If theres one team that can stifle and squeeze the life out of brazil's emotion, atmosphere and wave of momentum, it's germany and their ruthless professionalism.

Losing neymar and silva is the decisive blow.

Germany will do em in the semi, and frankly, I will be happy they do.

Can see a grudge match between them and holland in the final now.

Can't believe it's come to this, as an englishman but in the semi.......Deutschland gehen!!

Most of the teams left in it are average, which begs the question, just how sh*t ARE England? I do feel a little bit sorry for Neymar the player, but not the person, he's an arrogant c*ck. Scolari hasn't covered himself in much glory either, whining about Neymar being 'targeted' yet Rodriguez and, to a lesser extent, Alexis Sanchez in the Chile game were kicked off the park, add to that Brazil have committed the most fouls so far



That Brazil side are a bunch of chancers, living off past greats, and i sincerely hope they don't win it, if i had to choose then i'd like Holland to win it..... even if Robben IS a complete t*t.

Good predictions.

Yup. That's us.

I've seriously watched every one of these knockout games and just thought ''if england were playing this they'd be f*cked'.

Algeria are a better team than england. In last nights brazil game, how the hell would england have been able to handle that heat and pace. They'd have been run well a truly ragged and would have been reduced to congregating on the edge of the box and hoofing the ball 50 metres up field.

We are very sh*t, but during the first two games we actually did okay. Agree about most of the teams being average. But it's lead to an excellent World Cup having lower quality teams.



It was a nothing challenge, which is only whined about because he got injured. Scolari is just using the injustice to push his country/team. He knows he's lying but any coach will lie if it helps his team.



The Brazil side don't compare to the mythic Brazil sides, but even the mythic sides don't actually live up to the myths. They are nowhere near as bad as they are slated as.

Robben isn't a complete t*t, he's just a little bit of one. Yes, he'd go over to win a pen. But nearly every player he's up against would gladly break his ankle if it meant they'd win, and many of them have tried. A few have succeeded.

FIFA looking at possible retrospective action against Zuniga for the injury to Neymar.

I wonder, did FIFA ever get round to checking for retrospective action against Neymar for his elbow against Croatia.....

Of course they did... oh wait, no they didn't

Well Netherlands are still in it, but only just.
I want them to win it but I didn't like the antics of the replacement goalkeeper.
I'd have told him to stop it and booked him each time he did it after that.
Get in your goal or get booked.
Sure it worked out for him but it's a poor precedent for behaviour.
The game is fooked when gamesmanship bordering on cheating is tolerated.
What would happen if a goalie was sent off in a shoot out?

What did he do wrong? I'm a lover of all things competitive, and it looked to me like he was trying to psyche them out of it.

He did nothing wrong.
I look forward to the next golf play off (for example ) when just as a player is going for a winning putt, his opponent walks in front of him and tells him he is going to miss it.
There would be uproar.
But there is a bit of honour in some sports.
Not so football.

I remember watching the Ryder Cup a few years back, Anthony Kim was whooping in front of Sergio Garcia throughout their round and Sergio was mentally battered. I thought it was a bit much from Kim, but it seemingly gave him an edge over his opponent.

I've watched basketball for years and trash talk is a huge part of that sport. For me, it's fantastic to see how far somebody will go for a mental advantage over an opponent. It seemed nasty to see because Holland were the favourites and the 'big boys', but Krul had to gain every advantage possible. You can be sure as hell talk like that goes on in every sport at nearly every level, it's got nothing to do with honour.

You're welcome to it.
Win at any cost.
I would have been surprised if I had any allies in my view.
Honour, what an old fashioned notion.
Sportsmanship ditto.

Roddy - I'm not going to go back through the thread because you might have taken a holiday that week, but was Chelsea's blatant timewasting from the first minute of our game at Anfield acceptable or unacceptable?

I thought the referee was utterly appalling with his control of Krul. Krul made it clear that he was going to absolutely take the urine from the start and he just stood there and let him.

Players have strict rules where they all need to stand and what they need to do. But now keepers can go for a walk while the his opponent is waiting? The keeper can just come forward for a chat?

Look forward to any shootouts in subsequent matches taking 3 times longer because keepers come up with increasingly stupid ways to put players off.

The referee should have ordered Krul back to his line as soon as he walked out. If Krul ignored it he should have booked him. If Krul continued he should have sent him off.

I don't blame Krul. I blame that moron of a ref.

They would have had to replace him. Normally the back up keeper would be used. As Krul was the back up keeper and the other keeper was substituted it would have had to have been an outfield player.

That would have been funny.

I am glad that someone else thought that it wasn't on, and that by his inaction the ref condoned blatant intimidation.
This world cup has seen some improvements in refereeing procedures, but the wrestling for example continues unchecked.
Does anyone know the stats for the number if fouls per game? It must be horrendously high, yet the number of bookings does not seem in parity.
So games are stop-start jokes at the moment.
Hunting season is in full swing......

I see Brazil are appealing against Thiago Silva's one game ban...

Hollands penalties were inch perfect. Literally. You would watch the reply and an inch either way would have seen it saved/missed. Impecable. I remember when england took 5 perfect penalties in 96.

........The germans took 6. Game over.

Van Gaal's received alot of praise, probably justified. But it was a massive gamble, could have gone either way. He's not god, but he has got a pair of massive testicles

The dutch were very unlucky not to score in normal time and ET, so in the end the result is just.

I think right now, I fancy holland to be champions, just.

I think they have the best balance between being a functional team, and having those world class players in the final 3rd required to make the difference at this level.

One thing you simply can't account for though, is Lionel Messi.

Its a nailed on Germany/Argentina final - Germany will come on all efficient as normal and simply grind Brazil down, which won't take much as they are mediocre. Take Neymar out of the equation, which has now happened, and Brazil are no better than the much criticised England.

Argentina v Holland is much closer to call, but simply the thought of Messi against a Dutch defence which was rocking against a very average Costa Rica attack, leads me to think they will sneak it by the odd goal.

You're comparing a bit of wasted time, when play was finished and only penalties were left to take, to blatant time wasting from the first minute? It's not really the same, is it? I don't recall anybody moaning after the game about how long the shootout taken. Is that your issue?

I didn't view what Krul had done as time wasting - I viewed it as trying to gain an advantage over an opponent. I couldn't really give a sh*t what Krul was saying to them, he was doing what he could to gain an advantage. Anybody that's played sports, watched live sports in person or sometimes even watched it live on TV, will know that things like this go on in nearly every sport at nearly every level. It might have intimidated them, but it all adds to the drama for me and I enjoy seeing the mental side of the game on show at the highest level.

For the record. I hate time wasting in play because I've been in stadiums and I've forked out £50+ for a ticket, only to have some t*t on a field waste my time that I've actually paid for. I've never seen a penalty shootout, but given that I'd already had 30 mins extra play, I wouldn't really be complaining about players wasting an extra 20 seconds or so for each penalty.

What Krul done wasn't dishonourable, it was competitive, fierce and very risky considering he could have looked silly if it didn't work. Almost every sport around has moments like that, I really don't know why you view it as 'intimidation' and, if you do, what's wrong with intimidation on the football field? A strong tackle is intimidating, should we outlaw them?

No, it's not my issue. I want to know whether you were accepting of Chelsea's blatant destroying of Liverpool's game plan as you are of Krul's.

I don't think you will have been. I'd imagine you were stamping your feet like Suarez was. But the problem for Liverpool was that technically Schwarzer wasn't time wasting at that point because the ball was in play. Schwarzer could have stood there for however long was left of the half if one of your players hadn't come and forced him to play it. In fact that's exactly what he would have done. And you'd have wet yourself with anger.



But the penalty taker is risking having the pen retaken if he stutters his run too much. Is the penalty taker allowed to run over the ball too to have a word? Can he just stand there for a minute and just take it when he feels like it? Can he go for a run all around the box before shooting? What if he dummies to shoot 3 times before taking it?

The ref will book a penalty taker for any of that and tell him to stop messing about.

Just like the ref should have last night.



If Chelsea had been going for a title and Liverpool time wasted to do our heads in then you would have been absolutely delighted.

When teams time waste and mess us around next season Mourinho will be livid about it. And he'll probably have a little smile and then shrug his shoulders when a journo questions him about it and calls him a hypocrit.

CFC pushed the game to its limits in your title winning party. You bottled it. No doubt that was one of the games you've hated most in your life. I think you'll have been angry that day. Krul was doing a similar thing last night. You weren't involved so you will applaud Krul, but if he was doing that against Liverpool there's no way you'd look at it the same.

I didn't really give a sh*t about Chelsea that day to be honest, I was more frustrated by my own team than your lot. It wasn't only Schwarzer time wasting, it was the majority of your team over nearly everything. Taking an age for throw ins, etc.. You won the match, fair play, but it wasn't through any type of tactical quality or game play. You don't plan for a player slipping, and that was the only time you entered our half.



Let's be honest, he walked over and had a word. If the penalty taker walked over with the ball in his hand, went up to the 'keeper and said "it's going top right corner, you're not stopping it so don't even bother", I doubt very much anybody would be up in arms about it. Let's be honest, you're exaggerating what Krul done. He simply tried to talk them out of it, he didn't waste that much time, to be honest.



I don't really know what this has to do with Liverpool, but I've seen something similar done by a Liverpool 'keeper before. Dudek in 2005 was dancing around like a nutter trying to put them off, again, I didn't see anything wrong with it.

I said before, I'm a huge fan of the NBA and trash talking is huge in that game and I absolutely love it. It isn't really something I bring team bias into. I don't view it as time wasting, as a form of cheating or even something somebody should be booked for. He simply had a word with each player before the penalty, it was drama, not time wasting, cheating or taking the p*ss.

Kalas should have scored from a free header from a corner a couple of minutes before Ba scored. We'd actually had the better chances in the first half, admittedly not much better than your meager efforts, but we were barely trying and you were supposedly on your way to a title win.



He was blatantly acting in a way to disrupt the Costa Rican penalty takers. He didn't do much, but he was utterly blatant about it and everyone knew what he was doing. The ref should have simply ordered him to his line to stop messing around.

The penalties at the 2012 CL final were clearly more important to me. During the shoot out Nauer was allowed to kick the ball to every approaching Chelsea player and the ref just let him do it. If Cech left his line the ref was ordering him instantly back onto his line.

IMO all refs should be clamping down on dodgy play just like he was with Cech. The fact Nauer was allowed to do what he did was startling.




I think keepers can do what the hell they want on the line. If the keeper wants to dance, let him dance. But the striker should be able to kick the kick when he wants then. If it's a 3 minute stare out, that's his choice. If he wants to run up 3 times before, that's okay. But it's not, is it?

I fully approved of Adebayor's ridiculous run up to his Europa League pen. It was brilliant. But not as brilliant as the fact he skied it. That was close to the most I've ever laughed in my life.



If the keeper steps out 12 yards from his line to do that is the striker allowed to knock the ball in because he was going for a walk? Or does the striker have to wait until he's back and ready?

If the Costa Rican players knocked the ball in when Krul was coming for a chat he'd have been screaming at the ref he wasn't ready.

Don't forget it's a free kick offence to say "My ball" when the game is in play because that could be used by an attacker pretending to be the keeper. I don't know the rules on trash talk, but I don't think the rules actually allow it. It goes on because there's 22 players and only one ref. But one keeper trash talking to a penalty taker right in front of him is probably against the rules.

Rizzoli is a ******* idiot so it doesn't surprise me that he let all that go.

The cheek of it.