![\"Mertesacker](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/GettyImages-2278459286-scaled-e1784888421344-1024x682.jpg\")
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Mertesacker won the World Cup with Germany in 2014 Kirill Kudryavtsev via Getty Images<\/p>\n
Per Mertesacker is set to be announced as the German Football Federation (DFB)\u2019s new sporting director later this year.<\/p>\n
The former defender \u2014 who won the 2014 World Cup with Germany \u2014 left former club Arsenal at the end of the 2025-26 season.<\/p>\n
The 41-year-old had spent 15 years in north London, seven as a player and then eight years as the club\u2019s academy manager following his retirement in 2018.<\/p>\n
When asked about Mertesacker\u2019s impending appointment, DFB president Bernd Neuendorf said on Friday: \u201cPer\u2019s name was immediately on everyone\u2019s lips, but the truth is that Andreas Rettig, Rudi Voller and I had been in talks with Per for a year and a half.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe started these talks very early on, and he indicated early on that he would be ready to take on this task.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mertesacker\u2019s playing career span over two decades and saw him represent the likes of Hannover 96, Werder Bremen and Arsenal. The defender also made 104 appearances for Germany and featured six times in their triumphant 2014 World Cup campaign.<\/p>\n
Mertsacker also spent a short amount of time assisting interim head coach Freddie Ljungberg before Mikel Arteta was appointed in December 2019.<\/p>\n
Bukayo Saka, Emile Smith Rowe, Ethan Nwaneri, Myles Lewis-Skelly, Max Dowman and Marli Salmon are among the standout players to come through Arsenal\u2019s academy and feature for the first team in Mertesacker\u2019s time as its manager.<\/p>\n
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Jul 24, 2026<\/p>\n
Connections: Sports Edition<\/p>\n
Spot the pattern. Connect the terms<\/p>\n
Find the hidden link between sports terms<\/p>\n
Play today’s puzzle<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mertesacker won the World Cup with Germany in 2014 Kirill Kudryavtsev via Getty Images Per Mertesacker is set…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":954134,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2026],"tags":[7730,7,15718,16199,3373],"class_list":["post-954133","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-arsenal","tag-football","tag-germany","tag-international-football","tag-soccer"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116974564756725400","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/954133","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=954133"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/954133\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/954134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=954133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=954133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=954133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}