Kahn may quit Germany, claims Matthaus

BERLIN: German legend Lothar Matthaus believes his former Bayern Munich team-mate Oliver Kahn will retire from the German national team if manager Jurgen Klinsmann continues to play him off against Jens Lehmann.

Arsenal’s Lehmann, 34, was outstanding in Saturday’s 2-0 win over Iran and is pencilled in to start the next warm-up match against Cameroon on November 17 leaving Kahn, 35, out in the cold once again. “Taking away the captain’s armband and his goalkeeping coach will test Olli,” Matthaus told SportBild. “My first thought was Olli would pack his bags and quit the team.” Klinsmann stripped Kahn of the captaincy on his arrival as team manager and over the weekend backed the sacking of Kahn’s long-time friend and German goalkeeping coach Sepp Maier for being biased towards the Munich custodian. “He (Lehmann) can go hang himself, he’ll never be number one,” the 60-year-old Maier is reported to have said. Matthaus has openly criticised Klinsmann, 40, for shuffling his goalkeepers and believes Kahn, first choice since since 1996, will hang up his gloves to concentrate on club football with Bayern.

“At the moment everything goes against Kahn being in goal,” said 1990 World Cup winner Matthaus. “I fear Kahn will not be wearing the gloves for the 2006 World Cup. He may think:’I can not be bothered with this hassle and will just concentrate on playing for Bayern.” afp

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