Amiri fires U21 to victory – Kramaric makes appearance

Success continued on Friday evening for the TSG players currently on international duty. Both the German U21 side with Nadiem Amiri and Jeremy Toljan as well as the Croatian national team with Andrej Kramaric celebrated victories. Particular focus in Germany’s youth national team was directed at Amiri, who scored the winning goal in 1-0 friendly victory over England.

In the 23rd minute, Schalke’s Max Meyer delivered a corner into the penalty area, which was met by Matthias Ginter and forced England keeper Jordan Pickford into making a spectacular save. However, he was unable to prevent Amiri firing home the rebound from the edge of the area. The Hoffenheim professional made the starting line-up and scored his first goal for Germany’s U21 in his sixth appearance. At half-time he was replaced by Levin Öztunali.

His TSG team mate Jeremy Toljan started the game from the bench and was introduced after 39 minutes, coming on for Mitchell Weiser. His well-timed cross after 54 minutes nearly led to Germany adding a second goal to their lead. Next Tuesday manager Stefan Kuntz’s team will play Portugal in Stuttgart.

Croatia en route to the World Cup

Andrej Kramaric was a late substitute in Croatia’s 1-0 victory over the Ukraine in their World Cup qualifying campaign. Kramaric replaced the winning goalscorer Nikola Kalinic after 87 minutes. It was Croatia’s fourth straight win in the qualifying segment, as they lead Group I with 13 points from five games.

Croatia’s next qualifying game on June 11th will be against second placed Iceland, where they will look to take a big step towards qualifying for the tournament in Russia next year. Prior to this, they will face Estonia next Tuesday in a friendly held in Tallinn.