Germany national team have started facing the music for their poor outing in Russia as they were held hostage by an army of Germany reporters and photographers just as they landed home on Thursday.
Coach Joachim Low and captain Manuel Neuer were left to face the music as the Germans came to terms with their worst World Cup performance in 80 years.
National newspaper Bild declared the campaign as ‘the biggest disgrace in German World Cup history’.
Jerome Boateng wrote on Instagram: ‘Such a disaster. World Cup 2018 was not what we expected.
‘I’m still angry and disappointed and at the same time I feel sorry for all our fans who supported us in the stadiums
‘Four years ago we were on top of the world – now we’re on the bottom. These are the days in the life of a football player nobody envies you for. But that’s life.
‘All I can say is thank you to our fans that always support us. We will analyse what went wrong and carry on working as we always did. I promise we’ll be back strong!’
An honest tweet was sent from the national team’s official Twitter account the morning after the game, admitting that they deserved to be heading home.
It read: ‘Dear fans, we feel just as disappointed as you. The World Cup only comes around every four years and we expected so much more from us.
‘We’re sorry for not playing like world champions, and as painful as it is, we deserve to be out…’
A follow-up tweet then said: ‘Your support across the globe was incredible. We celebrated together in 2014, but sometimes in football you have to accept defeat and admit that your opponents were better.
‘Congrats to Sweden and Mexico, and of course to South Korea on their win. Thanks to Russia for your hospitality‘