👀 German World Cup player reveals: this country wanted to poach me | OneFootball

Malick Thiaw reacted quite emotionally when he found out from Germany coach Julian Nagelsmann that he had made the World Cup squad. He even had tears in his eyes.

The defender has now revealed that to the Finnish public broadcaster ‘Yle‘.

He also hinted that this emotional moment almost never happened at all. At least not if he had given in to the many attempts by another country to recruit him. In that case, he might not be going to the World Cup now.

That is because Thiaw holds both a German and a Finnish passport. And for a long time, the Finns tried to convince the defender that international football for a Nordic country was actually the cooler option. 

Since November at the latest, however, the matter has been settled: Nagelsmann played Thiaw in the last two international matches back then, tying him permanently to the German national team.

And that seems to have been exactly the right decision. In his interview with ‘Yle‘, Thiaw thanked the Finnish federation and said that Lukas Hradecky in particular had repeatedly tried to convince him via WhatsApp. He replied to all of those messages as well. But his big goal had always been to make it into the Germany team.

“I always told the federation that I love Finland and that I am Finnish, but that I first wanted to try to make it into the German national team. If you want to wait, that’s fine. If not, I understand. The German senior national team was always a big dream of mine,” said the Newcastle star.

Even if the breakthrough had not happened yet, the 24-year-old apparently would not have given up hope: “I’m no longer a junior, but I’m still young. I knew my level was good enough, and I was confident. I also got feedback from the coach that my chances would improve if I established myself in the Premier League.”

Now the decision has been made, and it is exactly what he always wanted.

Even so, the Thiaw family is approaching Sunday’s game against Finland with mixed feelings: “An interesting but also difficult match.”

It will be interesting to see whether Thiaw features in the match in which, theoretically, he could have ended up on either side. 

📸 Ian MacNicol - 2026 Getty Images

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇩🇪 here.

📸 Alexander Hassenstein - 2026 Getty Images