Two hours before kick off. Until then nothing is certain. Fabio Capello is understood to be reluctant to change the team that beat Slovenia but for all the Italian’s famed imperviousness to pressure, he does like a last-minute decision.
For the provisional squad he changed his mind on Owen Hargreaves, for the final 23 he left it late on Theo Walcott and on the morning of the Algeria game, he decided to switch from Rob Green to David James in goal.
Going into the final preparations for Sunday’s game with Germany, Jamie Carragher is hoping the England manager has another one of those second thoughts.
Capello clearly favours Carragher over Matthew Upson. That much was clear when he was selected to be Ledley King’s deputy after he was injured against the Americans.
But Upson did capably well against Slovenia and, perhaps crucially, is quicker over the turf than Carragher. The way Carragher was effortlessly rolled by Jozy Altidore in Rustenburg was not lost on Capello. Read more…
RIO FERDINAND has told Franz Beckenbauer: Your taunts will come back to bite you.
The England skipper, out of the World Cup with a knee injury, has been amazed at how much The Kaiser keeps sticking the boot into England.
Beckenbauer first labelled England a ‘kick and rush’ side which had gone backwards.
Then he said Fabio Capello’s team were ’stupid’ for finishing second in Group C and that our players were tired from a tough Premier League season.
Yet it looks like his rants have succeeded only in virtually doing boss Capello’s team-talk for him.
Although Beckenbauer apologised for his taunts last night, Ferdinand is convinced he will still live to regret them when England face the Germans in their last-16 crunch in Bloemfontein tomorrow.
He said: “I think those comments will come back to bite Beckenbauer. Perhaps he wasn’t expecting Germany and England to meet this early in the competition.
“It has unsettled him and he has got a bit rattled, so he’s looking for ways to get under our skin.
“But he hasn’t. He has just made the lads more determined. The team that wins a World Cup doesn’t necessarily start great. It’s the way you finish that counts.
“I know some of the lads think it would have been better to play Ghana and it would have been an easier route for us.
“But I prefer Germany, because you know what you’re getting with them. Ghana can be unpredictable. Germany are more straightforward.
“We start again at the knockout stage and facing Germany will spur us on. We are going to have to play well and have a bit of luck. Yet we see ourselves as a lot better team than one which goes out in the last 16.” Read more…
James’s German counterpart, Manuel Neuer, talks of playing the “memory game” if Sunday’s World Cup round of 16 game climaxes in a shoot-out. This involves Neuer remembering all the advice from the German technical staff on which way to dive for which player. At the last World Cup, Jens Lehmann frustrated Argentina by checking on their players’ preference from a slip of paper shoved down his sock.
Ben Foster helped Manchester United win the Carling Cup when checking on the Tottenham players’ approach on an iPod before the shoot-out and saving from Jamie O’Hara.
James would not reveal his intentions, saying: “I’ll probably look over to the physio!” Most of the information will be absorbed on Saturday, leaving him far better prepared than in Euro 2004. “We played Portugal [in the quarter-final shoot-out] and didn’t have the access to as much information as we could have done.”
James was particularly frustrated in the group stages in Lisbon, when he faced a penalty from Zinedine Zidane not having seen footage of how the Frenchman addressed spot kicks. Read more…
In a poignant mea culpa, he must have repeated 10 times that he was to blame for his team’s pathetic World Cup exit.
“I take all responsibility because if a team shows up at such an important game with terror in their head and hearts and the team can’t express its ability, it means the coach didn’t train as he should have – psychologically, tactically and physically,” he said.
It was a brutally honest analysis and the word which really resonated was “terror”. The European giants here have been laden with fright.
Yes, England live to fight another day, but they’ve been fantastically ordinary; Germany are there too but have stuttered. Johan Cruyff reckons only one has played with any true ambition and verve, Spain. And even they had their own initial mishap against Switzerland. But above all stands the unique double exit of the two 2006 finalists, who for the first time ever both imploded in spectacular and spectacularly different ways, but with both calamitous sagas exemplifying the fear and loathing which has hamstrung Europe’s superpowers.
The snowstorm of hype surrounding the teams, and the national demands for them to deliver, has never felt more suffocating. When before have the continent’s five major footballing nations all been battling in the last round of group matches to gain entry to the knockout stages? Never. Read more…
A match that almost certainly amounts to a play-off for qualification into the last 16, with Slovenia having the advantage of knowing that they would progress should there be a draw.
Slovenia have outperformed England in the most recent history of their respective matches against Algeria and the United States, but the longer term form says that Fabio Capello’s team should prevail.
Matthew Upson will start in defence for England following injuries to Rio Ferdinand and Ledley King as well as the suspension of Jamie Carragher, while Slovenia are waiting on the fitness of centre-back Marko Suler.
Key Clash
Frank Lampard v Robert Koren: Two midfielders with proven quality in front of goal. Koren, who is a free agent after being released at the end of last season by West Bromwich
Albion, scored Slovenia’s winner against Algeria and has a respectable strike-rate of a goal every five games throughout his club career. Lampard has comfortably bettered that ratio both for club and country but his most recent England goals only came last September.
Touchline duel
Fabio Capello v Matjaz Kek: As in every department, England have a huge theoretical edge in the dugout. Whereas Capello has managed with distinction in Italy, Spain and now England, Kek has never worked outside Slovenia.
Kek won two Slovenian league titles with Maribor before coaching the Under-15 and Under-16 national teams. He was then made Slovenia manager in 2002 and has overseen what is already their most successful ever World Cup campaign. Read more…
Soccer City’s metallic pot is gleaming in the sunshine, the vuvuzelas are becoming more cacophonous by the moment and a nation is now bathed in such a fever that even a Brazilian who has brought home a World Cup to show his compatriots reckons he has seen nothing to compare.
Now all that is needed to launch Africa’s World Cup is for the Bafana Bafana to deliver the perfect opening stanza by beating Mexico here on Friday. With a kind of madness descending upon Johannesburg which seems guaranteed to induce frayed nerves in the sturdiest of South Africa’s players, it is just as well the hosts have a manager of Carlos Alberto Parreira’s experience and stature to keep them calmly grounded.
So while Nelson Mandela makes his lump-in-the-throat appearance and amid all the opening ceremony razzmatazz before the historic kick-off in Africa’s biggest stadium, the man who guided Brazil to the 1994 title reckons he will have only one simple, soothing message to his players this afternoon: “Just have fun, enjoy the game.” Read more…
Fernando Torres marked his return from injury with a goal as Spain routed Poland 6-0 in their last World Cup warm-up match on Tuesday, but the European champions were left with doubts over Andres Iniesta after the playmaker came off early.
Iniesta provided the pass for David Villa’s opener before starting the move which led to David Silva’s 14th-minute goal. He came off in the 39th with an apparent leg problem.
Xabi Alonso scored in the 51st before setting up Cesc Fabregas seven minutes later in the Arsenal midfielder’s second game back from a fractured leg.
Torres, who came on for David Villa after 66 minutes for his first appearance since having knee surgery in April, guided Pedro Rodriguez’s pass home in the 76th before Pedro scored in the 81st.
Spain, who have won their last eleven games, go into the tournament in South Africa as favourites, although their optimism might be tempered by the injury scare to Iniesta.
The midfielder asked to be substituted just before the break after complaining of a thigh muscle problem.
Ref Jeff Selogilwe slammed Roo’s behaviour in England’s final warm-up game.
Selogilwe booked the hitman during the 3-0 win over local outfit Platinum Stars and said: “Rooney insulted me, he said ‘F*** you’.
“He must learn to control his temper. He could get sent off in the World Cup, especially if he uses this kind of language.
“If he insults a referee like me, then he will use that vulgar language to other referees as well.”
The fiery Manchester United star was red-carded in England’s last World Cup finals game - the 2006 quarter-final - for stamping on Portugal’s Ricardo Carvalho.
Selogilwe added: “Maybe the England players thought ‘This is just a friendly, we can do what we like and the referees are not that professional’.
“It’s a shame. He is a good player when you see him on the TV, but when you see him on the pitch, he just keeps on insulting the referees.
“To me it looks like Rooney insults people and fouls other players.
“So I was very disappointed in Rooney because he is my favourite player.”
And then with a smile he added: “Actually he is still my favourite player. He apologised to me and gave me the shirt he was wearing.”
Dutch winger Arjen Robben is a major doubt for the World Cup finals after limping off during his country’s 6-1 friendly rout of Hungary in Amsterdam.
Second-half substitute Robben scored two goals before injuring his hamstring when in possession in the 85th minute.
Coach Bert van Marwijk revealed Robben will undergo a scan on Sunday to determine the extent of the problem.
“He felt a sharp pain,” said van Marwijk. “That does not bode well, but I do not lose hope.”
Robben has been in top form for German Double winners and losing Champions League finalists Bayern Munich and his absence would be a devastating blow to the Dutch.
The team fly out to South Africa on Saturday night without the former Chelsea and Real Madrid player and captain Giovanni van Bronckhorst fears the 26-year-old may not even follow his team-mates to the finals.
“It was a magnificent match but Arjen’s injury overshadowed everything,” said Feyenoord’s van Bronckhorst. “I’m not very optimistic. He’s in real pain and finds it difficult to walk.” Read more…
