These were months of happy experiences: Italy drove the European champions out of World Cup qualification! Spain and Portugal defeated! She reached the 1/8 finals of the World Championship with two victories! And with Murat Yakin, a coach on the line, who gets along well with the people and at the same time, as the son of emigrants, stands for modern Switzerland.
Sometimes it seemed that people would applaud Yakin as soon as he fried an egg. The Swiss Football Association used this coach’s charisma to show the closeness of the national team on social media. Yakin here, yakin there, yakin everywhere
Now Yakin has a headwind for the first time. Because he – maybe because of this new popularity – overestimated himself before the World Cup. Which is understandable: until now, everything he touched turned into gold. The fact that we were very lucky in the World Cup qualifiers, for example that Jorginho missed two penalties, was often ignored.
Yakin became more and more stubborn: to take Fabian Frey with him, even though he is on the bench at Basel? We do. Going to the World Cup with just one right and one left back? It will work. Spontaneously change tactics in the 1/8 finals of Portugal? Let’s try.
Now it has been shipwrecked for the first time and is under fire. Of course, because they haven’t lost that much since 1997 and the last time they conceded as many goals in 1963 as against Portugal. That’s how the nati went down in history, but not in the way they wanted.
To be clear, attaching everything to the trainer here is too easy. These were the players who failed against Portugal.
And I will add: despite the recent disappointment, Yakin is the right choice for the future. He is an excellent representative of Switzerland and has done a lot right since taking office. He will learn from his mistakes. And despite all the criticism, after the disappointment one can also say: when the Nati played in the 1/8 finals of the World Cup, countries like Germany and Belgium were already watching from home.