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Well, Brazil is finally knocked out of the World Cup, by a French team that have found their form at such a crucial stage of the competition. Thierry Henry scored the winning goal. They didn't play Adriano and played a 4-5-1 formation to accomodate Juninho. Ronaldo was left up front by himself, which was a very bad decision as he has lost some of his pace. The change of tactics and formation could have been why Brazil lost to France, again. England had the game under control until Wayne Rooney was sent off, but they still managed to bomb forward with Peter Crouch their target man. Lampard had two glorious chances but missed both, again. Aaron Lennon could have gotten a penalty but not given. Owen Hargreaves was the best player for England that day. It went to penalty shootout. Frank Lampard could not even score, again. Hargreaves slotted it in. Gerrard and Carragher's miss meant that Cristiano Ronaldo's penalty was the decisive one, which he converted easily. England lose on penalties, again.
There will be a new World Champion, and it is going to be a European nation.~Last 4 Countries~
Germany vs Italy
Germany have home crowd advantage. Their front pairing of Miroslav Klose and Lukas Podolski will give the pro Italian defence some problems. The attacking triangle of Luca Toni, Alberto Gilardinho and Francesco Totti will give the defensive triangle of Torsten Frings, Christoph Metzelder and Per Mertesacker lots of problem. The game should be won in the midfield. If Michael Ballack, Bastian Schweinsteiger and Bernd Schneider can hold off the Italian midfield of Andreas Pirlo, Gennaro Gattuso and Mauro Camoranesi, then the Germans will triumph.
Portugal vs France
Both team will go into this game full of confidence. Portugal managed to pull off a penalty shootout victory over favourites England. France's only goal managed to kill off Brazil, courtesy of Thierry Henry. Portugal played the England game without Costinha and Deco, and now they'll have them back, rested and ready. Both teams will definitely use their flanks for their attacks. Florent Malouda, Franck Ribery or Sylvain Wiltord, Eric Abidal and Willy Sagnol are the flankers for France. Portugal's flankers are Cristiano Ronaldo, Luis Figo or Simao, Miguel and Nuno Valente. Whoever has the upper hand on the flanks will surely win the game.

my thoughts at 10:10 am