Germany rallies to beat Bosnia 3-1 in final pre-World Cup friendly

Germany rallies to beat Bosnia 3-1 in warmup

FRANKFURT, Germany — Bastian Schweinsteiger converted on two penalties and Germany rallied with a strong second half to beat Bosnia-Herzegovina 3-1 on Thursday, giving itself another confidence boost ahead of the World Cup.

Edin Dzeko scored for Bosnia in the 15th minute when Philipp Lahm’s attempted clearance struck the Wolfsburg striker in the chest and the ball looped over goalkeeper Manuel Neuer.

Lahm made amends by scoring the equalizer in the 50th and Bastian Schweinsteiger hit penalties in the 73rd and 77th to put Germany ahead for good in the last warm-up before the three-time champion travels to South Africa.

“We produced good performances. We created many chances but unfortunately we didn’t use them all,” Lahm said. “We are going to South Africa with a very good feeling.”

Coming off a 3-0 win in Hungary, the Germans were missing five players because of injuries. Germany will send its second-youngest team to the World Cup. Only the team for the inaugural World Cup in 1934 was younger.

Germany coach Joachim Loew had Lahm, the new captain for the injured Michael Ballack, playing as right back and Holger Badstuber, the newcomer from Bayern Munich, as left back. Another surprise was Hamburg midfielder Piotr Trochowski in the starting 11.

“We still have more than a week before our opening game against Australia (June 13) and I am not thinking yet of the starting 11,” Loew said.

“Despite hard training in the past two weeks we were able to step up the pace in the second half and I am pleased with that. We have a good team, we have a good spirit, we can play a good tournament in South Africa.”

Loew used only one striker, veteran Miroslav Klose, who is traveling to his third World Cup although he spent most of the season on the bench of Bayern Munich. Klose was top scorer of the 2006 World Cup at home and has 10 goals over two tournaments.

Germany picked Bosnia as its last warm-up opponent to get a taste of what it could expect from Serbia, its second Group D rival in South Africa. There was also a bit of the South African atmosphere, with many fans blowing vuvuzelas.

“We played well, at least in some stages and should have scored a couple of more goals,” Schweinsteiger said.

Lineups:

Germany: Manuel Neuer; Philipp Lahm, Arne Friedrich (Serdar Tasci, 86), Per Mertesacker, Holger Badstuber, Sami Khedira, Bastian Schweinsteiger (Toni Kroos, 86), Piotr Trochowski (Thomas Mueller, 45), Mesut Oezil (Mario Gomez, 80), Lukas Podolski (Marko Marin, 71), Miroslav Klose (Cacau, 45).

Bosnia-Herzegovina: Kenan Hasagic; Sanel Jahic, Emir Spahic, Adnan Mravac (Senijad Ibricic, 44), Safet Nadarevic, Sejad Salihovic (Dzemal Berberovic, 78), Elvir Rahimic, Miralem Pjanic, Zvjezdan Misimovic (Zlatan Mislimovic, 80), Vedad Ibisevic (Ermin Zec, 74), Edin Dzeko.