BELO HORIZONTE // Luiz Felipe Scolari called his side's humbling, 7-1 semi-final defeat to Germany on Tuesday "the worst moment of my life", but insisted Brazilian football does not require an overhaul.
In the aftermath of the country’s worst defeat since a 6-0 loss to Uruguay in 1920, Scolari accepted the responsibility, saying that as coach he is the only person who should be blamed for what proved a total mismatch.
Scolari had opted to hand Bernard his first start of the tournament as a replacement for the injured Neymar and chose to play Maicon over Dani Alves at right-back. Maicon was repeatedly caught out by the wandering figure of Toni Kroos, while the diminutive Bernard struggled to get the better of the physical German defence.
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Scolari said: “Who is responsible when the team plays? Who is responsible for picking the team? I am. It’s me. The catastrophic result can be shared with the whole group, but who made the choices about the tactical line-up, the way to play? I did. So the person responsible is me.
“If I think of myself as a player, a coach and a physical education teacher, it is the worst moment of my life. I will be remembered now for losing 7-1, but that is the risk I was willing to take. I accept that and life goes on.”
In the first half, Brazil capitulated and Germany capitalised; the clinical Europeans netting five times through Thomas Muller, Miroslav Klose, Toni Kroos (twice) and Sami Khedira. Scolari, after making two substitutions at half time, saw his side push early in the second period, but they were repeatedly caught out by Germany’s counter-attacks. Andre Schuerrle added two more and Oscar netted a late consolation for the hosts.
“I think up until the first goal, we were basically identical or better than the German team,” Scolari said. “They scored their first goal from a corner and in six minutes scored another four goals. There was lack of control. It’s not normal but it happens.”
Scolari was quick to point to his record since taking the role of coach 18 months ago. The defeat to Germany was only his third in 28 matches and he said he is already looking towards Saturday’s third-place match against the Netherlands or Argentina.
“The team that’s out there, 13 or 14 of those players will be in the 2018 World Cup. Look at the German team. They played the 2010 World Cup, they had played Euro 2008. I think 14 or 15 of them will be there in 2018.
“This is catastrophic, the worst loss of a Brazilian national team, but we have to learn how to deal with that also. We lost one match, to a great German team.”
Joachim Loew, the German coach, said his players had recognised the opposition were struggling under the expectations of being the host nation and exploited the large spaces Brazil left when they attacked at pace. Several times in the first period, Germany found themselves counter-attacking in numbers while their opponents were slow in getting back to defend.
“We realised they were cracking up and took advantage of it,” Loew said. “We were lucky that they were shell-shocked. They were clearly very confused and they never got back to their original organisation.”
Kroos provided a memorable performance in which he floated around the midfield picking passes at will and dominating the Brazil defence.
“Of course, Brazil have great players, but they had the greater pressure,” Kroos said. “In no match so far have they played to their top level.
“To win in Brazil against Brazil, in a World Cup semi-final … I have seen lots of good matches, but this was exceptional.”
gmeenaghan@thenational.ae