As with any epic footballing crisis it is only after the event, after the initial shock has subsided and the search through the rubble begins, that Germany's World Cup exit begins to look not just understandable but inescapable. On reflection, the warning signs, the fatalistic hints of what was to come, had been mounting up for some time.
It is a peculiar quirk of the human experience that history always feels inevitable; as the present becomes the past, events feel eerily pre-determined. For Germany, the journey to humiliating group-stage elimination has already begun to seem preordained, their eventual doom taking shape in a series of poor decisions that began in 2017.
Why, then, did so few see it coming? Before the World Cup began On Thursday morning newspaper Suddeutsche Zeiting ran the headline "Complacent in the disaster", which pretty accurately summarises the mood in Germany.
After the 2-0 defeat to South Korea, Mats Hummels made an even more damning assessment: "The last convincing performance we had was in the autumn of 2017." Germany were poor in each of their six friendly matches between November of last year and the beginning of the World Cup, sliding from disappointing draws with England, France, and Spain, to defeats against Brazil and Austria.
Their final pre-tournament match was a narrow 2-1 victory over Saudi Arabia in which every single tactical problem evidenced in Group D was on full display.
Joachim Low, then, is guilty of complacency more than anything else. The specifics of the defensive openness, midfield frailty, and weary attacking lines are better discussed in relation to the three group games below, but suffice to say the Saudis could easily have won on June 8.
Germany simply refused to learn from their own mistakes, instead assuming that things would fall into place once the tournament began, that their problems would melt away when it really mattered.
It is precisely the same naivety that saw France (2002), Italy (2010), and Spain (2014) knocked out at the group stages four years after lifting the World Cup. And so Low didn't bother adapting his style of play, didn't think to refresh an ageing squad with younger players.
Leroy Sane's notable absence was seen by many as evidence of Low's strength of resolve, but in hindsight it is a clear example of his stubbornness and unwillingness to evolve with the times.
How desperately they needed someone with his pace, width, and directness in Russia. Mexico & Sweden: problems in defence, midfield, and attack Without Bastian Schweinsteiger to sweep up in front of the defence or Philipp Lahm to control the opposition counter-attack, Germany were remarkably vulnerable in all three of their group matches.
Mexico easily broke, thanks in part to bravely leaving three men forward but largely because Sami Khedira, Jerome Boateng, and Mats Hummels were individually and collectively shambolic. Khedira is too slow on the turn to adequately provide cover for a back two and was constantly caught high up the pitch and out of position.
The same can be said of the full-backs Joshua Kimmich and Marvin Plattenhardt, whose commitment to attack left the centre-backs completely isolated.
Boateng is an ambling defender and, as the pre-tournament friendlies clearly showed, does not partner well with Hummels.
The setup was disastrous, but alarmingly none of the players or coaches seemed to notice; Mexico counter-attacked again and again, eventually making the breakthrough. From here on in Germany began to panic.
Across the three matches Low played three different centre-back pairs; he dropped Khedira then brought him back; he changed to a 4-3-3, back to a 4-2-3-1, then ended in a lethargic 4-4-2.