North Macedonia vs Germany: Lineups, team news, no room for youngsters, and more! (Updated)

With Germany looking to qualify for the next World Cup as soon as possible, Hansi Flick wants to prove his mettle by beating North Macedonia. They’re not giants, but they did beat Flick’s predecessor in Germany’s home leg of this fixture. With this being the last game of this international campaign, the coach may opt to put experimentation on hold in favor of simply collecting all three points.

Team news

It’s mostly good news, depending on your perspective. Flick confirmed that Antonio Rudiger missed training, but it was a precautionary measure and the Chelsea defender should be available for the game against the Macedonians. Apart from that, Bayern Munich captain Manuel Neuer has also returned to training and is available for selection.

So let’s talk about the lineup. Germany wants to qualify, and German journalists forgot to ask Hansi if he wants to rotate or not (thanks guys!) so we have no idea if there’s going to be any new names in the XI. However, given that Flick was coach of Bayern Munich for like a year-and-a-half, we probably predict the absolute bare-minimum changes possible.

Timo Werner will probably start up top, because Flick is very determined to prove how good Werner can be (and has defended him non-stop in the media since the Romania game). Joining him will probably be Thomas Muller, since Muller proved that he’s a far superior option to Marco Reus and I can’t see Flick making the same mistake twice. Leroy Sane and Serge Gnabry will probably be the wingers in this scenario, leaving Julian Nagelsmann with the headache of figuring out how to rest both of his star wingers next Sunday.

Joshua Kimmich and Leon Goretzka are likely to start again, as is an unchanged defense from Friday’s clash with Romania. Flick offered no real indication that he was looking to rotate or experiment with the lineup, so this is the best we can hope for. At least, Manuel Neuer is going to take over for ter Stegen in goal, so maybe the Germans can keep a clean sheet this time.

Here’s what the lineup could look like tomorrow:

Other options:

• Kai Havertz in for Timo Werner.
• Jamal Musiala in for one of the wingers.
• Karim Adeyemi in the attack (somewhere — he can play across the front line).
• Florian Wirtz or Marco Reus in at attacking midfield.
• David Raum or Nico Schlotterbeck in at left-back.

Update

Bild seems to agree with our predicted lineup.

Also, don’t forget to check out our preview podcast for this game!