Best performance so far ?

[kabbes]

So they have proved their fragility by... not conceding goals and scoring lots instead?

 

[London_Calling]

I think my point is many of the games Germany have been involved in have been fairly balanced at the outset - either team has a reasonable chance of scoring the first goal (Germany never having, say, a better than 55-60% of being the first team to score).

Once the first goal is scored in any game, the game is obviously redefined. Both teams adopt different strategies to those they deployed at kick off.

Germany seems particularly well placed (more so than usual) to then be the team to score the second - usually on the break.

But the game against Serbia is interesting and it's a shame there was a sending off.

A good place to get a taste for this area (for me) was 'A birth process model for association football matches' (Mark Dixon & Michael Robinson, 1998) - which I have on hard drive but can't find (for free) online atm. Abstract:

Data from over 4000 recent association football (soccer) matches from the main English competitions show clear evidence that the rate of scoring goals changes over the course of a match. This rate tends to increase over the game but is also influenced by the current score. We develop a model for a soccer match that incorporates parameters for both the attacking and the defensive strength of a team, home advantage, the current score and the time left to play. This model treats the number of goals scored by the two teams as interacting birth processes and shows a satisfactory fit to the data. We also investigate football cliches and find evidence that contradicts the cliche that a team is more vulnerable just after it has scored a goal.

 

[kabbes]

Sure, I get what you're saying. I was just being a bit facetious. But if you look at that Serbia game, the fact was that Germany created a tonne of chances after they went behind, even with only 10 men. Including a penalty, let us not forget. I think it was just one of those things, that their otherwise high-scoring strikers just kept fluffing great opportunities on the day.

 

[London_Calling]

Yes, but then Serbia also has a football pyramid based on a population of only 7 and a bit million.

Fwiw, I'd agree you can't draw very much of value from that game, but I do think it's unclear whether Germany has the skill set and tactics to overcome a goal deficit against decent opposition.