Ballack's goal beat the United States (Allsport).

By Paul Walker, PA Sport, Ulsan

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Germany's lucky World Cup semi-finalists were told to "stand up and play like men" during their controversial last-eight clash.

American defender Tony Sanneh, who plays his club football in Germany with Nurnberg, will not exactly be welcomed back there after launching a tirade against the three-times world champions and accusing them of cheating their way into the last four.

Tough defender Sanneh said: "The Germans win anyway they need to."

Sanneh's USA outsiders dominated the quarter-final, created far more chances, but were left frustrated and angry by the way the Germans dived and rolled around to win free kicks.

And the 30-year-old from Minnesota admitted he confronted German stars during the match with his accusations.

Sanneh said: "The Germans, and I told them so on the field, that they were flopping too easily to the ground.

"If they want to be men and they are proud Germans, I told them to fight and play like men. If they can't run around without falling, it's wrong.

"I told them to their face, stand up on your feet, it's a man's game so they should play like men.

"Once it was clear that they weren't going to beat you, they just went down."

Germany scored from a free kick when Michael Ballack headed the eventual winner, but as USA pressure increased, Sanneh claimed it was the string of dirty tricks that really soured the end of the American's fantasy journey to the quarter-finals.

Germany now go to their 10th World Cup semi-final in Seoul on Tuesday under a cloud of accusations.

Sanneh added: "I don't know whether the way they played was typical of them, but what's typical is that Germans win games, they always win. They win any way they need to. They don't always win the way they did here."

Sanneh, who has also played for Hertha Berlin, claimed: "They were not able to penetrate us or get any scoring chances unless they fell over. Either we fouled them too much or the referee gave them a lot of calls and that's ultimately how they scored.

"We were the better team and we felt we deserved to win. We were running with the Germans and eventually they would just fall. I don't think we had too many calls our way in those circumstances.

"We are not that physical a team but somehow we got all the yellow cards out there."

The Americans picked up five of the seven bookings in the match from Scottish referee Hugh Dallas.

The team went home after reaching this round for the first time in 72 years, and they were also fuming about a handball on the line by Werder Bremen's Torsten Frings, which stopped a Gregg Berhalter effort.

Sanneh said: "Obviously we are disappointed but three months from now we'll be saying we had a wonderful ride.

"I don't want to be a sore loser, but they had a handball on the line which should have been a red card and a penalty.

"The referee may not have seen it from his positioning, but I did and it was clear. With the pressure we were putting them under, with 10 men they would not have been able to live with us."

Coach Bruce Arena touched on another nerve by suggesting that the world's top football nations get the benefit of the doubt in close situations against the smaller - in soccer terms - nations.

He said: "Big nations get a lot more respect than the smaller ones, their team fell over too much. They got the free kicks but that is what happens when you are one of the big boys. Germany don't play well but still get the results."