Brazil's Olympic dream in ruins in the Wembley sunshine

I've lost count of the number of people I've heard over the last couple of weeks slating the Olympic football tournament - the usual comments are something about not caring less about this aspect of London 2012 and the fact that footballers already have their own World Cup.

Fair enough, but football has been part of the Olympics since 1896, it just doesn't get the same profile in Britain as in other parts of the world as we don't usually take part.

Over in Brazil, the Olympics are obviously a big deal, partly because they host the next football tournament in the Rio games of 2016, but also because they've never won Olympic gold.

Today against Mexico at Wembley, the feeling was they simply had to turn up to right that wrong, but they didn't vouch for the Mexican wave that hit them like a first minute sledgehammer.

By the time Mexico's Oribe Peralta struck a goal after just 30 seconds, most of the 86,000 fans were still settling down to watch the game - it came as such a surprise that plenty of people, myself included, didn't see it.

Brazil's illustrious forward line of Neymar, Oscar, Lendro Damiao and Hulk, who started the final on the bench, hardly threatened Mexico's goal in the first half which was a shame as it was the end at which I was sitting.

The game was there for the taking and that's exactly what Mexico did, Peralta smashing home a header from a corner late on.

Brazil's Rafael squared up to a team mate before being substituted and after Hulk pulled one back in the last minute, Oscar had a golden chance to head the winner, but blazed his header inches wide.

That was it - the final whistle, Mexicans all over the pitch and Brazil's players slumped to the floor.
After watching the lengthy medal ceremony - have you ever seen 69 athletes on a podium? - it was time to say goodbye to Wembley and to my Olympic experience.

As I walked down Wembley way with chanting Mexicans and Brazilian samba drummers I actually felt like it was a pretty unique experience and although two of the tree events I saw were football, I really enjoyed it all.

My Olympic journey from Coventry to Wembley via Eton Dorney only showed me a tiny bit of the Games, but I'm glad I made the effort, it's something I'll always remember.