Recently German international Mesut Ozil chose to retire from International football after Germany’s poor show at the 2018 World Cup and in doing so the playmaker put out a statement which has since created a lot of controversies.
Ozil accused a number of German politicians and press of using his Turkish heritage to slam him for the World Cup performance and in the centre of this debate was a picture of the Arsenal player meeting the Turkish president.
Ever since the statement, a number of top footballing personalities have come out in support of the former World Cup winner while Bayern Munich president Uli Hoeness chose to slam the footballer.
Hoeness claimed that Mesut Ozil was trying to hide behind all this controversy hurt to avoid the debate on his poor form and this statement has added fresh fuel to the already raging fire.
But now a couple of new stats have come to light which shows the utter rubbish that Uli Hoeness had spoken about the player and the Bayern president’s comments were indeed a smart tool to divert attention from the main issue – racism.
According to Opta, Ozil actually created more chances (5.5) per 90 minutes than any other players at the 2018 World Cup.
5.5 – @MesutOzil1088 created more chances per 90 minutes than any other player at the 2018 World Cup (minimum 90 minutes played). Tackled. pic.twitter.com/IQTGWqba9Q
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) July 23, 2018
While Whoscored.com have revealed that no player made more key passes (seven) in a World Cup match than Ozil v South Korea.
Mesut Özil: No player made more key passes in a World Cup match than @MesutOzil1088 vs South Korea (7)
For more player stats — https://t.co/ek5LxrxZuB pic.twitter.com/pzGtZhaC4E
— WhoScored.com (@WhoScored) July 23, 2018
Uli Hoeness said in his statement that Mesut Ozil made his last tackle before the 2014 World Cup but what he failed to notice is the amount of influence that the playmaker had during the 2018 World Cup despite Germany being knocked out – that too in an embarrassing fashion.
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