Creative Germany feel no fear

Germany's attacking prowess came in for high praise following the 6-2 win against Austria which booked their place at next summer's UEFA EURO 2012 finals.

Two Mesut Özil goals and one apiece from Lukas Podolski, Miroslav Klose, André Schürrle and Mario Götze earned Germany a comfortable victory and an unassailable 11-point cushion at the top of UEFA EURO 2012 qualifying Group A. With their perfect record still intact eight games into their campaign, it is little wonder captain Philipp Lahm is so pleased with his team-mates.

"Everyone was strong when it came to attacking, we scored six goals after all," he said. "We have won every point possible so far, we have had a perfect qualification and we have maintained our level of play since the World Cup and even developed it further. We have so much creativity that we can beat anyone."

Klose, whose opener brought his international tally to 62 goals – six shy of the legendary Gerd Müller – reflected on just how much has changed in this side since he came to fame in early 2000 in a German team renowned for efficiency rather than flair. "So much has changed in the past ten years," he said.

"You don't even know the half of it, you don't see all of our training sessions; the dynamism and joy we have playing football. The coach's role in this is huge. He has developed this team and this way of playing through training. It is the best Germany side I have ever played in, that much is for sure."

The man credited with this transformation, Joachim Löw, is equally content. "We may not be the very best team around, but we have always been consistent in recent years and have developed our football even further since 2010," he said. "We have shown that we can beat the big teams as well."

Özil, star of the show once more, added: "I feel the trust of the team and the coach and we have come a long way. We have qualified now and it doesn't matter who scores the goals. We know we have a very strong side, but there are others that can play at our level as well."

What of the opposition on a night of such German dominance? "It felt like we were chasing the ball for 87 of the 90 minutes and we maybe had 10% possession," said Martin Harnik, scorer of Austria's second goal. "The Germans made good use of the space and the early goal we conceded didn't help either. For them, everything went well."