So one of the best football world cups in recent memory has finally come to an end and few will disagree that the trophy was won by the best team in the competition as well as probably the best prepared.

As just a small example of the German team’s meticulous planning and attention to detail, consider their choice of base for the tournament.

The north of Brazil is a lot hotter and more humid than the south in the tournament months of June and July, so most teams chose to base themselves in the more comfortable south even though this meant that they would have to travel hundreds of miles to compete in games scheduled to take place in the north.

The Germans, knowing that all their group games were in the north, decided to base themselves there and save on the disruption that travel would undoubtedly bring. They even went so far as to construct their own exclusive training complex – the only World Cup building project to be completed on time.

The German victory in last night’s final should have surprised nobody. As Alexander Graham Bell once said, “Before anything else, preparation is the key to success.”