Luis Suarez, the Uruguay striker who has emerged as the most controversial figure of the World Cup, has called on his team-mates to "play to the death" to secure the prize of third place in the tournament.

Uruguay, already guaranteed the kudos of being the top South American side, face Germany in Port Elizabeth tomorrow in the third-place play-off.

The match has had a reputation for being an almost meaningless consolation prize but Suarez, whose last-minute handball against Ghana prevented the Africans from going through to the semi-finals, insists Uruguay will take enormous pride from coming third.

Suarez said: "For this squad, the World Cup is not over yet. Now what's left is to play to the death for third place."

The Ajax striker's action against Ghana led to global notoriety - for a time his name was the second-most searched for on Google, just below Paris Hilton's.

The handball incident led to FIFA president Sepp Blatter ruling out 'penalty goals' ever being awarded in such circumstances, while Uruguay coach Oscar Tabarez described it as "a scandal" that Suarez was being singled out as a cheat, having conceded a penalty and been banned for the semi-final against Holland.

Tabarez has also echoed his striker's call for Uruguay to pull out all the stops against Germany tomorrow.

He said: "Yes, third and fourth position is not the same as the top two, but we will go in with the same commitment and enthusiasm as we did against Holland.

"We have no guarantee that we will win but we will prepare ourselves for a fight to the death.

"The challenge for Uruguay is to finish third in the World Cup. I know Germany and they will make it very difficult for us, so we must fight hard to win."

Tabarez has a doubt over Diego Forlan, Uruguay's talisman and one of the outstanding players of the tournament, who suffered a thigh strain in the 3-2 defeat by Holland.