In the last almost 50 years, only one other goalkeeper has managed that! What Jonas Urbig even has over Manuel Neuer and Oliver Kahn
What several German goalkeeping legends were denied over the past almost 50 years, Bayern Munich’s Jonas Urbig has managed in his first two appearances for the Germany team.
The Bayern keeper made his senior international debut last Thursday in Germany’s 2-0 win over Serbia in the Nations League. Germany coach Jürgen Klopp then gave him a second game in the DFB goal in the 0-0 draw in Greece on Sunday.
Urbig kept a clean sheet in both matches and, according to data provider Opta, is only the second German goalkeeper since 1977 to avoid conceding in each of his first two internationals over the full 90 minutes. In the past 49 years, only Oliver Baumann (TSG Hoffenheim) had managed the same feat, doing so in October and November 2024. The 36-year-old, still Germany’s number two at the World Cup but not nominated for the first internationals under Klopp, kept clean sheets in a 1-0 win over the Netherlands and a 7-0 victory against Bosnia-Herzegovina.
A number of German goalkeeping legends failed to match what Baumann, and now Urbig, have done. Manuel Neuer, still Bayern’s number one ahead of Urbig, lost his clean sheet on his international debut in a 7-2 friendly win over the United Arab Emirates in June 2009.
When did Oliver Kahn concede his first goal for the national team?
Oliver Kahn, like Neuer a multiple World Goalkeeper of the Year, conceded once in each of the first two of his 86 internationals: in June 1995 in a 2-1 friendly win over Switzerland and in September 1995, when Kahn got the nod in a 4-1 win over Georgia in qualifying for Euro 1996.
Jens Lehmann, another German goalkeeping icon and number one at the home World Cup in 2006, is a special case in this statistic. The now 56-year-old, like Urbig and Baumann, did not concede in either of his first two internationals, 2-0 against Oman in February 1998 and 7-0 against Luxembourg in June 1998, both friendlies. But Lehmann only came on for the second half in both games, replacing the then first-choice keeper Andreas Köpke. In his first two international appearances over the full 90 minutes, both of which went badly wrong for the DFB team, Lehmann did have to pick the ball out of his net: in a 0-1 friendly defeat to Scotland in April 1999 and a 0-4 loss to Brazil at the Confederations Cup in July 1999.
At the start of 2025, Urbig moved from 1. FC Köln to Bayern and has since been developed in Munich as the future successor to Neuer, who could possibly end his career next summer. Urbig is number two, but he continues to get playing time and has made two appearances so far this season.
When was Jonas Urbig first nominated for the DFB team?
The 23-year-old was first nominated for the senior Germany national team by Klopp’s predecessor Julian Nagelsmann, but did not feature in the friendlies against Finland (4-0) and the USA (2-1) immediately before the disappointing World Cup in North America. Klopp has now called up Urbig for the second part of his XXL squad for the unusually long international window and, after the debut against Serbia, again opted for the Bayern keeper in Greece.
"The situation is that all the lads we have with us are playing regularly, and that is different with Jonas. That is why we planned for him to get another game," Klopp had explained the day before the Greece match as to why Urbig was again preferred to Noah Atubolu (number one at Eintracht Frankfurt) and Finn Dahmen (number one at FC Augsburg).
Who is currently number one in the DFB team?
For the time being, Klopp has given Marc-Andre ter Stegen the status of the DFB team’s new number one after Neuer’s renewed and final retirement. The experienced keeper, currently on loan from Barcelona to Ajax, was in goal for Klopp’s debut as Germany coach against the Netherlands (1-1), but was then no longer part of the second section of the DFB squad for the recent Nations League matches.
After the good impressions from his first two internationals, Urbig is likely to have a strong chance of developing into ter Stegen’s first challenger. In Greece, he looked composed and also produced an early save when, in the second minute, he brilliantly denied a header from Georgios Masouras during one of Greece’s rare dangerous attacking moves.
