Germany Career
Ballack started his international career in April 1999 in a match against Scotland coming on as a substitute. He cointinued playing a bit part role prior to Euro 2000, where Ballack only appeared in the German's bitterly disappointing for an hour and hardly had the time to impress his European counterparts. Ballack palyed his part in Germany qualifying for the 2002 world cup finals. Ballack's away goasl in the play- off against the Ukraineearned Germany a 1-1 draw, and Ballack set up a stroming victory in the home leg several days later. Ballack scored two more goals in the return leg, which finished 4-1, and German were then able to make their travel arrangments for Japan and Korea. His displays during the 2002 world cup finals were second to none, he almost single handedly carried the German's over tot the final, howveer heartbreak for Ballack occured in the semi-finals when he stopped a Korean player from scoring in the semi-final he was given his second yellow card, meaning suspension from the final. Germany lost 2-0 and Ballack and the German's now needed to look forward to Euro 2004.
The 2004 European Championships proved to soon for the German's and Ballack as they stumbled out in the group stages, which included an embarassing shock draw to Latvia. Ad the German's were hosting the 2006 world cup finals, Ballack was a force in the team. In 2005 Ballack appeared in 2005 matches for the German national team, scoring a very impressive seven goals. His form for Germany was outstanding leading up to the 2006 world cup finals. In a friendly match against USA in March 2006, Ballack scored the final goal of the match in a 4-1 thumping. In his first 60 appearances for the German national side, Ballack was on form scoring 29 times in 60 appearances for Germany, averaging nearly a goal every other match for the German's. He was Germany's captain during the 2006 world cup finals.
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