Bayern Munich and Germany forward, Thomas Muller has blasted the media, calling them hypocrites for their coverage of the Ozil racism story.
Mesut Ozil had retired from international football after accusing the DFB of racism, especially its President, Reinhard Grindel whom he said was patronising and belittling of his opinions.
Ozil had come under fire after he was photographed with Turkey’s President, Recip Erdogan along with Manchester City Midfielder, Ilkay Gundogan.
Ozil had borne the brunt of the criticism with many even questioning his inclusion in the World Cup squad and things only got worse with Germany’s elimination, with many pointing to Ozil as the scapegoat.
When asked about it at a press conference ahead of Bayern Munich’s friendly with Manchester United, Muller opted to blast the media instead of standing by Ozil like teammate Manuel Neuer did.
He said: “The whole discussion was fired up by outsiders,”
“Of course, the protagonists of that matter acted a little bit, unfortunately, both the executives of the DFB and the players.
“But, actually, this debate is hypocritical from the media’s side. Because of the debate, the media gets circulation.
“The DFB wanted to have peace with it, calm it, but the media always asked, again and again. The discussion was made bigger than it was and now you see what you get from that.
Muller continued: “For the sales numbers, of course, this is great, because now you still get to ask about it.
“For us players, I think the whole issue never was as big as it was made out to be, but of course we got confronted by it and we still do.
“So now we finally should end that debate and concentrate on football, because racism inside the national team never was an issue.”
Mesut Ozil is set to play a part in Arsenal’s last friendly before their Premier League opener with Manchester City next week as the Gunner take on Lazio today in Stockholm, Sweden.