For Tuesday night's friendly match (21:00) in Dortmund against France, current sporting director Rudi Völler, U-20 coach Hannes Wolf and Sandro Wagner will act as interim players before the Federation chooses Flick's successor for the European Championship (14 June-14 July).

Among the names of potential successors to Flick circulating in the media are Julian Nagelsmann, the former Bayern coach sidelined at the end of March, the Austrian Oliver Glasner, winner of the Europa League with Frankfurt in 2022, or Stefan Kuntz, double European champion in the past with the hopes (2017 and 2021).

Hansi Flick led his last training session late Sunday morning, open to the public, at the head of the Mannschaft in Wolsfburg. In contact with the 3,500 spectators, he was combative. "Yes, yes, I keep fighting," he said, admitting, however, that in professional football it was difficult to predict anything.

The DFB finally opted for the most radical solution, a novelty for them, while none of Flick's ten predecessors as coach had been removed from their posts. Whether Berti Vogts (1998), Erich Ribbeck (2000) or Rudi Völler (2004), all had resigned after fiascos in the World Cup or the Euro.

Hansi Flick, who took over in the summer of 2021 to succeed the long term of Joachim Löw (15 years old) marked by the world title in 2014, found himself under increasing pressure as the under-performances continued.

Catastrophic sequence

After the elimination in the 1st round at the 2022 World Cup, the German Federation decided to keep him, while appointing Rudi Völler as sporting director to chaperone him.

The sequence of friendly matches in March and June was catastrophic, with only one victory against modest Peru (2-0), a draw snatched in extremis against Ukraine (3-3) and defeats against Belgium (3-2, the first on German soil since 1954), Poland (1-0) and Colombia (2-0).

But even after the humiliation against Japan (4-1) on Saturday night in Wolfsburg, Flick claimed to be the man for the job. Völler, however, dodged the question of keeping Flick, referring to a night of reflection to take stock.

"Hansi raus!" ("Hansi out!") had begun to be heard in the stands of the stadium in Wolfsburg on Saturday night after the fourth Japanese goal that came to complete ten months of a descent into hell for the Mannschaft.

© 2023 AFP