Loew puts himself offside with Bundesliga’s Rauball

Germany coach Joachim Loew has put himself offside with the boss of the Bundesliga after criticising the standard of the German league.

Loew has admitted he is not impressed that Schalke 04 are the only German league side to reach the quarter-finals of the Champions League this season and said: “that doesn’t say much for the Bundesliga”.

But Loew’s comments have not gone down well with Reinhard Rauball, the president of the German Football League (DFL), who hit back at the national coach.

Rauball is displeased with Loew’s comments, especially as European football’s governing body UEFA have rewarded German clubs’ recent performances with an extra Champions League place.

Starting for the 2012/2013 season, the Bundesliga will have four teams, instead of three, in the Champions League, at the expense of Italy, because of how German teams have performed recently in European competition.

“I will call Loew personally, his criticisms of the Bundesliga are not justified,” Rauball said.

“We have ousted Italy from third place in the UEFA rankings, we can’t threaten Spain, who are second, and I recall that the English Premier League is leading with clubs who do not care about losing millions.”

Rauball could not resist taking a dig at the national team which last lifted a major title when they won the European Championships in 1996.

“The last time Germany won anything was a decade and a half ago,” said Rauball, while Bayern Munich were the last German team to lift the Champions League title in 2001.

Since Loew took charge of the national side in 2006, Germany finished second at Euro 2008 and third at the 2010 World Cup.