Everton midfielder Tim Cahill thought his red card in Australia's 4-0 defeat against Germany on Sunday evening was completely unjustified.
The former Millwall star was dismissed for a rash challenge on Bastian Schweinsteiger when Australia were already 2-0 down against a rampant German side.
After the match, Cahill said:"Dreams can be made and crushed in the space of hours. It's one of the lowest points of my career but this is the beauty of football. One day you are a hero, the next day you are at the bottom.
"My leg stayed bent all the way. Never once did I try to straighten it. What do you want me to say?
"A lot of credit goes to the German team and, for us, it makes it worse. I feel that maybe that decision changed the game, even though we were 2-0 down, I felt the momentum was with us."
Cahill will miss Saturday's game against Ghana with coach Pim Verbeek accepting that his side's hopes of progressing from Group D are already hanging by a thread.
He said:"We were outplayed. The way we handled the game was definitely not good. We were disorganised.
"We didn't play the way we need to in order to challenge. Germany are one of the candidates to win the World Cup.
"They showed they have a better team, they are much stronger than in the past. In the second half, I thought we did much better but when you have a player sent off then it becomes very difficult."Subscribe to Football FanCast News Headlines by Email