D. Ray Morton, 9th July 2014.
David Luiz turns on the waterworks after the worst game of his life. Paris St-Germain must be very concerned about having just spent €63m for his services
When making their pre-match predictions for the Brazil vs. Germany semi-final yesterday evening, people talked of Brazil's lack of creativity due to the missing Neymar. The concensus was that Germany would sniff out a narrow victory in a cagey match. The absence of centre-back and captain, Thiago Silva, was something of an afterthought. With Bayern Munich's Dante expected to replace him, it would be fine, they thought, and the main problem would be finding that spark in attack. Luiz Felipe Scolari must have been of the same school of thought and slapped the captain's armband on David Luiz allowing him to have command at the back. What a mistake that turned out to be.
Germany absolutely annihilated the Brazilians in Belo Horizonte, a place-name that will now seem like Hiroshima to native Brazilians. Thomas Müller opened the scoring with easiest of tap-ins from a corner with marking which would have driven a Sunday league manager insane. Bad start.
What happened between the 23rd and 29th minutes of that first half was scarcely believable. Even writing about it now, after the dust has settled, it still seems surreal. The Germans absolutely steamrollered a Brazilian side that had completely lost their discipline. They collapsed quicker than the Twin Towers. Miroslav Klose scored in the 23rd minute, his 16th all-time World Cup goal which saw him beat Ronaldo's record. Now Brazil more than just wilted. They lost the plot entirely. The cheese had slipped off the cracker. Toni Kroos netted two more goals before writers doing their play-by-play reports could catch their breath. Sami Khedira scored another. It was 5-0 and they had not played even half an hour.
Jaws dropped in the stands and the TV cameras flashed towards bawling Brazilian fans suffering a humiliation so great that it made their 1950 World Cup collapse to Uruguay seem like nothing. This was utter, complete devastation. The second half played out like something of a practice match. Manuel Neuer even had to make some decent saves but Brazil were playing like lost souls scattered around the Estádio Mineirão weighted by a sense of doom. As André Schürrle entered the fray, you could tell he was the type of player who would add more damage. Duly he did, scoring in the 69th and 79th minutes, the second goal quite stunning, Brazil left in tatters. Oscar's last minute rebuttal was like giving anaesthetic to someone who had just been put through a meat grinder.
This vile sea creature may be taking his vengeance on mankind after most of the world smirked gleefully at Brazil's demise
How did it all go so wrong? It cannot be blamed on David Luiz alone although he had a true nightmare, the worst game he will ever likely play. Collectively, as soon as the first goal went in, the heads dropped. This has been a strange World Cup for Brazil. Playing in front of their home crowd, the expectation has been massive. Players have routinely shed tears during the playing of the national anthem. Their psychological state bordered on somewhere between fanaticism and obsession. It was too volatile a cocktail without the calming presence of Thiago Silva around to essentially babysit a defence that did not have the bottle for a match of this magnitude.
It is something of a shame that Germany will not even be credited that highly for this unique semi-final triumph. Never has a team enjoyed such a resounding victory at this stage of the World Cup. Though Joachim Löw's side will go up in peoples' estimation, I still do not see them as a team that will tear apart either Argentina or the Netherlands in the final. Indeed, that second semi-final will probably be a world away from what we witnessed last night though making predictions at this stage of an insane World Cup is crazy business.
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