Thomas Muller's Struggles vs. Poland Highlight Germany's Stuttering Attack

Germany's surprising struggles in second matches at major tournaments under Joachim Low continued with a goalless draw against Poland in Stade de France on Thursday.

The world champions have now won only one of their five second matches under the 56-year-old's leadership, and they didn't look particularly close to adding a second win against their northeastern neighbours.

Poland thoroughly deserved the point. One could even argue that they were closer to winning all three than Germany, although it wasn't a game of big chances.

"All in all, a draw is a fair result," Low conceded after the game, per the German football association's official website, "but I’m not happy with it. We have to live with the point though."

If he wants to focus on the positive, his defence looked more convincing than it did against Ukraine in the opener at the weekend. The entire team showed better defensive cohesion, as Germany's full-backs Jonas Hector and Benedikt Howedes weren't isolated nearly as much as they were in the first match.

The centre-back pairing of Mats Hummels—who, as expected, replaced Shkodran Mustafi in the starting XI—and Jerome Boateng played very well, too. The 27-year-old Borussia Dortmund man looked a bit rusty at first, getting caught out of position two or three times in the early goings and giving away the ball cheaply on occasion, but got better as the game went on, making some important interventions in the second half when the game was more open for a while.

Francois Mori/Associated Press

The star of the show, however, was Boateng. The 27-year-old looked untouchable on his way to a man-of-the-match performance, winning every important duel, heroically blocking a Robert Lewandowski attempt—it's no coincidence that the imperious Pole is still waiting for his first shot in France—and, as per usual, distributing the ball from the back with great accuracy.

"Poland had one or two opportunities, but Manu [Manuel Neuer] didn’t have to make a single save," Low correctly pointed out after the match. 

One could, however, argue that the underdogs had the biggest chance of the game regardless, as Arkadiusz Milik's failure to connect with a sublime Kamil Grosicki cross moments into the second half was a big let off for Germany.

Still, the second clean sheet in as many games in France is something Germany can build on. In a tournament of few goals to this point, but a number of goalkeeping blunders, having the best 'keeper in the world and an excellent centre-back pairing in Boateng and Hummels might be enough to still consider Germany favourites to win Euro 2016.

That being said, "the improvement that the World Cup winners had sought after their 2-0 win in the opening game against Ukraine simply did not materialise," as Raphael Honigstein wrote for ESPN FC. "On the contrary: doubts about the team's attacking quality were only increased on this frustrating evening."

Indeed, Low's offense struggled mightily against a well-organised Poland back line. Former Germany goalkeeper Oliver Kahn, now working as a pundit for German broadcaster ZDF, stated at half-time the fact that Neuer hadn't had to make a save so far said it all about Poland's style of play, but the 47-year-old forgot to mention that Germany themselves hadn't worked Poland stopper Lukasz Fabianski in the first half.

Their harmlessness in the first period was historic:

Mario Gotze had a half-chance four minutes into the game, his header from a Julian Draxler cross going over the bar, but that was it. Sami Khedira led the way with three shots, but none came even close to hitting the target.

Much of the criticism once again focused on Gotze, whose desperate attempts to get involved in his team's play was obvious, as he dropped deeper than No. 10 Mesut Ozil at times and showed up on both wings despite playing as the lone centre-forward once more.

As in the first match, the bulk of action came over the left wing, "where left-back Jonas Hector and midfielder Julian Draxler played in close proximity to one another, as Honigstein put it. "But the duo's lack of pace made it the wrong kind of width: static, unproductive, a dead end 40 metres from goal, which might as well have been 400. Crosses were either cut out or sailed aimlessly over the head of Gotze."

Germany's best period of the game came early in the second half, when the 24-year-old was finally relieved of his duties leading the line and inserted in midfield, with Thomas Muller moving into a more central role. "The result was an immediate increase in fluency from Germany," Jonathan Wilson opined for Sports Illustrated.

It was no coincidence that Gotze had his best moment of the Euros so far in a role more suitable to his technical abilities, as he got the first shot on target in the 47th minute after a perfectly weighted vertical pass from Toni Kroos.

With his one scoring chance in two appearances, Gotze has one more than Muller, who so far has escaped criticism from a broader audience. That could change after Thursday's match, however.

"Thomas Muller had one of his worst games for the national team on the right. Nothing came off," Honigstein wrote. Marcus Bark of Sportschau.de (link in German) wondered which impostor had smuggled himself into the Germany team, because No. 13 hasn't looked like Muller so far.

Coming off his most prolific season in front of goal for Bayern Munich with 32 goals across competitions, per Transfermarkt.co.uk—and having scored 10 goals at FIFA World Cups by the tender age of 24—Muller was a popular pick for the Golden Boot in France, but, on the evidence of his first two matches, he'll have to improve drastically if he's to get close to that award. European championships haven't been kind to him so far, as this graphic indicates:

Now, it would be unfair to pin Germany's struggles against Poland entirely on him. It was another understated performance from Mesut Ozil, for example, who failed to deliver the creative spark.

Neuer bemoaned "a lack of flexibility up front," per Honigstein. "We didn't switch sides often enough, we didn't do anything surprising to pose different kind of problems for them." Boateng, meanwhile, argued that "we have to finish off our moves more often, we have to beat our man in attack, we have to try harder to make the run, we have to be more aggressive."

Both of these statements hint at a lack of ingenuity against Poland's well-organised defence. Bringing on Andre Schurrle, who needs space to create dangerous situations, and a classic target man in Mario Gomez, Low didn't do anything to change that. "The effect [of the Gomez substitution] was to kill Germany’s fluency," Wilson wrote.

Alexander Hassenstein/Getty Images

The question has to be asked: What did Low bring Leroy Sane for if the 20-year-old doesn't get a chance to make something happen when the team desperately needs it—for instance, against Poland?

The 56-year-old was effusive in his praise for the Schalke youngster in November, lauding his feel for spaces, quickness and finishing ability before the friendly against France, per sport magazine Kicker (link in German). In the warm-up to the Euros, he even compared Sane's willingness to actively search for one-on-ones to the likes of Neymar and Lionel Messi in an interview with Suddeutsche Zeitung (link in German).

If not in a stalemate against Poland, when will Sane ever get a chance to prove his qualities at the Euros? He couldn't have done worse than Muller.

The 26-year-old, of course, remains an automatic selection when Germany face Northern Ireland on Tuesday, but Low would do well to tap into his resources should his team continue to stutter offensively. It might be a good idea to start Gomez against the massive and very physical defence the team is likely to face. Draxler hasn't shown enough to warrant another start.

Regardless of the personnel decisions, Germany's attack needs to improve, and quickly. Boateng demanded as much after the match, per Honigstein: "If we continue like that, we don't get very far."

Lars Pollmann is a Featured Columnist who also writes for YellowWallPod.com. You can follow him on Twitter.