Roy Hodgson and Roberto Mancini continue to experience different fortunes, the former’s Liverpool labouring to a disappointing but nonetheless important goalless draw in Utrecht, whilst the latter’s Manchester City were equal to the stern test given them by Italian giants Juventus in the Europa League this evening. Eastlands witnessed for me a thoroughly absorbing game, certainly in comparison with the Reds’ match in Holland. The empty seats in Manchester however will not have escaped anyone’s notice and on a night like this the fact it wasn’t a sell out is somewhat surprising. City had everything Liverpool was lacking, creativity, guile and played attractive football. Something they did have in common was a lack of width. Adam Johnson naturally provided Roberto Mancini’s side with some, but this was as part of a free role. Liverpool put out a makeshift side with Martin Kelly occupying the wrong full-back birth, covering for the injured Fabio Aurelio and Paul Konchesky. Joe Cole cut inside from left often as has been his wont for many years, leaving Glen Johnson as the only player willing to get chalk on his boots.
This lack of width really worries me as does the continuing pattern of club captain Steven Gerrard being absent resulting in average or poor performances. There will come a time when he is too old to put on that red shirt and what will the Merseyside outfit do then? Over-reliance on Fernando Torres is also proving to be taking his toll. He still looks like he needs a rest to me and I am starting to wonder if constantly playing football, aside from being in a state where he has been physically unable to do so, is going to shorten the Spanish striker’s career. That said were it not for a smart save from Utrecht keeper Michel Vorm we may be talking about Liverpool scraping a 1-0 away victory. The Dutch international impressed on the European stage, thwarting Torres brilliantly at the near post in the second half, though I doubt Netherlands number one Maarten Stekelenberg has anything to worry about. One player we were all watching closely was Holland’s top domestic goalscorer Ricky van Wolfswinkel. The twenty-one year old striker was largely absent in the first half but after the break there were flashes of his talent, though he somewhat fluffed his lines with a good headed chance going begging because he wasn’t perhaps brave enough aerially.
A trio of Juventus players sparkled tonight. New hero Milos Krasic, fresh off his hat-trick against Cagliari at the weekend, showed a willingness to run at the Man City defence. The Serbian winger is a player I have been excited about for some time with genuine blistering pace, it’s just a shame he feels the need to go down so easily. The Turin outfit’s talisman and leader Alessandro del Piero will be thirty-six before 2010 is out but he continues to pose a threat, especially from dead balls. With the possible exception of Paolo Maldini Juventus’s number seven in my view is the best Italian player of my lifetime and on another day his free kick which hit the bar late on would’ve come down behind the goal line rather than just in front of it. Well done to the extra assistants for the call. Vincenzo Iaquinta must also get a mention as his deflected long range shot earned Luigi del Neri’s side a point at Eastlands. The one thing about the former Udinese frontman I never can quite understand is his willingness to run into the channels and go to the wing drifting inside. This is not a criticism of his work ethic, but at six foot three and built the way he is we all know that he could do an equally good, if not better job as a target man. His abysmal, Emile Heskey-esque international record is compelling evidence of this.
The gulf in creativity between Man City and Liverpool tonight was enormous. Joe Cole tried to provide that spark, but forcing the issue does not always work. Yaya Toure impressed with his assist coupled with Adam Johnson’s perfectly timed run in behind which saw Mancini’s men equalise inside the last ten minutes of the first half. The former Middlesbrough winger’s scoring of important goals continues; something that the watching Fabio Capello should be taking note of. In truth it is highly probable that both Johnsons who played in the Europa league tonight will be on that England teamsheet come Montenegro’s visit to Wembley on October 12th, injuries permitting of course.
Thursday, 30 September 2010
Tuesday, 28 September 2010
Deschamps's Marseille Lack Dynamism
You can’t help but think were he not worshipped by Olympique Marseille fans, Didier Deschamps would be under serious pressure by now. The French champions have had at best a mediocre start to their defence of their domestic league crown and offered no threat whatsoever against Chelsea this evening. They are yet to get off the mark in their Champions League campaign either. Carlo Ancelotti’s men didn’t have to be anywhere near their destructive 6-0 calibre best, as they started the English season with back-to-back score lines, to breeze past the opposition from across the Channel at Stamford Bridge tonight. A John Terry header went in at the near post past Stephane Mbia who’s effort to clear the ball from the line looked half-hearted and that is putting it kindly, to put the home side in front inside ten minutes. The Cameroonian player also foolishly raised his hands to protect himself to block a cross leaving the Belgian referee no option to award the blues a penalty which Nicolas Anelka converted just before the half hour with nonchalance. These two first half goals were enough to see off their opponents.
Matching Chelsea’s 4-3-3 formation was nothing short of a tactical blunder and Deschamps alone must take responsibility. Having let Senegalese frontman Mamadou Niang join Turkish giants Fenerbahce for the relatively cheap price of €8million and Ivorian forward Bakari Kone go to Qatar for just €5million, the former World Cup winning captain has spent more than twice as much on home grown duo Andre-Pierre Gignac and Loic Remy. The former, who according to some reports cost as much as €18million, barely made double figures in all competitions last season and was little more than a passenger in France’s farcical antics in South Africa over the summer. As for Remy, a €15million acquisition from Nice, I have seen play quite a few times now and just cannot understand what all the fuss is about. At twenty-three years old the time for taking about potential is over. Neither man has found the net for Marseille yet and on tonight’s evidence that is not surprising. Gignac will be twenty-five before the turn of the year and has had got just one good season under his belt whilst at Toulouse who do not seem to be missing him.
Deschamps’s central midfielders looked like they were treading water this evening, not carrying it as he did. Argentine Lucho Gonzalez, who himself cost Marseille the best part of €20million last summer, showed none of the attacking endeavour we saw of him when he was at Porto. He needed to perform in this way as his fellow teammates in the middle of park, Benoit Cheyrou and Edouard Cisse are not known for getting forward and showed no signs of enhancing that reputation at Stamford Bridge. We also saw tonight compelling evidence that converting holding midfielders into centre halves doesn’t always work with M’bia’s horror show. Paul Le Guen tried this tactic with Cameroon at the World Cup, playing the lad out of his natural position at right back in the first two group games and in the centre of defence in the final match. The Indomitable Lions finished bottom with no points. The manager had a fully fit squad to choose from; there were three other options to partner Souleymane Diawara at the back, four if you include moving forming Manchester United and Real Madrid star Gabriel Heinze infield from left back.
M’Bia was not the only player to be played out of his position. Substitute Mathieu Valbuena came on and played down the left wing when as we have seen in the past for both club and country he is more comfortably in the centre in an attacking role. All this criticism aside, we must not forget that Deschamps guided Marseille to the French title for the first time in nearly twenty years last season and has also taken a team, Monaco in 2004, to the final of the Champions League. Chelsea needed to respond to their defeat at Manchester City over the weekend, but the French made it so easy for them. M’Bia’s defensive calamities, the midfield’s lack of creativity, movement and attacking intent, together with inevitable lack of service into what looks like a strike force that wasn’t worth the money can be viewed as nothing but a complete disappointment. Perhaps it was just as well former Marseille player Didier Drogba was unavailable through suspension as if he had played we might have had a cricket score on our hands. To put it simply if Deschamps and the Stade Velodrome outfit wish to progress in Europe this season they are going to half to put in performances which are light years ahead of the display we saw tonight, and the same it can be argued could be said for them domestically if they wish to retain the Ligue 1 trophy.
Matching Chelsea’s 4-3-3 formation was nothing short of a tactical blunder and Deschamps alone must take responsibility. Having let Senegalese frontman Mamadou Niang join Turkish giants Fenerbahce for the relatively cheap price of €8million and Ivorian forward Bakari Kone go to Qatar for just €5million, the former World Cup winning captain has spent more than twice as much on home grown duo Andre-Pierre Gignac and Loic Remy. The former, who according to some reports cost as much as €18million, barely made double figures in all competitions last season and was little more than a passenger in France’s farcical antics in South Africa over the summer. As for Remy, a €15million acquisition from Nice, I have seen play quite a few times now and just cannot understand what all the fuss is about. At twenty-three years old the time for taking about potential is over. Neither man has found the net for Marseille yet and on tonight’s evidence that is not surprising. Gignac will be twenty-five before the turn of the year and has had got just one good season under his belt whilst at Toulouse who do not seem to be missing him.
Deschamps’s central midfielders looked like they were treading water this evening, not carrying it as he did. Argentine Lucho Gonzalez, who himself cost Marseille the best part of €20million last summer, showed none of the attacking endeavour we saw of him when he was at Porto. He needed to perform in this way as his fellow teammates in the middle of park, Benoit Cheyrou and Edouard Cisse are not known for getting forward and showed no signs of enhancing that reputation at Stamford Bridge. We also saw tonight compelling evidence that converting holding midfielders into centre halves doesn’t always work with M’bia’s horror show. Paul Le Guen tried this tactic with Cameroon at the World Cup, playing the lad out of his natural position at right back in the first two group games and in the centre of defence in the final match. The Indomitable Lions finished bottom with no points. The manager had a fully fit squad to choose from; there were three other options to partner Souleymane Diawara at the back, four if you include moving forming Manchester United and Real Madrid star Gabriel Heinze infield from left back.
M’Bia was not the only player to be played out of his position. Substitute Mathieu Valbuena came on and played down the left wing when as we have seen in the past for both club and country he is more comfortably in the centre in an attacking role. All this criticism aside, we must not forget that Deschamps guided Marseille to the French title for the first time in nearly twenty years last season and has also taken a team, Monaco in 2004, to the final of the Champions League. Chelsea needed to respond to their defeat at Manchester City over the weekend, but the French made it so easy for them. M’Bia’s defensive calamities, the midfield’s lack of creativity, movement and attacking intent, together with inevitable lack of service into what looks like a strike force that wasn’t worth the money can be viewed as nothing but a complete disappointment. Perhaps it was just as well former Marseille player Didier Drogba was unavailable through suspension as if he had played we might have had a cricket score on our hands. To put it simply if Deschamps and the Stade Velodrome outfit wish to progress in Europe this season they are going to half to put in performances which are light years ahead of the display we saw tonight, and the same it can be argued could be said for them domestically if they wish to retain the Ligue 1 trophy.
Saturday, 11 September 2010
Clarets Claim Red Rose Bragging Rights
Burnley 4 Preston 3
In the oldest Lancashire derby Burnley came from two goals down to score three times in six minutes to snatch three points away from North End thanks to a hat trick from Chris Iwelumo and a Jay Rodriguez strike. The game which provided some real tea-time entertainment saw Brian Laws’s side go 1-0 up after ten minutes when the Scotland striker was left unmarked from a corner to head home despite the efforts of Keith Treacy and keeper Andy Lonergan. It was the former Blackburn winger who inspired the response, but it was another bright youngster Adam Barton who levelled the match after Jon Parkin’s knockdown wasn’t dealt with by Clarke Carlisle, leaving the midfielder to place the ball beyond Brian Jensen. There was a hint of a hand but the Preston youth product made no movement towards the ball. Treacy put Preston in front latching onto a second ball, riding a challenge and finishing incisively off the post across the Burnley keeper.
The Clarets, particularly in the first two-thirds of the game, lacked creativity, but switched to a 4-4-2 with the introduction of substitutes Chris Eagles and Jay Rodriguez. Preston capitalised to increased their lead on seventy minutes when Barton found Treacy in space on the wing, who then crossed for Parkin to side foot with aplomb. The match turned on the sending of North End’s full back Billy Jones, yellow carded in the first half for a set to with Wade Elliott. With ten minutes remaining he received his second caution for time wasting and how costly his dismissal proved to be. Burnley began pressing and a creative spark appeared seemingly from nowhere when with a little over five minutes to go Iwelumo grabbed his second with an off-balance strike from inside the area from a lofted ball. With stoppage time in sight he completed his hat-trick by heading in a Graham Alexander free kick. Jay Rodriguez got the winner in the ninetieth minute, Preston having fallen asleep to a short corner, leaving the substitute unmarked in the six yard box to head Ross Wallace’s centre across Lonergan.
The ending to this game will distort the fact that the first half was at time rough and unattractive to watch. It was a case of long ball football from Preston for a good deal of the time. Burnley’s passing game until the sending off was ineffective all build-up and no end product. The match clearly turned on referee Kevin Friend’s decision to send Jones off. Whilst a 4-3 score-line is always an exciting one for the neutral it highlights the defensive frailties of both sides. Laws may not admit it but he has been extremely lucky to have taken three points from this game. It is not difficult to identify who is to blame for the Preston defeat. The price Darren Ferguson had paid for being loyal to a player he worked with at Peterborough and then brought to Deepdale over the summer is a very dear one. Welsh centre half Craig Morgan has never convinced me at this level, even less so as an international footballer. Today he was simply awful. He let Iwelumo go for the first Burnley goal and must also share responsibility for their equaliser with defensive partner and Irish international Sean St Ledger who was at fault for Rodriguez’s winner.
Burnley’s defence was no better. Clarke Carlisle didn’t look too clever gifting young Barton Preston’s leveller in the first half. Andre Bikey played well today, but that unsavoury incident when he was on international duty sticks out in the mind and has made me come to think of him as a professional who is always a little on the edge. Danny Fox’s appalling tackle spelled the end for young Manchester United loanee Josh King and David Edgar may be a utility man but right back is not a position in which he is strong. The Burnley right side that started was tactically wrong, especially when you consider Martin Paterson is not a winger. No wonder Preston had all their joy down that flank. Brian Laws has really got away with it for me tonight. Turning to more positive matters tonight we saw two excellent displays of playing the target man role. Both Parkin of Preston and Iwelumo of the Clarets , when given service, not only posed the opposition defence several problems, but brought their teammates into play as well, having held the ball up or won aerial battles. The Scottish centre forward will grab the headlines but Irishman Treacy really shone for me, providing North End with real quality, something they definitely lacked during the last lacklustre campaign.
On another day fortune might not favour the Turf Moor outfit and despite Preston being on the receiving end again there was enough in tonight’s performance from an attacking perspective to suggest they will be fine. I wouldn’t expect a push for promotion mind, but staying in the division is always preferable to slipping out of it.
In the oldest Lancashire derby Burnley came from two goals down to score three times in six minutes to snatch three points away from North End thanks to a hat trick from Chris Iwelumo and a Jay Rodriguez strike. The game which provided some real tea-time entertainment saw Brian Laws’s side go 1-0 up after ten minutes when the Scotland striker was left unmarked from a corner to head home despite the efforts of Keith Treacy and keeper Andy Lonergan. It was the former Blackburn winger who inspired the response, but it was another bright youngster Adam Barton who levelled the match after Jon Parkin’s knockdown wasn’t dealt with by Clarke Carlisle, leaving the midfielder to place the ball beyond Brian Jensen. There was a hint of a hand but the Preston youth product made no movement towards the ball. Treacy put Preston in front latching onto a second ball, riding a challenge and finishing incisively off the post across the Burnley keeper.
The Clarets, particularly in the first two-thirds of the game, lacked creativity, but switched to a 4-4-2 with the introduction of substitutes Chris Eagles and Jay Rodriguez. Preston capitalised to increased their lead on seventy minutes when Barton found Treacy in space on the wing, who then crossed for Parkin to side foot with aplomb. The match turned on the sending of North End’s full back Billy Jones, yellow carded in the first half for a set to with Wade Elliott. With ten minutes remaining he received his second caution for time wasting and how costly his dismissal proved to be. Burnley began pressing and a creative spark appeared seemingly from nowhere when with a little over five minutes to go Iwelumo grabbed his second with an off-balance strike from inside the area from a lofted ball. With stoppage time in sight he completed his hat-trick by heading in a Graham Alexander free kick. Jay Rodriguez got the winner in the ninetieth minute, Preston having fallen asleep to a short corner, leaving the substitute unmarked in the six yard box to head Ross Wallace’s centre across Lonergan.
The ending to this game will distort the fact that the first half was at time rough and unattractive to watch. It was a case of long ball football from Preston for a good deal of the time. Burnley’s passing game until the sending off was ineffective all build-up and no end product. The match clearly turned on referee Kevin Friend’s decision to send Jones off. Whilst a 4-3 score-line is always an exciting one for the neutral it highlights the defensive frailties of both sides. Laws may not admit it but he has been extremely lucky to have taken three points from this game. It is not difficult to identify who is to blame for the Preston defeat. The price Darren Ferguson had paid for being loyal to a player he worked with at Peterborough and then brought to Deepdale over the summer is a very dear one. Welsh centre half Craig Morgan has never convinced me at this level, even less so as an international footballer. Today he was simply awful. He let Iwelumo go for the first Burnley goal and must also share responsibility for their equaliser with defensive partner and Irish international Sean St Ledger who was at fault for Rodriguez’s winner.
Burnley’s defence was no better. Clarke Carlisle didn’t look too clever gifting young Barton Preston’s leveller in the first half. Andre Bikey played well today, but that unsavoury incident when he was on international duty sticks out in the mind and has made me come to think of him as a professional who is always a little on the edge. Danny Fox’s appalling tackle spelled the end for young Manchester United loanee Josh King and David Edgar may be a utility man but right back is not a position in which he is strong. The Burnley right side that started was tactically wrong, especially when you consider Martin Paterson is not a winger. No wonder Preston had all their joy down that flank. Brian Laws has really got away with it for me tonight. Turning to more positive matters tonight we saw two excellent displays of playing the target man role. Both Parkin of Preston and Iwelumo of the Clarets , when given service, not only posed the opposition defence several problems, but brought their teammates into play as well, having held the ball up or won aerial battles. The Scottish centre forward will grab the headlines but Irishman Treacy really shone for me, providing North End with real quality, something they definitely lacked during the last lacklustre campaign.
On another day fortune might not favour the Turf Moor outfit and despite Preston being on the receiving end again there was enough in tonight’s performance from an attacking perspective to suggest they will be fine. I wouldn’t expect a push for promotion mind, but staying in the division is always preferable to slipping out of it.
Tuesday, 7 September 2010
England Issue a Beating in Basel
Switzerland 1 England 3
The Three Lions made it six points from six with an impressive away win in Basel to sit top of Group ? in the Euro 2012 Qualifiers. A first half strike from Wayne Rooney was added to by goals from the in-form Adam Johnson and Darren Bent’s first in national colours with only Xherden Shaqiri’s reply for Ottmar Hitzfeld’s side.
In the tenth minute, Glen Johnson and Theo Walcott combined superbly down the right with the former crossing leaving Rooney with a simple tap in past new father Diego Benaglio. That would unfortunately be the end of Walcott’s night as the Arsenal winger was stretchered off replaced by the scorer of England’s second. Jermain Defoe, the hat-trick hero from Friday’s 4-0 win over Bulgaria could not quite latch on to a sublime ball from captain Steven Gerrard which may have seen the Lions further ahead before half time.
Swiss right back Stephan Lichsteiner was red-carded for a professional foul with a quarter of the game remaining for bringing down James Milner. Just a minute later England made their man advantage immediately count with Manchester City’s Adam Johnson capitalising on a defensive mistake before rounding the keeping and finishing nonchalantly. Switzerland responded almost instantly with the young Shaqiri being allowed to shoot by Ashley Cole and his failure to get tighter to the winger resulted in him unleashing an unstoppable strike past Joe Hart. Another better attacking performance from the Chelsea full back was rounded off with an assist for Bent’s maiden England goal in the last five minutes to restore the two goal cushion and destroy any hopes of a Swiss equaliser. The Sunderland striker who replaced Jermain Defoe netted with a sharp finish beating Benaglio at his near post with a powerful shot.
It was the performance of Adam Johnson which caught the eye again this evening. The tactic of cutting inside on the full backs seemed effective and praise must go to Fabio Capello as well as the players. With Milner joining his Man City teammate in the wide areas they gave Lichsteiner and former Tottenham player Reto Ziegler a torrid time. I would like to say a few words about Darren Bent though and how pleased England fans should be about him breaking his duck for his country. In previous games, particularly when he has started, he has suffered from a lack of service, but given a clear sight of goal he has shown he can deliver and it is gratifying to see a former youth international find the back of the net for the senior side. As with Johnson it vindicates the work of Under 21 managers and proves it is possible to translate youth side successes into the full national team.
The Swiss were very disappointing. Essentially the same side that defeated Spain in their opening World Cup group game, they looked so much more cumbersome in defence tonight. Gokhan Inler and Pirmin Schwelger offered little to no protection to their back four at all. They certainly seemed to be missing the creative influence of a Tranquillo Barnetta or Hakin Yakin. They offered no real threat and I am struggling to remember them testing Hart aside from Shaqiri’s thunderbolt which left him with no chance. Overall England fans should be satisfied with what is a perfect start to this qualification campaign and the two wins should ease the pressure on Capello and restore a bit of faith in their minds about the Italian.
The Three Lions made it six points from six with an impressive away win in Basel to sit top of Group ? in the Euro 2012 Qualifiers. A first half strike from Wayne Rooney was added to by goals from the in-form Adam Johnson and Darren Bent’s first in national colours with only Xherden Shaqiri’s reply for Ottmar Hitzfeld’s side.
In the tenth minute, Glen Johnson and Theo Walcott combined superbly down the right with the former crossing leaving Rooney with a simple tap in past new father Diego Benaglio. That would unfortunately be the end of Walcott’s night as the Arsenal winger was stretchered off replaced by the scorer of England’s second. Jermain Defoe, the hat-trick hero from Friday’s 4-0 win over Bulgaria could not quite latch on to a sublime ball from captain Steven Gerrard which may have seen the Lions further ahead before half time.
Swiss right back Stephan Lichsteiner was red-carded for a professional foul with a quarter of the game remaining for bringing down James Milner. Just a minute later England made their man advantage immediately count with Manchester City’s Adam Johnson capitalising on a defensive mistake before rounding the keeping and finishing nonchalantly. Switzerland responded almost instantly with the young Shaqiri being allowed to shoot by Ashley Cole and his failure to get tighter to the winger resulted in him unleashing an unstoppable strike past Joe Hart. Another better attacking performance from the Chelsea full back was rounded off with an assist for Bent’s maiden England goal in the last five minutes to restore the two goal cushion and destroy any hopes of a Swiss equaliser. The Sunderland striker who replaced Jermain Defoe netted with a sharp finish beating Benaglio at his near post with a powerful shot.
It was the performance of Adam Johnson which caught the eye again this evening. The tactic of cutting inside on the full backs seemed effective and praise must go to Fabio Capello as well as the players. With Milner joining his Man City teammate in the wide areas they gave Lichsteiner and former Tottenham player Reto Ziegler a torrid time. I would like to say a few words about Darren Bent though and how pleased England fans should be about him breaking his duck for his country. In previous games, particularly when he has started, he has suffered from a lack of service, but given a clear sight of goal he has shown he can deliver and it is gratifying to see a former youth international find the back of the net for the senior side. As with Johnson it vindicates the work of Under 21 managers and proves it is possible to translate youth side successes into the full national team.
The Swiss were very disappointing. Essentially the same side that defeated Spain in their opening World Cup group game, they looked so much more cumbersome in defence tonight. Gokhan Inler and Pirmin Schwelger offered little to no protection to their back four at all. They certainly seemed to be missing the creative influence of a Tranquillo Barnetta or Hakin Yakin. They offered no real threat and I am struggling to remember them testing Hart aside from Shaqiri’s thunderbolt which left him with no chance. Overall England fans should be satisfied with what is a perfect start to this qualification campaign and the two wins should ease the pressure on Capello and restore a bit of faith in their minds about the Italian.
Friday, 3 September 2010
Dangerous Defoe A Hat-Trick Hero
England 4 Bulgaria 0
England got their Euro 2012 qualifying campaign off to an excellent start with a 4-0 win over Bulgaria. A hat-trick from Tottenham’s Jermain Defoe and a goal from Adam Johnson saw Fabio Capello’s side win in convincing fashion. The Eastern European nation offered little threat throughout, but Joe Hart was called into action making three top saves.
At the other end former Liverpool goalkeeper Nikolay Mihaylov’s first action was to parry Ashley Cole’s shot from a tight angle, seconds later in just the third minute England took the lead with the Chelsea full-back crossing from the rebound for Defoe to volley into the roof of an unguarded net. Though they did not add to the score before half time a lot of the approach play was encouraging and there seemed to be more fluidity about the Three Lions.
The only thing which marred the victory was the injury to Michael Dawson, stretchered off early in the second half on his full debut. This allowed Bolton’s Gary Cahill to finally make his bow though he looked a little nervous at times. England doubled their lead on the hour mark countering from a Bulgarian attack which saw Hart parry a Stanislav Angelov shot from Martin Petrov’s square. Wayne Rooney drove up the park and slotted in for Defoe to add his second, finishing with aplomb through the legs of Mihaylov. The Spurs striker turned provider for Adam Johnson who placed the ball beyond the keeper after cutting inside from the right wing. Another great pass from Rooney saw Defoe collect the match ball after eighty-six minutes, though he took a knock on his ankle which will add to the concerns of his club manager Harry Redknapp. His triple has improved his goals-to-game ratio at the highest level substantially. Defoe's pace and clinical finishing will make him a hnadful for defenders in the Champions League.
Defensively Bulgaria did not put up much of a fight and were really lacking in pace at the back. PSV’s highly rated Sanislav Manolev had a particularly torrid time against Ashley Cole and was withdrawn with a quarter of the game to go. Ivelin Popov, a player who I earmarked as one to watch in Monday’s preview, only showed very brief flashes of his talent. The forward is now plying his trade in the Turkish Super League after a transfer deadline day move. They were simply lacking in thrust and unsurprisingly Valeri Bojinov’s legs have gone; there can be no doubt Dimitar Berbatov would’ve been more than a handful for Dawson/Cahill and Jagielka. Borussia Dortmund’s Dimitar Rangelov drew one save from Joe Hart, but he should feel that he could have done better, the finish nonetheless reflecting his poor international record. The Eastern Europeans had some good approach play but the lack of a consistent final ball and poor finishing were their undoing when coupled with their defensive frailties
Overall England kept their shape well, but there were one or two mistakes. Glen Johnson’s near own goal in the first half sticks out in the mind. Thankfully Hart was alert to it. Early in the second forty-five before getting injured Michael Dawson was particularly slack when he failed to deal with a long ball that saw Popov shoot just wide. Tonight’s win was comfortable but I am keeping my feet firmly on the ground. I have always believed the second match in this double header, the trip to Switzerland on Tuesday, will be the tougher test. That said there are a good number of positive for Capello and England fans to take from the performance at Wembley.
England got their Euro 2012 qualifying campaign off to an excellent start with a 4-0 win over Bulgaria. A hat-trick from Tottenham’s Jermain Defoe and a goal from Adam Johnson saw Fabio Capello’s side win in convincing fashion. The Eastern European nation offered little threat throughout, but Joe Hart was called into action making three top saves.
At the other end former Liverpool goalkeeper Nikolay Mihaylov’s first action was to parry Ashley Cole’s shot from a tight angle, seconds later in just the third minute England took the lead with the Chelsea full-back crossing from the rebound for Defoe to volley into the roof of an unguarded net. Though they did not add to the score before half time a lot of the approach play was encouraging and there seemed to be more fluidity about the Three Lions.
The only thing which marred the victory was the injury to Michael Dawson, stretchered off early in the second half on his full debut. This allowed Bolton’s Gary Cahill to finally make his bow though he looked a little nervous at times. England doubled their lead on the hour mark countering from a Bulgarian attack which saw Hart parry a Stanislav Angelov shot from Martin Petrov’s square. Wayne Rooney drove up the park and slotted in for Defoe to add his second, finishing with aplomb through the legs of Mihaylov. The Spurs striker turned provider for Adam Johnson who placed the ball beyond the keeper after cutting inside from the right wing. Another great pass from Rooney saw Defoe collect the match ball after eighty-six minutes, though he took a knock on his ankle which will add to the concerns of his club manager Harry Redknapp. His triple has improved his goals-to-game ratio at the highest level substantially. Defoe's pace and clinical finishing will make him a hnadful for defenders in the Champions League.
Defensively Bulgaria did not put up much of a fight and were really lacking in pace at the back. PSV’s highly rated Sanislav Manolev had a particularly torrid time against Ashley Cole and was withdrawn with a quarter of the game to go. Ivelin Popov, a player who I earmarked as one to watch in Monday’s preview, only showed very brief flashes of his talent. The forward is now plying his trade in the Turkish Super League after a transfer deadline day move. They were simply lacking in thrust and unsurprisingly Valeri Bojinov’s legs have gone; there can be no doubt Dimitar Berbatov would’ve been more than a handful for Dawson/Cahill and Jagielka. Borussia Dortmund’s Dimitar Rangelov drew one save from Joe Hart, but he should feel that he could have done better, the finish nonetheless reflecting his poor international record. The Eastern Europeans had some good approach play but the lack of a consistent final ball and poor finishing were their undoing when coupled with their defensive frailties
Overall England kept their shape well, but there were one or two mistakes. Glen Johnson’s near own goal in the first half sticks out in the mind. Thankfully Hart was alert to it. Early in the second forty-five before getting injured Michael Dawson was particularly slack when he failed to deal with a long ball that saw Popov shoot just wide. Tonight’s win was comfortable but I am keeping my feet firmly on the ground. I have always believed the second match in this double header, the trip to Switzerland on Tuesday, will be the tougher test. That said there are a good number of positive for Capello and England fans to take from the performance at Wembley.
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