Semi-finals review (and then there were two)

Uruguay vs Netherlands
A smashing game with smashing goals, and a bit of anxiety at the finish. Uruguay honestly never looked like they could win this game, especially as they had to take off the top scorer near the end, and was already missing their other top scorer. But the Dutch never dominated, and so on another day, it could have been a different story.

Due to my man-crush on the tireless Kuyt, I kept looking out for him, and I was intrigued to find him and Robben swapped sides constantly throughout the game, I hadn't noticed this before, and I don't know if it was new to this game, but it must have been hell for the Uruguayan full-backs to constantly adjust to the two coming and going. I couldn't actually catch them doing it, and to be honest, this made me realize how, when attacking, every Dutchman seemed to be switching at will, some kind of mini-total-football.

I double-checked Van Bronckhorst shooting statistics, and yes, the one and only time the man decides to unload, he hits the straightest rocket a Jabulani will ever see, and it went in true.

Probably the second best goal of the game was Uruguayan's second, I had a flashback of Argentina vs England in 1998, when Zanetti took the ball after hiding behind our wall, and hammered it in just before half time. This one had the same feel, though Pereira wasn't hiding, and had a harder shot to make with defenders in front of him. It made for a finish that was more exciting than one would have expected. Did anyone honestly predict five goals?

Spain vs Germany
Seemed like there's so little to comment on here. For all of its attacking glory, Germany fell short by a long way, only managing two shots on goal in the entire game (though Kroos had a very good chance) and the Spanish midfield just passed and pressed their way into such domination that it took Germany 30 minutes or more to even get a shot off. Wow. I honestly can say, even if the no-goal counted against Germany, and England beat them, and then saw off the Argentinians with confidence, we'd have lost this one.

I must say though, that Pedro really ticked me off. Torres came on with a fresh set of legs to help keep the pressure off at the end, and had a genuine chance to fulfil his purpose as a full-blooded goal scorer, and the little idiot just went for glory of his own. It made me almost wish that Germany had equalized, because he would have deserved some serious bad press for that, especially when such a good young forward needs the confidence boost before the final.

The End
Two plus years, over two hundred nations, 5 billion pounding hearts ago, I made a personal pledge to try and follow this cup as much as possible, and that meant the entire cup, and it seems like an eternity, fresh off Euro 2008, that I was checking the results of the small islands in CONCACAF and Oceania.

So it comes to this, two of the best teams to have never won the World Cup, get their chance on Sunday to finish all of this, in the last game. May the best team win.