Football – World Cup – Final
Sunday 13th July 2014 – Kickoff: 1600hrs
Sunday 4pm marks the final in the 2014 World Cup with Germany taking on Argentina at the Maracana in Rio de Janeiro.
It’s been a hectic month of football with many twists and turns and indeed a few big shocks along the way; Netherlands thrashing Spain 5-1 in their group opening match, the spirited progress of Costa Rica where they not only progressed from a seemingly impossible group, but won it in style, to the Germans inflicting a 7-1 humiliation upon the host nation in their own back yard, totally and utterly outplaying the Brazilians at their own game.
Which brings me nicely onto Germany – without doubt, Joachim Low’s side have looked the most impressive European outfit in this World Cup, with their energy and quick passing game with swift counter-attacks, they’ve looked the business from the first minute and they also mean business too.
It’s not just been about the forwards Muller or Klose either – the potent attacking midfield consisting of Ozil, Schweinsteiger, Khedira and Kroos have been deadly, with Lahm in the defensive midfield position providing the perfect foil, this has enabled the aforementioned four midfielders to go on rampaging runs and indeed goalscoring positions. The way that they dismantled the Brazilians, cutting through their defence like a hot knife through butter was a joy to behold.
Onto Argentina now, and to be honest, I feel they’ve been a little fortunate to have reached this far in the tournament and have scraped the bare minimum ‘pass’ marks so far; winning by one goal margins in all three of their group matches (2-1 v Bosnia-Herzegovina, 1-0 v Iran and 3-2 v Nigeria), were followed by a 1-0 extra-time win over Switzerland in the last 16, a narrow 1-0 win over Belgium in the quarter-final, and needed a penalty shoot-out against the Dutch to get through to today’s final.
In short, their progress through the tournament has been far less convincing than the Germans, and had it not been for Messi’s 4 goals so far, where would the Argentinians be, and who else can provide that spark of creativity that is needed to beat the likes of Germany?
Another aspect to consider is that Argentina have had a day less than Germany to prepare for the final and don’t forget they had to endure 120 minutes of open-play football along with penalties against the Netherlands while Germany looked to switch down the gears against Brazil having won the semi-final in the first 45 minutes, such was their dominance.
In short, the Germans look to have the greater depth in squad in the key areas such as midfield and attack along with a very solid goalkeeper in Neuer behind the back four, their attacking game is more precise and purposeful, and they simply possess more match winners than Argentina – my pick then is Germany to win this within the 90 minutes at good odds. Germany to win perhaps 2-1.
Pick: Germany straight win @ 2.34 Pinnacle
