'Neymar injury helped us win 7-1 in 2014'

Kolkata, Oct 19: One of the reasons Germany maged to annihilate Brazil 7-1 in the 2014 FIFA World Cup semi-fil was because their star forward Neymar was injured, German football association (DFB) Vice President Hans-Dieter Drewitz said on Thursday.

"We played so well against Brazil because Neymar was injured. Our boys were in the groove and everything went perfectly for them," Drewitz told reporters on the sidelines of Germany U-17 team's practice session ahead of their FIFA U-17 World Cup quarterfil clash against the same opponents on Sunday.

Brazil was embarrassed by Germany, giving up five goals in the first 30 minutes of the match. The team ended up losing 7-1.

Besides Neymar, who scored four goals in the World Cup before injuring his back during the game against Colombia, centre-back Thiago Silva was also absent due to accumulation of yellow cards.

Drewitz said the result and manner of victory was something not "normal" and might not happen again.

"In the 2014 World Cup against Brazil, it was something spectacular. But this is not normal. We don't expect this to happen again," Drewitz said.

Asked if the 2014 champions could repeat their feat in Russia next year, Drewitz said: "At the moment we don't know if we can win the World Cup again. The development of a team is like a roller-coaster...sometimes there is up and sometimes there is down. We want to constantly keep the good level.

"At the moment we can't read into the magic ball and we don't know what is going to happen. But we are working on the fact that our youth teams are always qualifying to the European championships as well as World Cups so that it will help them either to win a title or to win another (senior) World Cup." IANS