Jamal Musiala

Surely the reason had to be a bit more than he wanted a starting spot? Anyone read the story in The Athletic?

 
saivet said:
Surely the reason had to be a bit more than he wanted a starting spot? Anyone read the story in The Athletic?

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“England is home for me,” he says, by way of explaining why choosing between representing Germany or England at international level has been a decision he’s grappled with for many months. “It is difficult to find words for what England means for me because I have so many memories connected to very positive emotions.”

Having spent eight happy formative years in London, where he played for Chelsea and attended Whitgift School, Musiala felt every bit as English as German by the time he returned as a Bayern Munich academy player two years ago. He still does. “I have a heart for Germany and a heart for England. Both hearts will keep on beating.” He had represented both at youth level, but most turned out for England, including some of his closest friends such as Borussia Dortmund’s Jude Bellingham. So how did he chose Germany in the end?

“I’ve thought about this question a lot,” he says. “What is best for my future? Where do I have more chances to play? In the end, I just listened to the feeling that over a long period of time kept telling me that it was the right decision to play for Germany, the land I was born in. Still, it wasn’t an easy decision for me.”


With both countries exerting a similar emotional pull, a lot of it came down to sporting considerations. Bayern Munich team-mates such as Joshua Kimmich and Serge Gnabry were constantly in Musiala’s ear about joining up with him in the national team. The German Football Association, having at first felt that they had little chance of wrestling the player back from playing for England’s youth teams, stepped up their efforts to lure him over over the last few months.

National manager Joachim Low went to meet the player in late January in Munich and the next day went public with his intention to call him up for the internationals in March. He told Musalia that there was a clear pathway for him to break into the side in attacking midfield.

Germany’s dearth of talent at under-18 level worked in his favour. There’s a shortage of individualists, in particular: with the possible exception of Bayer 04 Leverkusen’s Florian Wirtz, no one’s quite as comfortable dribbling past players in the No 10 spot as the skinny but silky Musiala is at his age.

Low really pushed to win his confidence, also conscious of the fact that his capture would prove a huge coup and feelgood story to deflect from some of the negative sentiment surrounding the national team since their disappointing showings in the autumn.
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He comes across really well. Fair play to the guy. I hope we spank him if/when we play Germany in the EUROs!!
 
Bulldog United said:
Absolutely huge loss for England. This boy has all the talent to be the best in the world.
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I wouldn't go that far, we're producing an amount of talent that's unprecedented for England, he's a great talent but in his own words he has a better chance of playing for Germany than England.
 
Harry Harries said:
He comes across really well. Fair play to the guy. I hope we spank him if/when we play Germany in the EUROs!!
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Cheers mate. Interesting one, that makes sense in fairness. He probably feels every bit German as he does English so then it's logical to go with what seems like the better sporting decision for him.
 
Guys, many people don't know this: he was playing in Chelsea's academy.
 
Is he still english until he plays his first game for germany? Or just because he says it it's done?
 
Would be interesting to see if Low selects him to the senior team in the next few months. He might get a few more starts for Bayern and currently he's performing really well whenever he gets an opportunity.

Until he plays for the national team, he can still be eligible to switch even if he plays up until the U-21 (I think that's the rule).
 
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So he chose Germany because it’s an easier side to get into at the moment? Fair enough, I guess. Especially if he has no particular strong feeling either way to Germany or England. Little bit strange to me, but I think that’s because our NT doesn’t really ‘recruit’ like that.
 
In terms of chances to break into the team and future prospects it's a no brainer really to choose German with how the national teams are at the moment. He will probably be a regular pretty soon for Germany and for England he could end up spending 10 years behind Foden.
 
DWelbz19 said:
So he chose Germany because it’s an easier side to get into at the moment? Fair enough, I guess. Especially if he has no particular strong feeling either way to Germany or England. Little bit strange to me, but I think that’s because our NT doesn’t really ‘recruit’ like that.
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Well, he was also born in Germany
 
Had a feeling he’d choose Germany. He was born there, he’s living there, and lets be honest, it’s a much better chance of winning a World Cup.

I don’t think there’s much between the two countries in ability, it’s all mental. When the lights are brightest, England freeze.
 
Maybe it's just that he wants to be able to tell his grandchildren that he played on Moukoko's team.
 
Good player but it's not like we aren't stacked out with about 1000 attacking midfield options already, he made the right choice as Germany need a decent CAM ;)
 
Vidyoyo said:
Find it quite interesting that he went to private school, at least according to his wikipedia. That always seems a novelty with footballers/
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Less so these days. Most of City's academy go to St Bedes, Sancho & Foden went there. Guys like Patrick Bamford and the Ox are privately educated too.
 
Vidyoyo said:
Ah I see. Good schooling should be a perk so nice to see Chelsea doing that.
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It's probably a slightly illegal way of getting the patents to sign their kids up. Miles better than an envelope full of cash in my opinion, if the kid doesn't make it they at least get a great education.
 
As an England fan I think this will be the first dual national we've lost that I'll be bothered about. Zaha is probably the best player we've lost so far and while he's a decent player, he's not been a big miss really. Luckily Musiala plays in a position we're stacked in already and to be fair to him he was born in Germany so all things considered can't have too many complaints as an England fan.
 
dbs235 said:
As an England fan I think this will be the first dual national we've lost that I'll be bothered about. Zaha is probably the best player we've lost so far and while he's a decent player, he's not been a big miss really. Luckily Musiala plays in a position we're stacked in already and to be fair to him he was born in Germany so all things considered can't have too many complaints as an England fan.
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I think both Zaha and Moses would have won a lot of caps for England, although with really affecting our fortunes that much.
 
SirMarcusRashford said:
I've already gave examples how this is wrong. Do you want me to give more?

Bashing away on my keyboard without really giving too much thought into it, i can tell you right now without knowing any players who will be playing in 10 years New Zealand (4.9 million people) will be one of the best countries in the world at rugby, someone from Iceland (356,000 people) will be challenging for the World's Strongest Man and Jamaicans (3 million people) will be amongst the fastest sprinters in the world.

Also want to add, Germany have a ageing population, one of the highest ageing populations in the world. Them having 5/10/15 or 20 million more people than another country doesn't mean too much in a sporting sense when a high number of this population are too old to compete in professional sport.
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Dude, I think matey is talking theoretically. As in, if you ran 100/1,000/1,000,000 World Cups, the likelihood is that Germany (or France) would do better than most because of the infrastructure, sporting priority, and population size.
 
hasanejaz88 said:
Would be interesting to see if Low selects him to the senior team in the next few months. He might get a few more starts and currently he's performing really well whenever he gets an opportunity.

Until he plays for the national team, he can still be eligible to switch even if he plays up until the U-21 (I think that's the rule).
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He gets a nomination for the March matches and will probably play some minutes, too.
 
Can't really blame him for picking Germany given recent history of international football.

At least we kept CHO. Maybe he'll get bored in the bundesliga and decide to come home to Chelsea in a few years on a free.
 
One thing I saw on Twitter is that Jogi Löw has won more international titles than England. Maybe that was also a factor.
 
do.ob said:
One thing I saw on Twitter is that Jogi Löw has won more international titles than England. Maybe that was also a factor.
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...two?
(Real question, i can only think of Confed cup and world cup?)
 
do.ob said:
One thing I saw on Twitter is that Jogi Löw has won more international titles than England. Maybe that was also a factor.
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I assume you're joking :lol: I don't think any player especially as young as he is, is going to make that sort of decision based on who is currently managing the national team. It's not as if you'd expect Jogi to be hanging around too much longer anyway.
 
GhastlyHun said:
...two?
(Real question, i can only think of Confed cup and world cup?)
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Yes. Both go straight to the wikipedia "honours" column.


Judas said:
I assume you're joking :lol: I don't think any player especially as young as he is, is going to make that sort of decision based on who is currently managing the national team. It's not as if you'd expect Jogi to be hanging around too much longer anyway.
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It speaks of the "winning culture" that people on here love to go on so much, doesn't it?
 
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Not exactly sure this is a 'loss' for England but more of a gain for Germany. England have Mount, Foden, Maddison and Grealish in his position he's got no chance here especially under Southgate who has underused those above.

The more pressing concern is the fact that Chelsea are unable to produce the talent that comes through what I'd describe as the best system in the country. Embarrassing really to spend so much on first team players who haven't made any impact to the extent that they can justify throwing away youth talent.
 
Adam-Utd said:
Good player but it's not like we aren't stacked out with about 1000 attacking midfield options already, he made the right choice as Germany need a decent CAM ;)
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I'm actually not sure that he will really make our Euro squad because AM/SS is one of the spots where we have plenty of options too including another highly rated talent (Wirtz)

Even if Löw continues to ignore Müller there are just so many options, not to mention that we have great CMs (Kroos, Kimmich, Gündoga, Goretzka, Neuhaus) so we might not even play with a AM/SS and decide to go for 3 CMs or give hybrid role to Gündogan (doing exactly that for City), Goretzka or Neuhaus.
It'd also be harsh to ignore the performances of players like Stindl or Volland (or even Hofmann) who could also play as forwards and I don't see Löw dropping Havertz due to one bad season.

We will probably have around 11 or 12 spots for midfield + attack in our squad (we need 11-12 for goalkeepers+defense) and the likely candidates are:
Werner, Gnabry, Sane, Müller, Musiala, Reus, Brandt, Stindl, Hofmann, Wirtz, Havertz, Volland, Younes, Draxler (attack)
Kroos, Kimmich, Goretzka, Gündogan, Neuhaus (midfield)

That's 18 players for at best 12 sposts. Kroos, Kimmich, Goretzka, Gündogan, Werner, Gnabry, Sane and Reus are set in stone (no chance Löw leaves any of them at home) so it's 3-4 players you can still add.
So there is still a chance for Musiala in the squad but Löw will have to continue to ignore Müller as well as some players who showed good or even great performances this season (Neuhaus, Stindl, Hofmann, Younes) and there are still two other extremely talented AMs with Havertz/Wirtz available.
This will be a tough choice to make. I'm sure Musiala will have his spot after the EC but I feel this tournament is a bit too early especially because Musiala simply doesn't play enough yet (understandable considering that he is behind Müller) while someone like Wirtz is already a regular at Leverkusen.
 
HerrLeinad said:
I'm actually not sure that he will really make our Euro squad because AM/SS is one of the spots where we have plenty of options too including another highly rated talent (Wirtz)

Even if Löw continues to ignore Müller there are just so many options, not to mention that we have great CMs (Kroos, Kimmich, Gündoga, Goretzka, Neuhaus) so we might not even play with a AM/SS and decide to go for 3 CMs or give hybrid role to Gündogan (doing exactly that for City), Goretzka or Neuhaus.
It'd also be harsh to ignore the performances of players like Stindl or Volland (or even Hofmann) who could also play as forwards and I don't see Löw dropping Havertz due to one bad season.

We will probably have around 11 or 12 spots for midfield + attack in our squad (we need 11-12 for goalkeepers+defense) and the likely candidates are:
Werner, Gnabry, Sane, Müller, Musiala, Reus, Brandt, Stindl, Hofmann, Wirtz, Havertz, Volland, Younes, Draxler (attack)
Kroos, Kimmich, Goretzka, Gündogan, Neuhaus (midfield)

That's 18 players for at best 12 sposts. Kroos, Kimmich, Goretzka, Gündogan, Werner, Gnabry, Sane and Reus are set in stone (no chance Löw leaves any of them at home) so it's 3-4 players you can still add.
So there is still a chance for Musiala in the squad but Löw will have to continue to ignore Müller as well as some players who showed good or even great performances this season (Neuhaus, Stindl, Hofmann, Younes) and there are still two other extremely talented AMs with Havertz/Wirtz available.
This will be a tough choice to make. I'm sure Musiala will have his spot after the EC but I feel this tournament is a bit too early especially because Musiala simply doesn't play enough yet (understandable considering that he is behind Müller) while someone like Wirtz is already a regular at Leverkusen.
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Yes it's maybe a little early for a starting spot, but i think he will be in the squad.

With his age though he's obviously one for the future. in 4 years depending how it goes with Bayern he'll be 21/22 and could be a star of your NT.
 
He's made the right choice considering the fa have struggled to get a decent manager in charge of england since hoddle.
 
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