Brazil captain Thiago Silva will definitely miss Tuesday's World Cup 2014 semi-final against Germany after Fifa rejected the appeal against his yellow card against Colombia.
Silva picked up his second booking of the tournament and an automatic one-game suspension when he attempted to block a clearance from Colombia keeper David Ospina during Friday's feisty 2-1 quarter-final win.
Fifa also confirmed they would not be taking further action against Colombia defender Juan Zuniga, whose challenge on Neymar left the Brazil striker with a broken vertebrae and ended his World Cup campaign.
The Fifa statement read: "First and foremost, the chairman of the FIFA Disciplinary Committee wishes to state that he deeply regrets the incident and the serious consequences on Neymar's health.
"After an analysis of the matter and the extensive submission and documentation received from the CBF, the chairman came to the conclusion that the FIFA Disciplinary Committee cannot consider this matter in light of the conditions outlined in the FIFA Disciplinary Code (FDC) for the Disciplinary Committee to be able to intervene in such a situation.
"In particular, in this specific case, no retrospective action can be taken by the FIFA Disciplinary Committee, since the incident involving the Colombian player Juan Camilo Zuniga Mosquera did not escape the match officials' attention, which is the first of two cumulative and necessary conditions for art. 77 a) of the FDC to be applied.
"Meanwhile art. 77 b) of the FDC, which entitles the Disciplinary Committee to rectify obvious errors in the referee's disciplinary decisions, equally cannot be applied in this case because neither a yellow card nor a red card was shown by the referee to the player Juan Camilo Zuniga Mosquera. Indeed, art. 77 b) of the FDC stipulates that the Disciplinary Committee may rectify obvious errors in the referee's disciplinary decisions, which is only possible in the case of mistaken identity when a referee shows a yellow or red card to the wrong player.
"It is important to note that the conditions by which the FIFA Disciplinary Committee can intervene in any incident have to be considered independently of the consequences of that incident, such as an unfortunate injury suffered by a player.
"Finally, as a general remark, FIFA and the FIFA Disciplinary Committee regret any incidents occurring on the pitch that in particular have a negative impact on the health of players.
"We wish Neymar a prompt and complete recovery as we wish the same for all players who have sadly been ruled out of the World Cup through injury.
"With regard to CBF's request for the cancellation of the caution shown to the player Thiago Emiliano da Silva during the match played against Colombia, the chairman came to the conclusion that the FIFA Disciplinary Committee cannot consider the matter given the fact that there is no legal basis entitling it to grant such request."
