Germany confident of finals place

Germany coach Joachim Löw has said that "the big pressure" is off for his team after an unspectacular 2-0 win in Wales thanks to two Miroslav Klose goals.

'All in our hands'
With Slovakia and the Republic of Ireland drawing 2-2 on Saturday, victory in Cardiff left Germany eight points clear of third place in Group D, five ahead of second-placed Czech Republic. "Our situation in the group is great," said Low. "The big pressure of having to win every match is gone. It is all in our hands. We have made a huge step towards qualification."

'Very pleased'
The match may not have thrilled German fans, but Löw's men did a businesslike job, despite the absences of Michael Ballack, Mario Gomez, Bernd Schneider, Philipp Lahm and Thorsten Frings, and never looked back after Klose's sixth-minute opener, with the same player scoring their second on the hour. "I am very pleased with the result," said Löw. "We started out strongly, played good football and had a lot of pace. Later on that pace diminished and the final pass was missing."

Toshack impressed
"We are now the unchallenged leaders in our group and if we continue to play like this we will surely qualify," said Klose. "We are also constantly bringing fresh talent into the team and those new players usually do quite well so we are doing very well here." Wales manager John Toshack did not disagree. "Germany are a very strong team," he said. "They are physically much stronger than we are. I cannot complain about the result."

'Important step'
"We have had problems with Wales in the past," said Löw, remembering the friendly Germany lost in Cardiff before travelling to the 2002 FIFA World Cup finals. "This was a very important step towards [UEFA] EURO 2008™ and after winning we are confident that we will be playing in Austria and Switzerland next year."