Can Brazil Recover Following Historical Loss to Germany?

Published on July 11th, 2014 3:01 pm EST
Despite the fact that both the Netherlands and Brazil made it to the semi-finals of this year's World Cup, both teams have significantly different feelings on their tournaments so far.

Brazil was expected to win the tournament in front of their rabid hometown fans. Anything less than a World Cup win was to be considered a massive failure.

Things were going along swimmingly for Brazil until they lost Neymar for the tournament during their Quarter-final battle with Columbia. The team was never able to recover from losing their best player and ended up suffering a historical beating at the hands of Germany in the semi-finals.

The Netherlands, on the other hand, have to be happy with how their tournament went. The team was not considered to be one of the favourites to win heading into the tournament, but a Group stage annihilation of Spain gave the Dutch team a tremendous boost of confidence - a boost of confidence that they rode all the way into the semi-finals. The Dutch team pushed Argentina to the limit, as Lionel Messi and company won in penalty kicks.

In short, the teams from the Netherlands surpassed expectations, while the Brazilian club was left drowning with disappointment.

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The tale of two different mindsets will make for an interesting third place match this Saturday.

Here are the odds for Saturday's match:

Brazil, 2.15
Draw, 3.80
Holland, 3.40

Betting on this game will be tough as the coaches will likely be giving ample amounts of playing time to their substitute players. Names like Robben and Van Persie will likely be getting only small amounts of playing time.

Another note - the Netherlands has seen their offense run dry in the past two games, which may translate into a low scoring game. Here are the current over/under odds:

Over 2.5 goals, 1.57
Under 2.5 goals, 2.35

Having said that, the two teams may just end up throwing caution to the win and letting their strikers go, which may result in a high scoring tilt.

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Who do you think will win on Saturday?