Kroos Spain

For several years, Toni Kroos' best position was something of a mystery. It was definitely central - but shuffled between defense and attack, and the midfielder, on the books of Hansa Rostock as a teenager, just wasn't quite finding his feet at the Allianz Arena.

A special player, blessed with accurate passing and intelligence, Kroos was nurtured at Bayern Munich, like he was truly one of their own. A loan-spell at Leverkusen seemed to indicate his future lay as a No.10 attacking-midfielder, but on his return under Jupp Heynckes, he wasn't able to make that spot his own at the Bavarian side.

He flittered in-and-out of the team - sometimes as a one of the defensive-pivot players, while acting as a deep-lying playmaker for the German national team. It didn't quite work and Pep Guardiola sought to make the 24-year-old the complete midfielder. If Guardiola got his way, Kroos would undoubtedly still be a Bayern player.

The making of Kroos in Madrid

But the move to Real Madrid - the deal tied up at a bargain price of 25-million-euro ($27m) - has reinvigorated Kroos, the midfielder thriving in the engine room of the European champions - and showing his adaptability by switching positions in his time in La Liga.

"At Bayern, I played a bit left of a sort of Number Eight," he explained in an interview with German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung. "I was basically the connection between defense and attack.

"At Real Madrid, I'm playing centrally and ten meters further back, actually in a clear Number Six position. Pep Guardiola told me at the start: ‘Toni, the best players move further back during their careers.' With Ancelotti I could go the same way.”

"As far as Real goes, you can certainly say that I'm a Number Six player."

"Kroos is another professor," Ancelotti said in Spain's Al Primer Toque. "He has graduated from Xabi Alonso's university very quickly. He surprises me because he is never worried. If he is under pressure or not, his play is always the same."

As blunt as Germany appeared in the win over Gibraltar, Kroos was still the most important cog of the system. A kind of passing machine, he tapped the ball left, right, back and forth, making himself available for the ball and maintaining some ebb and flow to Germany's football.

Shaping up against the Spanish team, outstanding ball masters in their own right, will be a direct match-up for the Real ace who will look to take charge in Vigo.

Beating the Spanish hoodoo

Germany haven't won on Spanish soil in 14 years since the first match of Rudi Völler's reign as the head coach of the German team. The DFB-team have picked up only eight victories in the overall 21 meetings, as Joachim Löw takes charge of the world champions for the 118th time.

Jerome Boateng and Manuel Neuer of Bayern Munich withdrew from the squad for the Spain game over the weekend with the defender suffering from a calf problem. Meanwhile, Neuer has a knee injury, picked up in the 4-0 win over Gibraltar in Euro 2016 qualification.

"We can't take any risks with Manuel," said Löw who will decide between Borussia Dortmund's Roman Weidenfeller and Hannover's Ron-Robert Zieler as the deputy to the Ballon D'Or nominee.

Likewise, Spain will be missing a handful of important players, like Cesc Fabregas and David Silva. But they do welcome a host of promising players to Vigo, including Bayern Munich's prodigious left-back Juan Bernat and Valencia's Paco Alcacer.