Former Germany captain Bastian Schweinsteiger has openly criticized the German Football Association for its singular pursuit of Jürgen Klopp to replace Julian Nagelsmann as national team head coach, warning the federation lacks a credible backup plan.
Speaking as an ARD pundit ahead of the France–Morocco quarter-final at the 2026 World Cup, Schweinsteiger questioned whether the DFB had considered alternatives and named Lothar Matthäus and Matthias Sammer as viable candidates. He described the association's handling of the coaching search as lacking composure and called DFB president Bernd Neuendorf and league executive Hans-Joachim Watzke's planned trip to the United States to meet Klopp "a bit hectic."
Schweinsteiger cautioned against overestimating what Klopp could deliver, saying German football "is on the ground" and urging the DFB to set more modest targets, pointing to a World Cup quarter-final as a realistic objective.