This has been the World Cup  of surprises, and one of the big ones come today, with the Netherlands knocking out five-time winner Brazil 2-1.

Holland has a great soccer tradition but has never won the World Cup; up until this year the country has always been a great under-achiever.

Not today; Holland played well, but was also helped by Brazil’s Felipe Melo being sent off with a red card for a really stupid and nasty foul. Felipe Melo was the goat of the day, and will have a hard time living it down in soccer-mad Brazil.

“Melo-Drama” was the headline in the Italian daily TuttoSport, and that really summed it up. When two teams are basically at the same level; it’s not often the one with 10 men is going to win the match.

While Netherlands-Brazil was the big match today – worthy of a World Cup final – Saturday’s not-to-miss game is Argentina-Germany.

Both have shown themselves to be strong teams, and the game is a major test for Argentine coach Diego Armando Maradona.  He was undoubtedly one of the world’s greatest players in his day, but has yet to prove himself as a coach.