FIFA World Cup 2010: Last round of matches of Group D, Germany Group Favourites
The group favourites Germany started their World Cup campaign with an impressive display against Australia, which is clearly the best performance by any team in the first round of group matches. Despite missing their regular captain and talismanic midfielder Michael Ballack, the German squad showed all the required credentials of a title winning team. Vision of young players Mesut Ozil and Thomas Muller for seeing defence-busting passes and movement of all players off the ball was very impressive indeed.
In their second match against Serbia, Germany became victim to a referee who was not in a very good mood that day. They played with 10 men for most of the match after Miroslav Klose, received two yellow cards in the first half. Serbia made full use of this opportunity and scored in only a minute of this sending off. It always extremely difficult for any team to chase the game with a numerical disadvantage but Germany received an opportunity to salvage some thing from this match, only for Lukas Podolski to take a poor, rolling penalty kick straight to the Serbian goal keeper.
Germany will play their last group match against Ghana in an almost must-win situation. A victory in this match will put them in a very strong position to get the first position in the group, which is very useful when qualifying for the knock out stage. In case of a draw, they will rely on the Serbia-Australia result and hope that that match also ends in a draw. This will send Germany through to next round with superior goal difference but at second position.
Ghana is on top of the group of two rounds of group matches but both of their goals have come from penalty kicks through Asamoah Gyan. Although their defence has been very tight, they were lucky to get breakthroughs in both matches, with handballs from the opponent players in the penalty box. First, it was the Serbian substitute Zdravko Kuzmanovic, who was sent in to provide some defensive cover after Aleksandar Lukovic was sent off with two bookable offences. In the second match, Harry Kewell received a straight red card when he blocked a goal-bound shot with his hand.
Ghana just needs to avoid defeat in their last group match against Germany for progressing through this group and not depending on the Serbia-Australia result. Victory in this match will guarantee their top spot in the group, while a draw will get them the second position if Serbia gets the likely win against Australia. Ghana may qualify with even a defeat on basis of the goals scored but only if the match between Serbia and Australia ends in a draw. Ghana will only need to match Serbia’s result to get the top spot in Group D, but not a defeat in which case Germany will be on the summit.
Serbia has conceded one penalty each in both of their group matches. Loss of concentration or what, but they must be thankful to be still in the race for qualification for the Round of 16. If they win their last group match against Australia, then they will surely qualify for the next stage but the first or second position will be dependent on the Germany-Ghana result.
Australia, on the other hand, is in a very difficult situation. They first need to win against Serbia by a handsome margin and then hope for the same result for Germany in their match against Ghana, to cover up for the 5-goal deficit in the overall goal difference with Ghana. If Ghana manages to get any points from their game against Germany and it would be virtually over for the Australians as far as their 2010 World Cup campaign is concerned.
The winner of this group will face the runner-up of Group C in the Round of 16, while the second-positioned team from this group will face their winner. Group C consists of England, USA, Slovenia and Algeria.
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