FRANCE 98 – General Media News Template

European champions Germany were lucky to hold out for a 0-0 drawn against little Finland in a World Cup warm-up match here on Wednesday night.

It was a mediocre match on a bumpy pitch, but had the run of play gone more Finland’s way, they might have grabbed a historic victory. The Finns have only beaten the Germans once in 16 matches dating back to 1923. The Finns had three chances before the break to get on the scoresheet. Jari Litmanen failed with a shot, Jari Kinnunen had a chance from close in and a header from Sami Hyypia was knocked off the line by Thomas Hassler.

The return of 1990 World Cup-winning captain Lothar Matthaus after three and a half years out of the national side was not enough to prevent gaps appearing at the back for the Germans. The Germans disappointed and had only one real chance on goal-when a diving header by Olaf Marschall careered past the post.

Captain Jurgen Klinsmann and his teammate Thomas Helmer earlier both returned to Germany for treatment on minor injuries-Klinsmann injured his right leg in training and Helmer was suffering from a torn leg muscle. German coach Berti Vogts said ” I’m very unhappy. We have trained hard but I thought some players were further physically than they are. There’s no excuse. I expected a greater willingness to fight. Football is a running game and sometimes it would be better if the players thought of this and talked a bit less. “

” We’ve trained hard over the last 10 days,’ Matthaus said afterwards. ” We’re getting ready for a World Cup and you have to train that way. But I think you could see we all had heavy legs today. “

Germany have a chance to improve things on Saturday when they play another friendly against Colombia in Frankfurt.