UGLIEST WIN EVER?
The last time we faced Japan was back in the Sven era, to be precise [art of an FA Summer tournament that was held at the City of Manchester Stadium in '04. The best England were able to come up with on that occasion was a 1-1 draw with then-Liverpool assasin Michael Owen scoring for the Three Lions. Amazingly the last time we beat Japan was during another mini-tournament, this time the Umbro Cup of '95. Terry Venables was the manager and Darren Anderton and David Platt were the scorers for the Three Lions in a 2-1 win at Wembley. Overall, we've certainly become used to seeing Japan at the World Cup and the big guns can't take them completely for granted.
This made them a reasonable challege for Fabio Capello's England. Their last game at home provided a messy win and after that his 30 returned to their training camp in Austria for what would be their last game before the World Cup. This match at the UPC Arena would be a last chance for players to make their case for a ticket to South Africa. It was a return to 4-4-2 for England with James in goal, Rio and Terry in central defence, Ashley Cole left back, Lampard and Spurs' Tom Huddlestone(full debut for England) at central midfield, Lennon left mid. Rooney and Bent up front. Time to see what this combination could do in a match situation.
Well England started the game OK...untill the 7th minute when Yasuhito Endo found Tulio Tanaka in the box to head in the first goal of the match. After that, England pretty much looked dead, with no clue about how to deal with the situation. Eventually the Three Lions managed to get their attack going but the fact is, it looked as though they'd left their shooting boots on the training pitch. The Japanese looked much more up for the match. Bottom line, this experiment clearly was not working. Fabio was left having to bash some heads together in an effort to stave off an unwanted humiliation before the flight to South Africa. What could be done?
Well the first thing that was done was an inevitable half time overhaul of the team. That seemed to at least fire England up more and yet, still no one was able to hit the net, even from the penalty spot.At least we were starting to run the show though. However the nature of the eventual turnaround turned out to be arguably more embarassing than going behind in the first place. First a 73rd minute cross from sub Joe Cole was ironically headed in by Tanaka. Then a 83rd minute cross from Ashley Cole was struck at by Yuji Nakazawa...right into his own net. Well I never complain about an England win but we'll certainly need to do better than this when the big competition starts.
Elsewhere, Northern Ireland faced Chille in the Estadio Municipal Nelson Arenas. Again NI fielded an experimental lineup and against one of the more useful teams going to South Africa, that predictably proved to be a hiding to nothing, Esteban Paredas opening the scoring for the home side. Chille ran the show pretty much throught the match but credit where credit's due the British side didn't actually concede any more goals. A useful experience for a young Northern Ireland team preparing to build for yet another qualification campaign. Despite losing both their games on the other side of the Atlantic, they certainly didn't disgrace themselves.
The Republic of Ireland faced Algeria in the RDS Arena. Irish debutant Paul Green opened the scoring for the men in green, a great moment for him and what must have been a jawdropping one for Algeria, who would have been expecting a relatively smooth warmup for the Three Lions. They were given no mercy in the second half either with Robbie Keane hitting the net twice, the second time with a penalty and with that it was game over. An awesome result for the Irish that'll have freaked out England's upcoming group opponents. There have been plenty of similar results around the world so so looking back, maybe we didn't do so badly after all!
Now though, the 30 has become 23 and the Three Lions are now in South Africa.
Football's biggest tournament awaits.
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