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That's why I'm worried about France not attacking yet. Who knows what our defense will be like today..


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And 0-1 Germany!

I got a little bit worried after I posted that as France seemed to come to life... but hopefully Germany get a few more goals in.

Germany has been playing very well, but we look very vulnerable to a counter attack...

Muller is starting to grate a little bit...

France definitely stepped up this half...


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And we advance!

Well done Germany!

Wasn't the most thrilling of games to be honest.

Bring back the USA!

Aye, rather boring game :/

Well, this game is as different as it could possibly be...

Columbia should have been able to take that free kick again. Really hope they can claw the game back.

Disappointed that France couldn't step up when they needed to, they were just lacking any sense of urgency.

Germany seemed happy to stay at 1-0, which is fair enough.

First half of Brazil Columbia was great! Think the ref needs to flash the yellow a couple of times though, there have been some bad fouls that have gone unpunished.

Needs yellows for fouls, yellows for diving, yellows for pissing on the foam line...he just needs to grow a pair.


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40 fouls, no card, that ref is just padding the game for the semi-finals.

Edit: finally


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This game just screams "call it for Brazil, we can't have them riot!"...

It's a joke. If they go through I'm hoping another team steps up and smashes their back doors in.

I like Germany's chances there

Time for Germany to shine!

I'd love to see Germany destroy Brazil, the ref was ridiculously bias.

Don't pull the card out for 40 fouls and you won't be able to get control back no matter what you do. Surprised that there were not more players carried off the field.

But Brazil simply has not looked that dominating, they have a key suspension, probably an injury...Germany needs to capitalize on that!

Really, really poor ref. Lots of poor sportsmanship and purposeful fouls that were fueled by him. Not a good match :(

It sucks for Neymar. But honestly, when you let a match run wild like that what else do you really expect.

 d-usa wrote:
Needs yellows for fouls, yellows for diving, yellows for pissing on the foam line...he just needs to grow a pair.

40 fouls, no card, that ref is just padding the game for the semi-finals.

I didn't watch the game, but from what matches I have seen a lot of the refereeing this world cup has been poor, with the exception of England-Italy and Germany-Algeria.
Croatia-Brazil, Mexico-Cameroon and England-Uruguay were all poorly officiated.
Fouls not called that should have been, fouls called that were legit, offsides given that were on, offsides not given that were off, cards not being given for fouls that deserve it... poor.

That guy managed to make all those other games look like high quality affairs.

I think he might have been the first guy to use the vanishing spray and go "okay guys, don't cross that...fine do whatever you want and charge the free kick...I don't care anymore"


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And Neymar officially out for the semis...

 d-usa wrote:
And Neymar officially out for the semis...

good, I loathe that guy. Such a selfish, dirty player. At least Robben's learnt to pass over the past couple of years (despite all the jokes)

I don't really care for him. But it sucks that a referee had such little control of the game that somebody ended up getting seriously hurt. Hell, somebody even thought he would get away with charging the goalie during a kickoff.


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Update: Broken back.

A game that was non-officiated to such a degree that players are jumping knee-first into other players and break their backs, and don't get a card for it because "advantage"...

I'm admittedly not a soccer expert, but the knee to the back of Neymar looked REALLY flagrant.

The big hope now for me is that, because he's hurt, the Brazilian expectations will go down and they'll riot less when they lose Sunday.

I'd be legitimately concerned that gak could get real ugly down there when they lose.

I can see Germany beating Brazil, but I fear for that German defence if they ever play Holland in the final with Robben's pace.

That aside, that Referee had a shocker. It was pub team on a Sunday.

Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:I can see Germany beating Brazil, but I fear for that German defence if they ever play Holland in the final with Robben's pace.

Yeah, Low had better change his tactics from the Algeria game, the only reason they didn't concede one or two goals in the first half was a mixture of luck, the sweeper role that Neuer was playing and the fact that, Algeria aren't a world class team. Against the likes of Robben, plus the quality of players feeding and being fed by him (Sneijder, Huntelaar, van Persie), they have to have a lower back line, and at least have one full back (I'd say it should be something like:

Klose - Muller
Ozil/Gotze - Schweinsteiger - Kroos - Schurrle
Mustafi - Boateng - Hummels - Lahm


with Lahm being whichever side Robben will be, and maybe throw in Mertesacker to defend against Huntelaar's headers (though Hummels could do that too, I suppose)

Yus! Hooray! Well done to the tea and van Gaal specifically.

I'm just going to leave this here.

Possession

Holland: 75%

Costa Rica: 25%


Goal attempts

Holland: 18

Costa Rica: 3


On target

Holland: 12

Costa Rica: 1


Off target

Holland: 6

Costa Rica: 2


Corners

Holland: 11

Costa Rica: 1


Fouls

Holland: 14

Costa Rica: 12


Offsides

Holland: 16

Costa Rica: 2

Also, Costa Rica should be banned from ever playing football again. Their playstyle was just so downright horrible. They were aiming for the penalty shootout from the very beginning. They barely even tried to attack. They were constantly with 10 guys on their own half!
That way football really is no fun at all to watch. There should be a limit to the number of defending players

Brilliant move from Van Gaal to bring in his reserve keeper though. And Tim Krul should get a statue and a festive day named after him

Agreed, I was very glad the Dutch won the shootout. They absolutely deserved it and the statistics showed that.

To be fair to the Costa Ricans, if you were a weak team in a world cup quarter final against one of the best attacking teams in the world, and ones who crushed the defending champions 5-1, you'd try for the lottery of a penalty shootout too.

One the flipside, great foresight and tactics from van Gaal to train up his substitute keeper in penalties
Krul studying where the Costa Ricans shoot and telling them as they stepped up reminds me of that whole incident with Lehmann vs Argentina when he got the notes out of his sock

 creeping-deth87 wrote:
Agreed, I was very glad the Dutch won the shootout. They absolutely deserved it and the statistics showed that.

This google picture pretty much sums up the entire match