{"id":43947,"date":"2026-06-26T15:36:29","date_gmt":"2026-06-26T15:36:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/43947\/"},"modified":"2026-06-26T15:36:29","modified_gmt":"2026-06-26T15:36:29","slug":"rudiger-keeps-focus-on-germany-despite-mourinho-excitement-lets-think-about-the-world-cup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/43947\/","title":{"rendered":"R\u00fcdiger keeps focus on Germany despite Mourinho excitement: \u201cLet\u2019s think about the World Cup\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"\">Antonio R\u00fcdiger has reiterated that his immediate focus remains on Germany\u2019s World Cup campaign despite the growing excitement surrounding Jos\u00e9 Mourinho\u2019s arrival at <a class=\"link \" href=\"https:\/\/sports.yahoo.com\/soccer\/teams\/real-madrid\/\" data-i13n=\"sec:content-canvas;subsec:anchor_text;elm:context_link\" data-ylk=\"slk:Real Madrid;sec:content-canvas;subsec:anchor_text;elm:context_link;itc:0\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Real Madrid&quot;,&quot;ySubModuleName&quot;:&quot;anchor_text&quot;,&quot;yHasCommerce&quot;:false}\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Real Madrid<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Speaking to DAZN following <a href=\"https:\/\/www.managingmadrid.com\/real-madrid-cf-players\/109461\/antonio-rudiger-makes-first-start-at-2026-world-cup-as-germany-fall-2-1-to-ecuador\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Germany\u2019s 2-1 defeat to Ecuador;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Germany\u2019s 2-1 defeat to Ecuador&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Germany\u2019s 2-1 defeat to Ecuador<\/a>, the veteran defender was asked about the prospect of finally working under Mourinho next season. Rather than getting carried away by the anticipation, R\u00fcdiger made it clear that the World Cup is his priority before turning his attention back to club football.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">\u201cExcited about Mourinho? Let\u2019s think about the World Cup and then I\u2019m going to be with my dad.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">While R\u00fcdiger kept his answer brief after Germany\u2019s defeat, he had spoken at greater length about Mourinho earlier this week, revealing just how eager he is to begin working with the Portuguese coach after years of near misses.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">\u201cI can\u2019t say too much, but I can say that I\u2019m incredibly excited. Finally, I\u2019m going to play under him. In the past, there were many conversations with him, but for some reason, it never came to fruition. That\u2019s why I\u2019m even happier to welcome him to us now.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">The 33-year-old also reflected on a difficult 2025-26 campaign, admitting that injuries made it one of the toughest periods of his career before he fought his way back to full fitness.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">\u201cI had a difficult year last year, especially physically. I had to fight a lot with injuries and I managed to come back.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">R\u00fcdiger\u2019s perseverance was rewarded with a new Real Madrid contract through 2027, and the German international emphasized that remaining at the Santiago Bernab\u00e9u was always his objective.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">\u201cReal Madrid is practically my home. I feel very good there, my family feels very good there, and that\u2019s why I never really thought about anything else. I just wanted to get back in shape and earn my new contract. And I did it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Antonio R\u00fcdiger has reiterated that his immediate focus remains on Germany\u2019s World Cup campaign despite the growing excitement&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":43948,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[828,37701,823,5,332,37702,5764,4793,230,232,284],"class_list":["post-43947","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-germany","tag-antonio-rudiger","tag-east-rutherford","tag-ecuador","tag-germany","tag-getty-images","tag-icon-sportswire","tag-jose-mourinho","tag-nj","tag-real-madrid","tag-rudiger","tag-world-cup"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43947"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43947\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}