After a highly decorated and successful professional career that has spanned 16 years, 34-year-old Toni Kroos has decided to hang his boots at the end of the season, although he would show one last dance in the Euro 2024.
Toni Kroos started his professional football career at Bayern Munich’s reserve team, where he played in the Regionalliga Süd division in 2007-08 season. That season, he also played up to 20 games for the Bayern Munich first team as the youngest player at the time.
After a highly successful period in Bayern Munich, the German legend moved to Real Madrid in 2014 as one of the best midfielders in the world and had 10 successful seasons in Spain. He’s loved in Germany and in Spain and regarded as one of the greatest midfielders of all time.
Toni Kroos Success In The Bundesliga
In Toni Kroos’s first professional season in the Bundesliga, he played for both the Bayern Munich first team and the reserve team. For the first team, he was, at the time, the youngest ever player to represent Bayern Munich. He was 17 years and 265 days old at the time.
That season, Toni Kroos featured 20 times for Bayern Munich in all competitions, 14 of those times from the bench. He won the Bundesliga and the DFB-Pokal that year. The next season wasn’t as expected for Kroos under Jürgen Klinsmann, and he left Bayern to Leverkusen on loan.
After what was a very successful year and a half in Leverkusen where he scored 10 goals in 48 appearances for the club, he returned to Munich in 2010. Toni Kroos went on to win the Bundesliga and the DFB-Pokal two more times after that. He also won the UEFA Champions League in 2013 after Bayern defeated German rivals Borussia Dortmund in the final in Wembley Stadium.
With Bayern, Toni Kroos had earlier won the DFL-Supercup at the beginning of that season. He later went on to win the UEFA Super Cup and FIFA Club World Cup. In 2014, he switched allegiances from Germany to Spain when he signed for Real Madrid.
In Bayern Munich, he was named in the Bundesliga Team of the Season twice and UEFA Champions League Squad of the Season once. The year he joined Real Madrid, he won a few awards for his season at Bayern Munich too, like the Silbernes Lorbeerblatt, FIFA FIFPro World11, UEFA Team of the Year, IFFHS World’s Best Playmaker, and German Player of the Year.
Toni Kroos: The Madrid Midfield Colossus
In Real Madrid, Toni Kroos has made 463 appearances in 10 fruitful years, with Matchday 38 in La Liga and the UEFA Champions League final still coming up to make it 465 for the German. In those 463 games, he’s scored 28 goals and provided 98 assists. 22 of these goals and 72 of the assists have come from his 305 appearances in the La Liga.
This German legend is one of six players who have scored on their 100th appearance in the UEFA Champions League. The other great players are Robert Lewandowski, Thierry Henry, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Cristiano Ronaldo, and Andrea Pirlo.
In the 2018 FIFA Club World Cup final where Real Madrid beat Al Ain 4-1, he broke and set the record for the most chances created in a FIFA Club World Cup final with seven chances created. In 2021, he scored Real Madrid’s 1,000th European Cup/Champions League goal, making Real Madrid the first club to reach that number of goals in the competition.
Toni Kroos is known as the king of long passes. As at March 2024, he was the outfield player who had completed the most successful long passes in Europe’s big-five leagues, with approximately 9.6 long passes every 90 minutes.
In 10 years in Real Madrid, he’s won the La Liga trophy four times, the Copa del Rey once, the Supercopa de España four times, the UEFA Champions League four times with Real Madrid in another final for a potential fifth win with Madrid, the UEFA Super Cup three times, and the FIFA Club World Cup five times.
In Real Madrid, Toni Kroos has won a plethora of personal awards including UEFA Champions League Squad of the Season four times, La Liga Top assist provider once, FIFA FIFPro World11, UEFA Team of the Year, and UEFA La Liga Team of the Season twice each, GQ German Athlete of the Year and German Footballer of the Year once each, and both IFFHS World Team of the Decade and IFFHS UEFA Team of the Decade in 2020.
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A Fascinating Talent For Germany Internationally
In May 2006, he competed with Germany in the 2006 UEFA European Under-17 Championship and was named the Golden Player, although Germany finished fourth. The next year, he finished as joint top scorer with Victor Moses. Germany beat the Netherlands to finish fifth.
In 2007 at the FIFA U-17 World Cup, Toni Kroos was awarded the Best Player award although Germany finished third. He also scored five goals to win the Bronze Shoe.
After playing a pivotal role in Germany winning their fourth FIFA World Cup trophy in 2014, he was listed in both the FIFA World Cup Dream and All-Star Teams. In this World Cup, the Brazilian fans nicknamed Toni Kroos Garçom which means “waiter” in Portuguese for how precise the passes he delivered to the strikers were.
According to the Castrol Performance Index, which is the World Cup’s official statistical analyzer, Toni Kroos had a rating of 9.79 out of 10 which made him the best performer at the 2014 World Cup.
With 593 accurate passes in Euro 2016, Toni Kroos holds the record of the most successful passes in a single edition of the Euros since 1980. He was named in the UEFA European Championship Team of the Tournament.
Toni Kroos retired from international football in 2021, but returned in 2024 and will participate in the 2024 Euros. Since making his international debut in 2010, he’s played 108 games for his country, scored 17 goals and provided 21 assists. He’s considered one of the greatest midfielders of his generation.
About the Author
Ebenezer has been an avid writer for over a decade and a half. Within that period, he has garnered experience in various fields such as editing, graphics design, transcribing, sales, data analysis, and football management.
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