Unless the manager gets it hilariously wrong (like Löw against Italy in 2012), the worldcup knockout stages are in my opinion a lot more about mentality than tactics, at least compared to two-legged CL ties. It's one of the main reasons, why I like Löw being stubborn here with this somewhat wrong looking back four (compared to his constant experimenting in 2012). It's the first time since '96 that I have that feeling of a real German tournament, one about a not perfect team getting the job done anyway. It helps a lot that the attack isn't built around Özil anymore and that 3 man midfield looks like it can fight it out, if playing pretty doesn't work. A few good options on the bench, Müller upfront who'll score important goals if no one else does and a back four that can withstand constant pressure and isn't reliable on keeping the ball (even though they are very good doing it). I expect us to get past Algeria with another mediocre performance and hope that the criticism won't have an effect on Löw's decisions, because I'm sure that team will look great against France, Brazil, Chile in the quarter/seminfinals, if we make it that far.
I actually agree with you there. I think that we'll fare much better with the current set-up if the opposing team isn't just set on defending the entire game but tries to face us in midfield, where we are clearly superior. My only problem regarding that is the lack of pace our full backs have. Both Höwedes and Boateng had a few problems against Beasley and Johnson yesterday. And if that's what they can do, I don't want to see what Alves and Marcello may be capable of.
For the game against Algeria I see pretty much four different possibilities:
1. Algeria play like they did against Belgium (which the players supposedly did not like), analyse the last two games and come up with a a similar tactic. Germany plays exactly like they did the last two games. Germany plays efficiently, resulting in a close win.
2. Pretty much like the first, only Germany lacks in efficency, resulting in the game going to penalties or, in case of individual slip ups, a close Algerian victory.
3. The rumours about Algeria are true and the team doesn't go for the defensive route, but takes Germany head on. In this case they most likely get hammered.
4. Löw changes ups the tactics. This results in a higher scoring game, no matter how Algeria wishes to play, with Germany probably conceding at least one while most likely still winning by at least two goals.
I am kind of afraid of possibility number two. Algeria seems to be quite dangerous on the counter. The reason the last games weren't lost, was because Germany showed the efficency we are known for, which many people thought to be lost. If we don't show that efficency against Algeria, we might be in serious trouble, because, as in the last three games, we probably won't get many chances on goal. So I can definitely say that I'm not happy about playing Algeria. They have two matches to analyse where a defensive team managed to give us trouble, let's see what they'll come up with.
Löw has been stubborn for years about this. Never trained set-pieces, thinking they are no important parts of the game.
As far as I've heard, he changed that now and trained them extensively.
Don't like the approach though. I don't have an inside perspective on the way Löw uses and trains set-pieces, but to the outsider it just seems like they took the lazy way out by putting tall guys into the back four instead of focusing on training corners. A lot of teams still manage to be dangerous at set-pieces while having quick, smaller full backs. And you reall don't need four centre backs to defend corners efficently. Well, one step at a time, I guess.
