Ex-Nigerian international, Austin Okocha has criticized Bayern Munich defender of Ghanaian descent, Jérôme Boateng, after Germany’s 2-1 win over Sweden on Saturday.
It was a World Cup Group F encounter at Fisht Olympic Stadium, Sochi.
Boateng was yellow carded in the 71st minute for tripping Sweden’s Emil Forsberg and got a second yellow eleven minutes later after charging Marcus Berg from behind.
Okocha was unhappy that the former Manchester City defender was a burden to his central defensive partner, Antonio Rüdiger.
Okocha said on Supersports, ”Boateng, today, was one of those players that was trying to overplay. He is a defender, his first job is to defend.
”Today, he was always out of position, and left Rüdiger to deal with everything that the Swedish attack threw at them, so I was disappointed with his performance today and he capped it all with a red card.
”He was struggling to get himself in a good position and there was no need for that tackle. If you stand in the right position, you don’t need to get into tackles like that.”
Ola Toivonen gave Sweden the lead in the 32nd minute, Germany equalized through Marco Reus two minutes into the second half, then Real Madrid star Toni Kroos netted the game winner on 95 minutes.
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