GERMANY PROFILE: Lacking in ingenuity and at times looking utterly confused, Germany are not the footblling powerhouse they once were, writes Paul Doyle

Those Irish fans who hoped to be paired with England to prove we’re better will now have to rely on us beating Germany 6-1 to shut up our lippy neighbours. ireland.com is prepared to put its reputation for uncanny soothsaying on the line by predicting that won’t happen. Nevertheless, we’re confident Roy Keane and company can beat the auld enemy’s old enemy.

Germany are the top seeds largely because they won the competition in 1990. Their performances since then have been anything but intimidating: they were knocked out of USA ’94 by Bulgaria, trounced at France ’98 by Croatia, and finished bottom of their group at Euro 2000.

The last time we met them, in a 1994 friendly, they became one of only two countries to concede a goal to Gary Kelly as they lost 2-0; and, of course, last September, the famed "Teutonic discipline" was in tatters when they collapsed to an unprecedented 5-1 defeat at home to England.

That defeat was supposed to awaken the so-called sleeping giant, but Rudi Voller’s men still couldn’t muster a win in their final group game, at home to Finland, and secured their passage to the Orient only after a play-off win, albeit an emphatic one, over Ukraine.

The days when German footballers were uber alles are all over. The current side are muscular and determined but, without the exceptional Mehmet Scholl (above), are bereft of players of true ingenuity. No longer the best in the world, they may not even be the best team in Group E.

Oliver Kahn is an excellent ‘keeper, an expert exponent of that old party-trick of "making oneself big" when strikers come lumbering through. But he is not especially agile, though he’s unquestionably more so than the plodders immediately in front of him - you can imagine Robbie Keane and, particularly, Damien Duff bamboozling Jens Nowotny and Thomas Linke until they drop or are dropped.

Voller will pray Jens Jeremies (right) is fit and in form, otherwise his midfield has no chance of containing Roy Keane. Dietmar Hamann or Carsten Ramelow are certainly of inferior stock, and young Michael Ballack was given the run-around by Roy when the two met in the Champions League semi-final.

Germany are in a bit of a muddle up front: Oliver Bierhoff is unappreciated and Carsten Jancker is over-played for one so under-skilled. Jancker’s sheer bulk makes him a nuisance to any defence, but not as much of a nuisance as the ball looks to him when he’s attempting to trap it at his feet. Miroslav Klose shot to the fore with two hat-tricks in recent friendlies, but for most of the season he has not even a regular at Kaiserslautern.

Whatever you say about Kevin Kilbane and Jason McAteer, they both have one indisputable quality: their inexhaustible stamina. They will be counted upon to thwart the forward surges of Lars Ricken, Oliver Neuville, and Christian Ziege, the likely sources of any German menace.

After South Korea and Japan, Germany are the top seeds most likely to be evicted in the first round.

Squad:

Goalkeepers
1-Oliver Kahn (Bayern Munich), 12-Jens Lehmann (Borussia Dortmund), 23-Hans-Jorg Butt (Bayer Leverkusen)

Defenders
2-Thomas Linke (Bayern Munich), 4-Frank Baumann (Werder Bremen), 15-Sebastian Kehl (Borussia Dortmund), 21-Christoph Metzelder (Borussia Dortmund), 3-Marko Rehmer (Hertha Berlin), 6-Christian Ziege (Tottenham/Eng), 18-Jorg Bohme (Schalke 04)

Midfielders
13-Michael Ballack (Bayern Munich), 5-Carsten Ramelow (Bayer Leverkusen), 19-Bernd Schneider (Bayer Leverkusen), 22-Torsten Frings (werder Bremen), 16-Jens Jeremies (Bayern Munich), 8-Dietmar Hamann (Liverpool/Eng), 10-Lars Ricken (Borussia Dortmund)

Forwards
14-Gerald Asamoah (Schalke 04), 20-Oliver Bierhoff (Monaco/Fra), 7-Oliver Neuville (Bayer Leverkusen), 9-Carsten Jancker (Bayern Munich), 11-Miroslav Klose (Kaiserslautern), 17-Marco Bode (Werder Bremen)