Germany Cruise Through To The Quater-Finals

Posted by footynut in June 25th, 2006

Podolski Power…!

I predicted a 2-1 scoreline to this game, and it almost came to past…but a 2-0 scoreline is pretty close eh?

Germany controlled the game from the first to the final whislte,and when somebody as legendary as Henrik Larsson misses a penalty,you know it’s just not your day.The Germans had an astonishing 63% possession of the ball compared to Sweden’s 37%.

It all went wrong for the Swedes early on as Lukas Podolski put Germany in front after just 4 minutes thanks to some really poor defending by Sweden.Miroslav Klose & Podolski tormented the Swedish defence from than on, and sweden just didn’t have the answer to that,they were slow in attack and look pretty much shell shock,and how did Germany capatalise on that!, as Podolski scored his second of the day in the 12th minute.It’s no wonder than that Bayern Munich has signed the star striker.

Stunned Sweden were then reduced to 10 men after defender Teddy Lucic picked up two yellow cards before half-time, although the Scandinavians should have pulled a goal back through former Celtic striker Henrik Larsson who sent a 53rd-minute penalty over the crossbar.

Teddy Lucic receiving his marchong orders.

I must say i was impressed with referee Carlos Eugenio Simon of Brazil,i thought he handled the game pretty well,definitely better than some other officials i’ve seen in this tournament so far *cough*Graham Poll*cough*.

Anywayz,back to the game,at the restart it was pretty much the same,Germany in total control,it was just a bore to watch..because the game effectively had ended as a contest in the 12th minute,the Germans missed numerous chances to add to their tally with Ballack,Klose,Frings,Barowski and Schneider missing a host of great opportunities,which should be a concern to Klinsmann,because their next opponents, Argentina is not going to be as easy to open up as Sweden.

The game could have had a twist had Henrik Larsson converted a penalty in the 53rd minute,but it was just not to be..it was the day for the host nation,who now has 4 wins in a row,one of the only teams that still have a 100% record.

At the beginning of the tournament,German media conducted a poll asking the german public if their team were good enough to win the cup,a low percentage of 18% said YES,i’m sure now the stats will say a different thing ;).

Special praise has to go to Sweden’s goalie Andreas Isaksson who produced top notch saves to deny the Germans futher goals,other than that the whole Swedish team seemed to be out of sorts…next time maybe?

germany
No prizes to guess who she supports..