The 2014 FIFA World Cup seemed destined to be settled by penalties last night until Germany’s Mario Goetze stepped up in extra time to score the winning goal against Argentina wearing boots incorporating 3D knitted uppers produced on Stoll flat knitting machines.

The young Bayern Munich forward scored in the 113^th minute with a superb volley wearing the very latest Nike Magista Obra boots which incorporate Nike’s now legendary Flyknit flat knitted uppers.

Nike football boots knocked in a total of 76 of the 169 goals scored in this summer’s tournament with 12 coming from players wearing Magista Obra and 23 from Mercurial Superfly, Nike’s other ‘flat knitted boots’.

Goetze’s goal comes at the end of a long journey for Germany who last won the World Cup in 1990 as West Germany just prior to German reunification.

The win, watched by German Chancellor Angela Merkel, is also a huge coup for U.S. based apparel and footwear manufacturer Nike. The majority of the German national side’s players wear rival brand adidas but Nike backed the right player in rising star Mario Goetze.

Nike launched the new Magista football boot based on its revolutionary Flyknit technology earlier this year. The technology first appeared in running shoes for the London Olympics but this year was the first time it has been used in football boots. The boot was unveiled by FC Barcelona playmaker Andrés Iniesta in Spain in March and is designed to give players unprecedented fit, feel and control.

The Magista launch came just ten days after arch rival adidas launched its Samba Primeknit, which it claimed was the world’s first knitted football boot. But there was no sign of the adidas knitted boot in Brazil.

Building on Nike’s history of groundbreaking innovation in performance footwear, the radical new Magista football boot redefines the concept of how football boots look and perform. Providing improved fit, touch and traction, the boot is designed for the needs of the creative playmaker and it seemed to work for Goetze last night. With one strike of his Nike Magista boot, German striker Mario Gotze sent his country into raptures and sealed his place in football history.

For Nike Football, the winning goal moment capped an exciting year for both the brand and the business. On the pitch, Nike started the tournament with 10 sponsored teams, while 53% of all players selected for their squads wore Nike boots, more than for all other brands combined.

Throughout the competition, Nike-sponsored players scored 76 goals, including the winner in the final from German striker Mario Gotze, and the goal that took his fellow striker Miroslav Klose to all-time tournament goalscorer, breaking the cumulative record previously held by Ronaldo of Brasil.

Off the pitch, the #RiskEverything campaign dominated views, social chatter and engagement leading up to and during the tournament, Nike reports. The three #RiskEverything films,  ‘Risk Everything,” “Winner Stays” and “The Last Game”, have racked up 397 million online views to date. Twenty-three million people engaged with the content by liking, retweeting or commenting, making “The Last Game” one of Facebook's most shared posts ever, Nike adds.

Nike extended the campaign by creating real-time animations, such as the #AskZlatan digital shorts. The animated Zlatan Ibrahimovic commented on Nike's teams and players through short videos posted on social media and through media partnerships, resulting in 20.6 million online views and 12 million consumer engagements.

As a result, Nike Football gained 6.2 million new followers during this time across different social platforms, around 1.5 million per week throughout the tournament. This brings the cumulative total of Nike Football's social channels to 78.8 million followers.

These numbers show an unprecedented level of engagement with the brand, the Oregon headquartered company says. Alongside 21% growth in Nike Football’s business over the fiscal year leading up to the tournament (June 1, 2013 - May 31, 2014), the figures demonstrate why Nike is the sport’s leading brand globally.

Further reading

Maracanã beckons for knitted football boots as Magista and Mercurial make World Cup debut

Nike launches Magista football boot with Flyknit technology