Klopp has not won in two games, and Urbig makes his Germany debut against bottom side Serbia in Munich
Germany host Serbia at the Allianz Arena with Jürgen Klopp still looking for a first win. Jonas Urbig starts in goal, and Nico Schlotterbeck is out with an ankle injury.
Oct 1, 2026
Jürgen Klopp has had two games in charge of Germany, a 1-1 draw with the Netherlands in Amsterdam and a 1-0 home defeat to Greece in Augsburg. The third is against Serbia at the Allianz Arena on Thursday night, and the side bottom of Nations League Group A2 is probably the kindest opponent he will get for a first win.
Kick-off is 8:45pm in Munich, which is 12:15am IST on Friday.
Urbig in goal, a different squad around him
Klopp has split this window’s selection into two groups, and it is mostly the second one that plays in Munich. Florian Wirtz, Nick Woltemade, Aleksandar Pavlović and Jonathan Burkardt are all in it, along with a handful of uncapped names.
Jonas Urbig will make his senior international debut in goal, at his club’s own ground. “I’m delighted that I’ll get the chance to walk out at my home stadium tomorrow,” the Bayern Munich goalkeeper said.
Nico Schlotterbeck will not be there. The Dortmund defender damaged the lateral ligament in his right ankle in training, and he is out of both October games. “Nico rolled his ankle during the warm-up with no contact from another player,” Klopp said. It is a rough run for Schlotterbeck, who missed the end of Germany’s World Cup with a ligament injury to his other ankle.
Serbia have lost both, and are without Vlahović
Veljko Paunović’s side have played twice at home and lost both 2-1. Greece came from behind in Belgrade with a stoppage-time header from Anastasios Douvikas, and the Netherlands won there on Sunday with two goals from Mexx Meerdink on his first start.
Paunović is short up front. Dušan Vlahović pulled out of the squad injured before the first game, and Aleksandar Mitrović has been out injured since July. Sergej Milinković-Savić and Saša Lukić are still in midfield, though, and Klopp was not taking the visitors lightly. He expects Serbia to play much like Greece did, and he said their experience makes them particularly awkward. “They know all the tricks of the game,” he said.
He has reason to be careful. The last competitive meeting between the two was at the 2010 World Cup, which Serbia won 1-0. The most recent game of any kind was a 1-1 friendly in 2019.
What a third game without a win would mean
Greece lead the group with six points, the Netherlands have four, Germany one and Serbia none. Germany go to Greece on Sunday, 4 October, so anything less than three points here would leave Klopp needing a result away at the group leaders to stop this campaign drifting.
Klopp drew his first three games at Liverpool in 2015 as well, and nobody brings that up now. A club manager gets another game within the week, though. A national coach gets a handful a year, and the home defeat to Greece has already used up a fair bit of the goodwill he arrived with. I expect Germany to win this one. If they don’t, the questions about him get louder fast.