Belo Horizonte: Germany insist their only focus is now on winning Sunday’s World Cup final, with the euphoria of their historic 7-1 semi-final drubbing of Brazil quickly forgotten.
Germany will face either the Netherlands or Argentina in Sunday’s final at Rio de Janeiro’s Maracana Stadium.
The Selecao were put to the sword by the Germans in the emotionally-charged semi as they felt the loss of injured superstar Neymar and suspended captain Thiago Silva. But the Germans quickly switched their attention to Sunday’s final as they bid to end their country’s 24-year wait for a fourth World Cup title.
“We haven’t reached our goal yet, we will put our foot to the floor once again and put our heart and souls into it to win this thing”, said Thomas Mueller, who scored Germany’s 2000th international goal to kick-off the rout.
“We can’t run away with ourselves, just as it was said that we were finished after the (last 16 win over) Algeria, now we’ll be praised to the heavens.
“That’s really the wrong approach — we’re really just a very good team.”
Germany will now travel to Rio for their eighth World Cup final having avenged their 2-0 defeat to Brazil in the 2002 final in emphatic style.
Toni Kroos and Andre Schuerrle both netted twice, while veteran Miroslav Klose made history of his own by scoring his 16th World Cup goal to become the competition’s all-time sole top-scorer.
“We played an unbelievable game — respect, but another game is yet to come,” said man-of-the-match Kroos .
“We have come here to be world champions and we’re not there yet. Whatever happens, there is a top opponent ahead of us and we both have a 50:50 chance.”
Centre-back Mats Hum-mels said the German dressing room in Belo Horizonte was eerily quiet after the final whistle and there is a determination to realise the dream of a fourth title.
“It was astoundingly quiet in the dressing room, but that was easy to explain as we knew we had the game won with an hour to play, not wishing to sound arrogant,” he said. "So there wasn't much emotion after the final whistle.”
