Decision to call up Ouédraogo made “relatively quickly”

After Karl was ruled out, he “relatively quickly” decided on Assan, Nagelsmann explained to RTL before the successful final World Cup warm-up against co-hosts USA, which Germany won 2-1. “We definitely wanted to take a young player with us and went for the one who, alongside Lenny, made the best impression with us.”

The right-footer also made a strong impression as a person. “After our camp in November, Assan received extremely positive feedback from all the players. He’s a really nice person with great ability.” The youngster underlined that impression with a debut goal in what is still his only senior Germany appearance to date, scoring in the 6-0 win over Slovakia at the Red Bull Arena.

Another point in his favour was that, while other candidates had recently had less match practice and training time, the 20-year-old was on the pitch for RBL in the friendly against Mamelodi Sundowns on 29th May. “Assan is still in the right rhythm. He played and trained with Leipzig in South Africa,” said Nagelsmann. “There’s no point in us bringing in a player we need to build up again for a week. He has to be fit straight away.”

That means our number 20 has everything needed to help Germany straight away – whether as a number 10, out wide or slightly deeper in central midfield.