Voller aims to silence Beckenbauer

Rudi Voller knows his Germany team must win the World Cup if he is to silence Franz Beckenbauer's constant criticism of the current squad.

Success in this tournament would make Voller only the third man in history, after his compatriot and Brazilian Mario Zagalo, to win the tournament first as a player, then as a coach.

But Voller's team - who face host nation South Korea in Seoul in the first semi-final - have been slaughtered by Beckenbauer, who has branded them "lucky" to have even got this far.

After the narrow victory over the United States, Beckenbauer said: "Rudi must tell the players their honour is at stake. If my team had played as this one did against the United States in the quarter-finals, I'd have felt personally insulted."

But Voller hit back, saying: "Whatever Franz has said, we will just have to get on with it. That's just the way it is. Obviously, sometimes the criticism is too harsh and exaggerated.

"But we have to criticise ourselves as well and we know we need something extra now, that is something we have discussed amongst ourselves."

Voller added: "We have a good chance to reach the final, but we will have to play much better if we really want to make it.

"My main criticism against the USA was that we didn't manage to go out and play with confidence. And we had every reason to be confident after the way we'd got through our group.

"It's no excuse to say that this is the biggest thing that can happen to a footballer, and we find ourselves in the semi-final against all expectations. We have to be better than that. We have to go out with more confidence."