9.7.14 World Cup Semi-Finals

Brazil v Germany

After just one minute, I feared that the refereeing would lean in favour of Brazil, when a vigorously waving linesman awarded a corner despite the ball not having gone out of play.  I needn't have worried, because overall, the Mexican officials did a pretty reasonable job.  They were so much better than the Brazil players, who to a man massively fucked up.

The 7-0 outcome was hilarious, and a complete shock to just about everyone on the planet.  It was some justice, though, to see David Luiz getting no benefit despite efforts to elbow people in the face, efforts which should actually have seen him sent off in the first half!  Seeing him in tears at the end of the game was of no interest or consequence, and I had no sympathy at all.  £50million PSG has paid for him.  Oops.

The rest of the team managed no better.  Why Scolari insisted on giving Fred a place is beyond me, and the collected efforts of the rest of the team amounted to the worth of perhaps a group of tipsy blokes leaving a pub at lunch time. The Germans, of course, played very well, and deserved to win.  There can be no argument that the Germans played well, and that whilst the score did flatter them, there was in any arena or context, a few goals between the teams on the day.

Netherlands v Argentina

What a boring match.  Okay, it was never going to compete with the Brazil v Germany game, but even so, I'd have hoped for rather more than this poor showing.  The extra time was as uninteresting as the previous 90 minutes, and the penalties duly arrived.  Again, the Dutch keeper approach was to delay the taking of the penalties, and interfere with the opponents taking them.  This is unsporting.

In summary, there must surely be a vast majority of support that's in favour of Germany winning on Sunday.  It would be a travesty if Argentina managed to steal a win considering the rather limited abilities of the team and the minimal levels of entertainment that have been offered en route to the final.

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