Germany continues a mind-boggling trend of defending World Cup champs getting knocked out early

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German players looking devastated following the team's surprising early exit from the 2018 World Cup.

• Germany's exit in the group stage of this World Cup is the third straight time, and fourth time in five years, that the reigning World Cup winner has failed to reach the knockout rounds. 
• Italy and Spain, the previous two teams to experience this, have had mixed success since their disappointing follow-up World Cups. 
• But Germany should be poised to bounce back from this disappointment. 
• The team's long-time coach appears set to stay on even after this failure. 

Germany, the reigning World Cup winner and a popular pick to win the tournament again this year, has been knocked out of the World Cup group stage, an utterly shocking development. 

But history was not on Germany's side - as BBC "Match of the Day" tweeted out, this is the third straight tournament in which the reigning World Cup winners have failed to get out of the group stage. 

Furthermore, 1998 World Cup winners France failed to advance out of the group stage as well, making it four out of five World Cup winners whose next tournament ended in disappointment. 

For Italy, the early exit at the 2010 World Cup was a harbinger of further disappointment, which culminated in them failing to even qualify for the 2018 World Cup.

Spain, on the other hand, has bounced back. Spain is still in this year's tournament and is a favorite to win the whole thing. 

Now, Germany looks to be entering into a rebuilding period, or perhaps more accurately a retooling period, something the country's history - Germany has won four World Cups in all - and robust club and youth development infrastructure suggests it should be able to do. 

Interestingly, the German Football Association has already announced that coach Joachim Löw, who has been the head coach since 2006, will stay on as the team's coach. 

"We believe there will be a transition that will take place after the World Cup, regardless of the outcome of the tournament, and no one is better equipped to handle that than Jogi Low," said German F.A. President Reinhard Grindel, per ESPN.