You don't have to be penniless to be poor. Stubborn ignorance often works just as well.
1 - That goal should have stood. Shame on the officials and FIFA for not being able or capable to spot and rectify this.
2 - It would have made no difference.
Germany were rampant, a runaway freight train.
They passed with menace, moved with intent and finished with panache. Right from the first game against Australia, whom everyone wrote off as garbage, but who then almost made it through to the second round themselves, Germany have shown a fluidity not seen since Holland at Euro 2008.
Young, vibrant and pacy, their movement both on and off the ball rips opponents to shreds. They always seem to have an extra man and don't waste time with sideways passes.
They get the ball and immediately look to move forward. The man on the ball runs with the ball and looks to pass in forward triangles. Two or more men off the ball are always running towards the opposing goal. This movement either moves defenders out of position, giving the man on the ball, time and space, to continue his run with the ball. Or they ignore the runners and try to close down the man on the ball. If so, he passes off to the other players running around him and the move repeats, closer to goal.
It's simply really, but executed so fast and with such synchronicity that most teams cannot cope.
England definitely had no answer. Except for a five minute spell leading up to, and after their first goal, through a header by Matthew Upson, England were outclassed.
Yoda could have told you.
Movement creates space. Space creates passes. Passes create chances. Chances create goals.
So either you create chances or you prevent the opposition from creating chances (Mourinho, et al). If you do either one of the two, you stand a good chance of winning. Do neither and you will lose.
England couldn't do the first and didn't do the second. Germany opened them up at will and could have scored more. England looked out of it right after Lukas Podolski's goal, the second of the match, to put Germany up 2-0.
People will claim, it was unfair, a one off, or wonder how far this team has fallen. I ask you this. Were England ever any good ? These players are above average, with Steven Gerrard and Wayne Rooney capable of occasional glimpses of world class form. But overall they are one dimensional, un-inventive workmen who flourish in a one dimensional league, players who cannot perform outside their comfort zones, who over achieve for club but care little for country.
More importantly they lack a system and the desire to invent the game.
Football is about simple things and doing them well.
Germany, revamped with youth, possess both the desire and ability. And they do the simple things well. Pass, move. pass, move, shoot. Repeat.
Their front six of Podolski, Miroslav Klose, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Sami Khedira, Mesut Ozil and Thomas Muller interchanged at will, running at the defence and finding each other almost telepathically. The fact that the latter three are recent additions from the U21 team make it even more impressive. Allayed to this are the usual German qualities of work rate, concentration and effort. It's an almost unbeatable combination.
This game made a compelling case for video technology.
But Germany laid down another marker. No one looks as fluid as them. They may not win the World Cup, but have been one of the best teams so far.
England, predictably, are out way before the big games.
Germany 4 - 1 England
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