STUTTGART, Germany – After three consecutive victories and a draw, Armenia’s national soccer team suffered its first loss, which was a pretty heavy one. Its squad was defeated 6:0 on September 5 by four-time world champion Germany in Stuttgart. Midfielder Serge Gnabry, native of Stuttgart, hit the first goal six minutes after the game started and doubled the score nine minutes later. The first half finished with 4:0 on the scoreboard. Die Mannschaft, as Germany’s squad is called, or “The Team” in English, added two more goals during the second half.
The four-time champions prevailed for almost the entire duration of the game. The Armenians had only one real attempt at the German goal but Sarkis Adamian’s strike was unsuccessful.
Armenia now occupies the second horizontal of the J group with ten scores, yielding leadership to the Germans. The next game will be played in Yerevan on September 8, where the Armenian national team will host Lichtenstein. In October, the squad from Yerevan will compete against Iceland (October 8, Reykjavik) and Romanians (October 11, Bucharest). After that, the two home games against N. Macedonia (November 11) and Germany (November 14) will conclude the qualifying tour. The group leader will advance to the world championship, which will happen in Qatar next year. Whoever occupies the 2nd horizontal will have to play extra games, which will determine the participation.
Sunday’s match marked several significant caps that the players accomplished: Germany’s goalkeeper Manuel Neuer and midfielder/forward Thomas Mueller were honored for playing 100 games for Die Mannschaft. Armenia’s captain, Henrikh Mkhitaryan, played his 90th and Tigran Barsegian his 40th match for the national team. Mkhitaryan has scored 30 and Barsegian 8 goals.
Armenians from Stuttgart and different European cities were present cheering for their national squad. Before this game, Armenia and Germany played on June 6, 2014. In a friendly international match, Germans again overwhelmed the Armenians 6:1.
