We still have two more matches to play in the upcoming period. That's fine; everything is going according to plan. I'll say it again: we gathered a lot of valuable information today. A group of players are returning to the squad tonight, and the new players who only arrived this morning will start training tomorrow. They also haven't gone through tactical integration yet, and I know that! Nevertheless, from my perspective, implementing personnel changes is an inevitable and necessary path. We've done it, and we're 100% committed to this decision. But I can really imagine the outside world starting to explode now: "My God, how can they play like this?" and so on. That's all normal; everyone has the right to express their opinion.

But we've decided to move forward this way, and the overall atmosphere of the training camp has been fantastic. I just told the lads in the dressing room: honestly, this week, aside from this match, or more precisely, aside from most of this match, everything has been perfect. Training throughout the week was very good, and setbacks are an integral part of every growth path. Today's result isn't ideal, but I prefer a bad start to a bad ending.

Now we have to continue moving forward in the same direction. The team will gradually build chemistry, and all the pieces will eventually come together perfectly. Because as long as you keep doing the right things, success will come naturally. We're doing the right things, but right now we're facing a slight time constraint in this match cycle: only two days of training, then recovery, then immediately another match. No one in sports would say, "That's perfect, that's how it should be done." But that's the reality of the rhythm. I'll say it again: all the various explanations from outside—even though there are many reasons—sound like excuses, and I really don't want to make excuses.

I'm very unhappy with the loss; it's truly awful. If we had played a 0-0 draw today, we wouldn't feel much better, but that conceded goal really hurt me. But the rest of it we have to face with composure: even though we didn't want to be hit with cold water like this, because it happened, we have to move forward. This doesn't diminish the players' abilities; they're just showing their current level. My job is to make them understand our tactical demands more thoroughly and execute them more decisively on the pitch. My greatest consolation today, or rather, the only positive highlight, was the first 15 minutes of the second half, when we were completely at our best, and the lads made it very clear: "This is what we need to produce." We immediately took control of the match, and the play was beautiful. As for the rest of the time, it was indeed unsatisfying.