Germany - Team Fact Sheet

10 Gigantic Facts about Germany's World Cup Football Team

When you think of Germany, you think of superb engineering, great cars, the Autobahn, The Wall, the Protestant Reformation, cutting-edge design, big beer steins at Oktoberfest, fairy tale castles in the mountains, a few other things we don't need to go into right now.

But you also think of a powerful sporting tradition. Not only do they fare well in every Olympics, they have a fantastic football record for both men and women.

This nation of 82 million doesn't know what it means to back down: they bring their best on every occasion. And their tenacious work ethic has paid off with lots of trophies. As one of the most consistent performers in the World Cup, you always have to keep an eye on Germany.

Here's the top 10 facts you need to know about the German football team:

10. The German squad's nickname is Die Mannschaft (The Team). Gotta say, that's pretty weak. How about The Yelping Eagles? Or The Studious Engineers? Not "the team." It's too literal, guys.

9. Adidas AG is the longstanding kit provider to the German team, a sponsorship that began in 1954. Adidas is a German brand founded by Adolf Dassler in 1924. It sponsors a number of other teams too, like Argentina, Mexico and Japan.

8. From 1950-56, Germany had 3 "national" teams: West Germany, East Germany and Saarland. (You're thinking, "Saarland? Never heard of it." We neither.) East and West stayed split until re-unification in 1990.

7. The Germans are coached by Joachim Löw. A former attacking midfielder, he never played for the national side himself, but has been a solid coach for Germany since 2006 when he was promoted up from Assistant Coach. He has the highest winning percentage of any German coach with 69%. That's awesome.

6. Germany has been runners-up 4 times at the World Cup, and they've made 11 semi-final appearances there too - a record. Perhaps the most consistent performers at the World Cup, they often finish near the top.

5. Lothar Matthäus, considered one of the greatest defenders ever, has the most caps for Germany - a ridiculous 150! He played on the national side from 1980-2000, racking up a leading 25 matches in 5 World Cups alone. Since then, he's coached in Serbia, Hungary, Brazil, Austria and Israel.

4. Germany's top scorer Gerd Müller shot 68 goals in only 62 caps! A striker for the national side from 1966-1974, "The Nation's Bomber" as he was known, finished his international career on the sweetest of all possible notes: he scored the winning goal against the Netherlands to win the 1974 World Cup in Munich. How perfect is that?!

3. FIFA ranked Germany 6th prior to the World Cup, but their excellent round of qualifications with 8 wins and 2 draws sees them on an upswing. Plus, German tourists love South Africa, so it's likely their football team will too.

2. Germany has won the World Cup 3 times. They beat Hungary 3-2 in Switzerland, 1954. They edged the Netherlands 2-1 in Germany, 1974. And they defeated Argentina 1-0 in Italy, 1990. Let's see what they got 20 years later.

1. Germany is the only nation to have won both the men's and women's World Cups. The women, in fact, have won the last 2 World Cups and have never been ranked less than 3rd in the world. C'mon boys - better keep up!