FIRST TEAM
08/20/2016

Silver! Brazil hold their nerve from the spot

Brazil secured gold at Rio 2016 with a 5-4 penalty shootout victory over Germany. The teams were level at 1-1 after 90 minutes. Superstar Neymar put the hosts ahead with a free-kick shortly before half time, but Max Meyer leveled the score in the second half following some good work from Jeremy Toljan.

The Germany Olympic team will have to be happy with silver as they suffered a final defeat on penalties to hosts Brazil in the Maracana stadium in Rio de Janeiro. Nils Petersen was the unlucky player to miss for Germany, as he failed to convert the team’s fifth penalty in the shootout. Amongst others Niklas Süle scored from the spot in the shootout. Neymar took the responsibility of taking the decisive penalty for Brazil and won the hosts gold.

Horst Hrubesch made no changes to the team that overcame Nigeria in the semi-finals for the final, selecting TSG’s Niklas Süle and Jeremy Toljan in defence once again.

The first real chance of the game fell to Germany at the 10 minute mark when Leverkusen’s Julian Brandt was inches away from giving Germany an early lead as he hit the post with an effort from 20 yards.

Superstar Neymar scores

Neymar had more luck with the woodwork than Brandt did in the 27th minute as his free-kick from almost 30 yards found its way into the German goal via the underside of the crossbar. 1-0 to the hosts.

Max Meyer had the first chance to equalise from a corner but his effort was well saved by Weverton in the Brazilian’s goal. It looked like  the confusion in the box from the rebound would lead to a goal but no one could get the ball under control to finish. Sven Bender then hit the crossbar with a header in the 35th minute.

Meyer bags the equaliser

Germany were much more active following the restart but struggled to create any clear chances in the early stages of the second half, as Brazil stood strong and closed down the spaces. That all changed in the 59th minute though. Hoffenheim’s Jeremy Toljan found himself in space on the right-wing and fired a pin-point cross into the box for Max Meyer, who made no mistake from 12 yards.

Former Hoffenheim man Grischa Prömel came on for Lars Bender in the 69th minute, which meant four former achtzehn99 academy players were on the pitch in the Olympic final (Prömel, Süle, Toljan and Leipzig’s Davie Selke).

The Germans slowly became more tired and the hosts put the pressure on, trapping the DFB team in their own half. However, Süle, Toljan and Co. survived the onslaught and took the game to extra time.

Battle of attrition

It was a similar picture throughout extra time – Brazil had much more energetic and put more into the game. Germany restricted themselves to keeping things tight at the back. Süle, Ginter, Toljan and Klostermann threw themselves in front of every ball and Germany managed to take the game to penalties

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