England 1. James, David 5. Terry, John 2. Neville, Gary 3. Cole, Ashley 6. Upson, Matthew 7. Beckham, David 4. Butt, Nicky 8. Lampard, Frank 11. Cole, Joe 10. Heskey, Emile 9. Rooney, Wayne
Denmark 1. Sorensen, Thomas 3. Henriksen, René 6. Helveg, Thomas 5. Jensen, Niclas 4. Nielsen, Per 2. Wieghorst, Morten 7. Gravesen, Thomas 8. Gronkjaer, Jesper 10. Jorgensen, Martin 11. Sand, Ebbe 9. Rommedahl, Dennis
England, 1-0. Rooney with a "thumper" of a goal. Just inside the box, first time, off the crossbar into the back of the net.
2-2 from a pen, Poor England defending again- Upson with a 2-footed challenge- blatant pen- well put away in top corner of goal
second organisation has been a joke... denmark had some good chances and no suprise they bagged the lead.. just afew points.. -lampard continues to play crap at international level..cant reproduce his chelsea form. -glen johnson aint ready for full internationals.. -rooney is looking better with every game. -cole looked good.. -upson aint up to the job..
i reckon beattie is another kevin phillips.. a player who has a good goalscoring season ,gets afew international caps and is proved to be not up to the job... he'll win about 8 or 9 caps and wont be heard of again..
Well it's the final whistle. An interesting game, exciting first half and then the second half descended into the usual friendly farce of substitutions and formation changes which destroyed England's flow. In the last 20 minutes it was all a second string England team, which perhaps shows again that Sven has most of his squad already made up in his mind and just wants to figure out who will be a backup and in what order. I agree with your summary SRM. Would just like to add that: - Robinson is ready to take over as goalkeeper if James slips up, but that hasn't really happened just yet. Robbo still needs a bit more International experience, I'd like to see him get a few more games before Euro 2004 even if he goes into the tournament only as number 2. -Beattie looks capable but needs to be in a team where we're looking to put in crosses from out wide and he has a pacey player up front with him to do more of the running into the channels. Really he doesn't fit into the shape of the team at the moment so I can perhaps see why Sven didn't pick him until he was forced. - Terry is an international class defender, but as he isn't the quickest he needs someone with pace alongside him to help him out. Or at the very least someone better than Upson!
In the second half the midfield didnt press the ball and gave denmark time to play it around.. lampard was the main culprit in allowing denmark space to attack... The most dangerous moments came from his lack of concentration around the box.
I'm just pissing myself laughing at some of the muppets phoning into Radio 5 moaning about a lack of passion/pride or crap like that - lads, for goodness' sake, it's only a friendly. These players showed plenty of those qualities when it mattered. My only other observation is that Evertonians must be incredibly hacked off at their league form when they have some players doing so well for their national teams (Gravesen, Rooney, McFadden + some others).
not a lack of pride.. just poor organisation in the second half due to loads of substitutions.. defence needs abit of work by the looks of it.
Sven's got to go, he's a crap manager. - He keeps persisting with the diamond midfield despite it making us horribly un-protected down the left. - He keeps relying on the individial brilliance of Beckham and Owen to pull his under-performing teams out the gutter in important matches. - He keeps picking players like Phil Chuckle, Gary Chuckle and Heskey. - He keeps wasting friendly matches by turning them into sub heavy mockeries. How the hell can you find things out about X player by playing them in a totally changed team for the last 5 or so minutes? There are loads of other reasons as to why he has to go. I am not knee jerk reacting to this one game as I've had my doubts about him for a while. Let's hope we can get some one like Capello in after Euro 2004. One more point - I thought Rooney was excellent, England's best player on the night alongside Joe Cole. Keep it up wayne
capello cant even speak english... no way is he any sort of candidate.. as for sven... friendlies are always a joke but he gets the job done in the proper matches..
Capello can speak perfect English last time I checked. He was a canditate to take over form Keegan but got turned down for Sven Goran Houllier. Infinitly better than Sven and his Graham Taylor like tactics. As for getting the job done in important matches no ne has not, the players have saved Eriksson and he crap tactics blushes time after time with the referee helping us out here and there...