Germans Emerge as Group Winners After Beating Ecuador 3-0

The German national team played top-notch soccer in beating a less than impressive Ecuador side 3-0 and finished atop Group A on Tuesday.

German coach Jürgen Klinsmann achieved the goal he set for his team before entering the match in Berlin. Despite the victory, Klinsmann had his thoughts on Saturday's round of 16 game.

"We're very happy. It's a great moment," Klinsmann said on German public television after the match.

"We've cleared the first hurdle and have gathered lots of self-confidence in doing so. But the biggest challenge is yet to come," he added, making reference to a match-up with England or Sweden on Saturday in Munich.

The challenges against Ecuador were, however, few. The biggest one came early.

In the first minute, an Ecuador cross forced German keeper Jens Lehmann to dive off his line, just in front of Ecuador's Ivan Kaviedes. The warning shot would be the last one Ecuador coach Luis Suarez' squad could get off.

Three minutes later, the Ecuadorian defense lost track of German striker, and man of the match, Miroslav Klose in their penalty area before Per Mertesacker's cross from the left landed on the foot of Bastian Schweinsteiger on the right side. He squared it to Klose, who turned from seven meters out to drill the ball past Ecuador's keeper Cristian Mora.

The early goal took the wind out of the South American's sails, and for almost the remainder of the first-half Ecuador failed to mount any threatening attacks against a German backline that is the known weakness of Jürgen Klinsmann's team.

"We certainly must improve if want to go further in this World
Cup," Ecuador coach Luis Suarez said. "Today everybody played badly so we will have to make huge progress and look at our mistakes so as not to repeat them."

Ecuador offense lacked creativity

Over the course of the match, newcomer and at times in the past suspect fullback Robert Huth, who replaced Christoph Metzelder in the interior of the defense, was hardly ever worthy of notice.

The 1-0 lead lulled both sides into passivity for much of the remainder of the first-half, leading the Berlin crowd to grow quiet, not sure if they should be confident or weary of that score. Klose continued his aggressive play but was seldom given any good chances by his teammates to increase the lead.

Until the 44th minute.

Germany ahead 2-0 at half-time

Nearing half-time, German team captain Micheal Ballack, who seemed to be protecting himself from getting his second yellow card of the tournament, which would have seen him suspended for the next match, looped a ball into the penalty area. Klose charged past his defender, beat keeper Mora to the ball, tapped it around him and only had to nudge it over the line into the net.

The 2-0 lead at half assured the 80,000 fans in Olympic Stadium that Germany would finish on top in Group A. Klose said the Germans had underlined their intent.

"We absolutely want to be world champions and I think you saw our intentions today," he said.

At the start of the second-half, Ecuador attempted to turn things around, played with a little more passion but truly didn't try to create any opportunities to pull back to within one goal.

In the 57th minute Lukas Podolski ended any doubt that might have remained in the game when he scored his first World Cup goal, getting a large monkey off his back.

Klose was the man who helped set up the goal with his excellent pass to Bernd Schneider on the right wing. The Bayer Leverkusen midfielder then found Podolski at the penalty spot and the future Bayern Munich striker slid to push the ball into the net.

After that, the competition was taken out of the game with both squads doing what they had to do to save their energy for the round of 16.

Klinsmann can now concentrate on the next match and is one stop close to his stated goal when he took on the job of national coach over 22 months ago -- winning the World Cup.