• Midfielder says Özil’s international retirement ‘not in order’ • Özil claimed he was scapegoated for his Turkish background

Toni Kroos has criticised his former Germany teammate Mesut Özil for the way he announced his international retirement over claims of racism, which the Real Madrid midfielder called “nonsense”.

Özil announced he would no longer be playing for the national in July after Joachim Löw’s Germany crashed out of the World Cup group stage. He said he had faced “racism and disrespect” because of his Turkish roots.

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“Basically Mesut is a deserved international and as a player he deserved a better departure,” Kroos told Bild newspaper in an interview published on Thursday. “But the way he resigned was not in order.”

Özil, 29, was a key member of Germany’s World Cup-winning side in 2014 and was voted by fans as the team’s player of the year five times since 2011. But the Arsenal midfielder faced a barrage of criticism at home for having his photograph taken with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in May and for his performances at the World Cup in Russia.

In his resignation statement last month, Özil also accused the German Football Association of failing to back him in the row over the photo. German fans jeered him and Manchester City’s Ilkay Gündoğan, who is also of Turkish descent and posed with Erdoğan, during World Cup warm-up games in May.

“The parts in his statement that are rightly addressed are unfortunately overshadowed by the significantly higher amount of nonsense,” Kroos said. “I think he knows very well that racism within the national team and the DFB does not exist.”

Germany’s elimination from the World Cup was their earliest exit from the tournament in 80 years, and Özil felt he was scapegoated for their unsuccessful title defence.

In his statement, Özil wrote: “In the eyes of [German FA president Reinhard] Grindel and his supporters I am German when we win, but I am an immigrant when we lose.”

Kroos, 28, said he had no plans to follow Özil into international retirement:“I will continue towards Euro 2020 and have set myself the goal of being far more successful there than in the recent past.

“I had a good talk with Joachim Löw. “We will find solutions together so that I can get a break here and there. For me that’s the only way and I am thankful for Jogi’s understanding.”