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Miroslav Klose, left, Michael Ballack, center and other players celebrate after Klose scored the third goal of the game.

updated 9:14 p.m. ET March 22, 2006

DORTMUND, Germany - Gregg Berhalter had a welt under an eye. Josh Wolff walked off the field with a concussion and a cut that needed five stitches. Cory Gibbs had a bruise on his knee.

Germany didn’t just beat the United States, the Germans beat up on the Americans, a 4-1 rout Wednesday night that relieved some of the pressure on the World Cup hosts and did little to inspire confidence in the U.S. team.

After a scoreless first half that left the home fans booing and whistling, the Germans went ahead when halftime sub Bastian Schweinsteiger scored 21 seconds into the second half. Germany then overwhelmed the Americans with goals by Oliver Neuville (73rd minute), Miroslav Klose (75th minute) and Michael Ballack (79th minute).

“What this game proves is who can play at this level and who can’t,” U.S. goalkeeper Kasey Keller said.

Steve Cherundolo scored his first international goal in the 85th on a 75-yard drive that bounced into the net. The Americans were missing Landon Donovan, Brian McBride, Claudio Reyna, DaMarcus Beasley, Oguchi Onyewu and Eddie Lewis because of injuries and club commitments, and U.S. coach Bruce Arena referred to the group on the field as his “second team.”

“I don’t think too many players played themselves on our World Cup roster tonight, to be honest with you,” he said.

Germany’s national team and coach Juergen Klinsmann were under intense pressure from fans, bosses and politicians following a 4-1 loss at Italy on March 1.

“Klinsi, will he be gone if he loses today?” read a large headline in Bild, with a picture on an airplane, a reference to Klinsmann’s decision to live in California and commute to Germany.

Many in the crowd of 64,500 at Signal Iduna Park were unhappy when Lukas Podolski and Ballack misfired on open shots early.

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“It was an important victory because now we’ll be able to prepare in peace for the World Cup,” Klinsmann said. “Some of the criticism in the past few weeks was justified but some comments were below the belt.”

Now it is the Americans’ fans who have some doubt, especially given a tough World Cup group that includes the Czech Republic, Italy and Ghana. The United States, an all-time high fifth in the world rankings, had previously played World Cup warmups against far weaker teams, tying Canada 0-0 and beating Norway (5-0), Japan (3-2) Guatemala (4-0) and Poland (1-0).

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Their remaining exhibitions are all against teams that failed to qualify for the 32-nation field: Jamaica, Morocco, Venezuela and Latvia. When playing in Europe against the big five soccer powers of Germany, England, Italy, France and Spain, the United States is 0-9 and has been outscored 26-4. The Americans allowed four goals for the first time since a 4-2 loss at Germany that preceded the 2002 World Cup.

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