Nothing seems to be going right at the moment for Steve McLaren and his English team! They are currently fourth in their Euro 2008 qualification group, which puts them in danger of not qualifying for the event to be held next year in Austria and Switzerland. They have not played well over the last few months and now, they have lost at home to a severely depleted German side!
It is difficult to figure out what is going wrong with a team that has some of world football’s finest and most hyped talents! They did show signs of returning to form in their match against Brazil at the newly constructed home of English football – the Wembley. They played well and although denied victory by a late Brazil equalizer, they did look the better team. And last night against the Germans they seemed to have started from where they had left off against the Latin Americans. The 80000 strong crowd must have been mighty relieved when Frank Lampard’s thumping shot from inside the box gave England the lead against their arch-rivals!
The Germans however have always been tough opposition for England, especially, and surprisingly, on English grounds! The last time England won a home game against the Germans was 3 decades back! And the Germans were keen to maintain that record. They were shaky at the start, but Lampard’s goal seemed to have provided the ignition they required! Missing almost all of their regular players in the midfield (captain Ballack, Frings and Schweinsteiger) and up front (Klose and Podolski) they still managed to play some very effective football.
In fact, such critical was the shortage of experienced players, that coach Joachim Loew had to field left-back Phillip Lahm in the centre of the midfield with debutant Christian Panders taking Lahm’s original position. And Panders, after a nervous start when he struggled against the pace and power of young Manchester City right-back Micah Richards, repaid his manager’s faith by putting up a more solid show at the back, and, more importantly, sending a screamer past hapless England goalkeeper Paul Robinson to score Germany’s second goal.
Both the goalkeepers had torrid times under the bar. While Jens Lehmann (having already made 2 blunders playing for Arsenal in the English Premier League) was easily beaten at the near post by Lampard, England’s Paul Robinson totally misjudged Bernd Schneider’s cross and presented Kevin Kuranyi with a simple tap-in opportunity. David James, who replaced Robinson in the second half, had a better match, although that can be attributed to Germany playing with just Kuranyi up front after having taken the lead. Kevin Kuranyi here deserves a special mention. It is not easy to play as the lone striker, and the Brazilian-born German forward did more than a reasonable job out of it. Not only did he score Germany’s first goal, he also got himself into scoring positions a few more times.
England, on the other hand, sorely missed the services of Wayne Rooney, Steven Gerrard and Owen Hargreaves. While Rooney up front would have been a handful for the German defenders, Gerrard and Hargreaves could have provided more stability to the midfield. Michael Owen, back from an injury, missed two sitters and will probably take some more time to get back to the lethal Owen of old. Owen’s Newcastle teammate Alan Smith wasn’t really impressive, and his replacement Kieron Dyer showed that just having pace without the ability to finish does not make you a striker. David Beckham, too, was disappointing.
The Germans were the last team to beat England at the old Wembley, and they became, even with a second string side, the first to do so at the newly constructed stadium. After a few years of slump, this football powerhouse is back and is playing as aggressively as ever. English fans, however, must be worried about their team’s future. It will indeed be interesting to see how they perform in their coming European qualifiers against teams of the caliber of Croatia, Russia and Israel. An Euro Cup without England is not what football lovers would like to see!
. And with Sania Mirza playing arguably her best tennis of late, the All India Football Federation reviving the Nehru Cup after a hiatus and the Indian cricket team standing on the verge of a series win in England for the first time in 21 years, I don’t think I could have timed this any better! The perfect time to start a sports blog!