Seriously, The F*ck?!

Today has seen the first semi-final of the 2014 World Cup between Brazil and Germany. Perhaps more importantly though this match was refereed by Mexico's Marco Rodríguez who was last seen 'refeering' the disaster between Italy and Uruguay in the final game of Group D.

As many people thought that performance should have seen Rodriguez sent straight home from the competition rather than being advanced to the pool of referees for the knock-out phase there was obviously a lot on interest in how he would cope during this match. There was particular concern over whether his obvious bias in favour of South American teams at the expense of European teams would once again kill the football game and hand Brazil an easy victory over a clearly superior German team. On the face of it I would say that generally Rodriguez had a fairly good game. After all he is generally considered a World class referee which makes his performance against Italy even more difficult to explain.

The confusion over what sort of referee would be turning up along with the obvious pressure of the occasion meant that the start of the game was very unsettled and disjointed. Having noticed how the Germans have been able to settle in and control a game the Brazilian side began with the obvious intent of playing a very attacking and harassing game in order to prevent the Germans establishing a rhythm. Obviously this also prevented the Brazilians establishing a rhythm of their own and in the early melee Germany won a corner in the 10th minute. From that corner Toni Kroos was able to deliver a cross that found Thomas Müller who neatly swept the ball into the net to put Germany 1-0 up.

Although every neutral wanted Brazil to equalise rather than Germany go 2-0 up we were also desperate for Germany's Miroslav Klose score his 16th goal in a World Cup finals in order for him to beat the Brazilian Ronaldo's record and become the player to score the most goals in a World Cup finals. In the 21st minute Klose decided to tease us when his left footed shot was saved by Julio Cesar - the Brazilian 'keeper. Teasing us further Klose picked up the rebound only for it to be blocked for a third time by Cesar. Picking up the rebound for a second time Klose made no mistake and netted Germany's second in the 23rd minute.

At this point the confusion over the referee along with the shock of going 2-0 down inside 25 minutes clearly added to Brazil's uncertainty over losing both their star-player Neymar and their Captain Thiago Silva and they began to collapse. In the 24th minute Kroos scored Germany's third and in the 26th minute he got their fourth. It was around this time people who normally only call me when there's been a death in the family started ringing to make sure I was watching. Despite this distraction though I'm pretty sure that Sami Khedira added Germany's fifth in the 29th minute.

Germany then took a short pause allowing us to realise that by half-time Germany had already equalled the record win of 5 clear goals in a semi-final and were well on track to beat the record win of 9 clear goals in any World Cup finals match.

Unfortunately for the record books Germany came out for the second half intending to rest up for the final while Brazil came out looking to at least limit the damage in order to restore something resembling pride. As a result Brazil had the best of the first 25 minutes of the half with Ramires, Oscar, Marcelo and Paulinho all creating chances without effect.

In the 69th minute though Schürrle decided he hadn't done scoring and netted Germany's 6th. Ten minutes later he netted his 3rd and Germany's 7th. This put Germany in sight of their all time biggest World Cup finals victory of 8-0 against the mighty Saudi Arabia in a group game in the 2002 finals. Sadly with Schurrle's hat-trick in the bag Germany took their foot off the gas and Oscar scored a late - consolation seems too strong a word - goal for Brazil in the 90th minute leaving the final score 7-1 to Germany.

As a result Germany will now go through to Sunday's final while Brazil will have to find a way to rise again for Saturday's third place play-off. In tomorrow's semi-final between the Netherlands and Argentina we will find out who plays who.

23:10 on 8/7/14 (UK date).