Germany need saving ahead of their home Euros and Kroos could be the solution
What will save hosts Germany at this summer's Euros? Will it be the memory of Franz Beckenbauer, will it be their pink-to-purple inclusivity Adidas second strip, or will it be Toni Kroos?
Germany need saving. Group stage elimination in the last two World Cups came either side of a last-16 exit against England at the Euros. They sacked their coach for the first time ever last September when they fired Hansi Flick, and his replacement Julian Nagelsmann goes into Saturday's meeting with France on the back of two defeats.
Invoking the spirit of their greatest-ever player is one way to instil some of the old invincibility back into the team. Nagelsmann's players travelled to training this week in a team bus emblazoned with the image of Beckenbauer.
The game against France is the first since his death. 'Thank you, Franz' was written large on the side of the bus alongside his picture.
It may inspire some but it also sets the bar dauntingly high. After winning the World Cup on home soil as a player in 1974, he won it as a manager in 1990. Current coach Nagelsmann has four games left to hone his best XI, and six new call-ups in his latest squad suggests he isn't even close.
There's a home friendly with the Netherlands on Tuesday, and two more against Ukraine and Greece, before going up against Scotland on June 14, and then Hungary and Switzerland. A third group-stage exit in six years is unthinkable.
So what of the pink to purple second shirts that the German Football Association (DFB) says on its website represents 'the new generation of German football fans and the diversity of the country'?
If the nod to Beckenbauer is a call to turn back the clock, this is an attempt at a great leap forward. The German people have fallen out of
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