Germany midfielder, Toni Kroos has lamented his side’s 1-0 defeat to France in their opening EURO 2020 game on Tuesday after Matts Hummels’ “unfortunate” own goal.
Speaking after the match, Kross admitted that the pressure is on the German team who are eager to avoid a repeat of the 2018 World Cup when they finished bottom of their group and the pressure is on for Saturday’s home game against Portugal.
“We had our chances, no fewer than the French had, but the match was decided by an unfortunate goal,” Kroos told broadcaster ARD. “We would have defended against that nine times out of 10.
“We controlled most of the match and there were very few counter-attacks from the French. “We have lost the first match and when you only have three games, then the pressure is large,” added Kroos.
Speaking further (as captured by Tz), Kross said, “I think we delivered a lot of what we had planned for this match. We played a decent game in my opinion and had enough chances to get a goal. An unlucky goal decided the game.
“It was clear to us that they had class and that we couldn’t turn them off for more than 90 minutes. We checked a lot, I saw relatively few counterattacks from France. We could have made more of it in order to create another chance in certain situations.”
Germany faces a tough test on Saturday against defending champions Portugal who began their campaign with a 3-0 hard-fought victory over Hungary in Budapest.
