Congrats to Germany for winning their first World Cup!

It sounds really weird when you call Brazil "American soil."

Have to say, they are fully worthy champions.

As worthy as anyone in recent memory. Their games against Portugal and Brazil were stunning, to say the least, and they played as well as anyone has today against Argentina. Argentina's defense, which has been underrated throughout the cup, showed up today too, and it was just a really good old-style match.

Also I won $200, so that's good.

Yeah, Germany fully deserved to win but you gotta give it to Argentina, who played very well; creating great scoring chances and taking an overwhelming favorite to extra time.

Congratulations to Germany. They won courtesy of a very good goal, and in my opinion were clearly the best team of this tournament. Argentina deserve credit for giving Germany a serious test in the final.

@jeff Kuta - it's their 4th 1950, 1974, 1990, and 2014

I didn't keep up with numbers but did Messi really deserve the Golden Ball?

@CommanderBryan. Germany won their first in 1954. 1950 was the Maracanazo

@obi - thanks for the correction.

I did mean @ogion - I am on a phone autocorrected to Obi since I've referenced him before.

Hehe... it was quite a party night around here.

One could say that the party night was so wild, it was hard for him to...keep the party sane!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcYppAs6ZdI

Technically, the first three titles were won by West Germany. ;)

It was always just Germany to the German people.

west germany = nowaday germany.

"It was always just Germany to the German people."

What the fuck does this even mean. Has botox gone back on a regimen of stupid?

this clearly means that the german people never dubbed it as a win for "west germany", but as a win for germany. did you really not understand this sentence?

@ bo_sox: No, he didn't. To suggest that Messi was the best performing player at this tournament is daft. James Rodriguez would have been a better choice, although of course he did get the Golden Boot.

"an European team wins the Cup on American soil."

Because all the American teams were arranged to knock each other out.

Why this is an achievement when Europe gets 13-14 teams to South America's 5 is beyond me, but UEFA-types will congratulate themselves for anything and everything.

"west germany = nowaday germany."

Nice to see people finally admitting that "unification" was an annexation.

of course it was. is anybody denying that?

I've heard it denied in the past since everybody claims East Germans wanted unification.

wait, are you claiming that the people of east germany didn't want the annexation?

Have you never seen the news reels from when the Berlin Wall came down? The ones where you see thousands of East Germans desperately trying to repair it?

Messi getting the Golden Ball was terrible. Not that it matters much, but Argentina was never a dominant side and I got the feeling that they were scraping by doing the bare minimum to advance, coming out of a weak group and then drawing two relatively strong but far from difficult sides. If anything, losing DiMaria showed that he was more valuable to the side than Messi.

i don't understand that either. who should have gotten it, in your opinion?

"wait, are you claiming that the people of east germany didn't want the annexation?"

Did the West Germans bother to ask them?

Is it a surprise to you that 67% of East Germans say they don't feel like they're part of a united country, and a good 15% wish the wall was back up? Does that show up in Octavious's news reels? If unification is so great why did everybody leave?

"Not that it matters much, but Argentina was never a dominant side and I got the feeling that they were scraping by doing the bare minimum to advance, coming out of a weak group and then drawing two relatively strong but far from difficult sides."

That describes every team in the tournament. There was no dominant side. Singling out Argentina when Messi scored four goals and nobody scored against them is ridiculous. Messi got his team into the final.

putin, i might stand corrected on this one by the statistics. i just got the impression (you know, from living in the german-speaking part of europe) that the general consesus is that the unification is good and that the ridiculous dispute between the so-called "ossis" and "wessis" is settled by now. seems like i am wrong on this one. of course, this statistic might favor opinions from rural parts of eastern germany.

just one question: what do you mean by "If unification is so great why did everybody leave?" who left?

The East Germans. Millions left eastern Germany since the Anschluss.

Rodriguez would have been a good choice, as would have Muller (5 goals, 3 assists). I don't understand how Messi got it.

"this clearly means that the german people never dubbed it as a win for "west germany", but as a win for germany. did you really not understand this sentence? "

I don't understand how you can say this when for 45 years East Germans saw themselves as Germany... It's not that I don't understand, it is wrong.

@ Putin: "Singling out Argentina when Messi scored four goals and nobody scored against them is ridiculous."

I thought Argentina actually played ok in the final, but just for the record, in the tournament as a whole, Bosnia scored a goal against them, and Nigeria scored two goals against them.

And Bosnia and Nigeria are good teams. To claim that was a weak group is nonsense. Many people thought going into this tournament Bosnia was in top form, knocking off some high quality opponents like Mexico in the run-up.

"Bosnia scored a goal against them, and Nigeria scored two goals against them."

3 goals in 7 games, but they're an average team?

Argentina beat this Netherlands team you all were raving about not even a week ago. But they're average and Messi is undeserving. What a crock.

Messi won Man of the Match 4 times, more than any other player. Granted, they were for his 3 group stage matches and the round of 16, but he did win them. He also contributed in every game, though his profile was quite a bit lower from the quarterfinals onward.

Putin, calm down. I was merely correcting your claim that "nobody scored against them", for the sake of accuracy.

I repeat my view that Argentina played ok in the final. Indeed they had a good World Cup and came very close to the ultimate victory.