Serbia 1-3 Germany: Klopp’s men keep hopes alive as nine-man hosts relegated

UEFA Nations League,
League A – 5

Serbia
BE

Germany
GER

Rajko Mitić Stadium

Javier Alberola Rojas

Srdjan Babic 56′

Srdjan Babic 3′ (OG)
Florian Wirtz 14′
Brajan Gruda 50′

Germany they kept their hopes of reaching the UEFA Nations League quarter-finals intact as they cruised to a 3-1 win Serbia.

Serbia had been ordered to play the Group A2 match behind closed doors as punishment for racist and discriminatory behavior in previous matches with Greece and the Netherlands.

As a result, the competition was watched by 5,000 children in Belgrade, where Serbia’s relegation from Group A was confirmed when the game ended with nine men.

Germany took the lead in the third minute when Kai Havertz’s header from Maximilian Mittelstadt’s corner was inadvertently turned into his own net by Srdan Babic.

Florian Wirtz then doubled Germany’s lead after Havertz was denied by Vanja Milinkovic-Savic following Aleksandar Pavlovic’s through ball, the Liverpool man seeing the Serbian goalkeeper get a hand on his deep follow-up before packing the ball over the line.

Havertz and Jonathan Tah missed golden opportunities to make it 3-0, but Brajan Gruda left Serbia with a mountain to climb with a stunning individual goal on his debut for his country.

Gruda capped a wonderful run by firing into the bottom right-hand corner from the edge of the box, before Babic made some atonement for his earlier error as he pulled one back with the rebound after Marc-Andre ter Stegen had blocked Stefan Gudelj’s header.

But Vanja Dragojevic saw red for Serbia in the 74th minute following a VAR review for a rash foul on Joshua Kimmich, making a comeback very unlikely, and Andrija Zivkovic followed suit by being dismissed in the 89th minute, receiving successive yellow cards for dissent.

Serbia’s miserable winless campaign will end on Monday against Greece, when Germany will be hoping for a favour.

Die Mannschaft are level on points with Greece after being hammered 7-0 by leaders Holland. However, if Germany beat the Oranje, they will qualify regardless of the result in Greece, and the Group A2 surprise package will be lost if the top three teams end up tied on goal difference in Amsterdam.

The UEFA Nations League table

Next matches of Serbia and Germany