Valencia goalkeeper Timo Hildebrand admits that his exclusion from the Germany squad for Euro 2008 has left him "surprised, shocked and irritated."

The 29-year-old was left out of Joachim Low's squad despite being the second choice throughout the qualifying campaign and increasing the pressure on number one Jens Lehmann over recent months.

Instead, youngster Rene Adler of Bayer Leverkusen and Hannover's more experienced Robert Enke will be travelling to Austria and Switzerland this summer.

Low admitted that Hildebrand had taken the news badly, and the player used his own website timo-hildebrand.de to explain exactly how hard the news had hit him.

"This morning, goalkeeper coach Andreas Kopke called me and informed me that the national team's coaching team had decided not to nominate me for the upcoming European Championships," he wrote.

"I am surprised, shocked and irritated.

"Obviously, there is nothing I can do but accept this decision as it is, but I cannot undestand it whatsoever.

"I have been in the squad for all the qualifying matches and there was no criticism of my performance and no indication that it was not enough.

"It has always been clear to me that I am the number two, but I will challenge (to be number one) because my form and performances are right, because I am fit and because the time is right.

"For this, not being picked is completely unexpected and comes from out of nowhere."