England team Foster, Brown, Bridge, Barry, Upson, Lescott, Wright-Phillips, Jenas, Bent, Rooney, Milner. Subs: Green, Cahill, Warnock, Huddlestone, Crouch, Defoe, Young, Hart.
Brazil: Julio Cesar, Maicon, Lucio, Thiago Silva, Michel Bastos, Felipe Melo, Silva, Elano, Kaka, Nilmar, Luis Fabiano. Subs: Doni, Dani Alves, Luisao, Juan, Aurelio, Josue, Lucas, Alex, Julio Baptista, Robinho, Carlos Eduardo, Hulk.
The friendly in Doha that a second string England team lost 1-0 leaves us in a bit of a quandary. The problem is that this was an exhibition game, with World Cup hosting underpinning the teams and location. Brazil will host the World Cup in 2014, England wants the 2018 World Cup and Qatar the hosts of this game are campaigning for the World Cup of 2022. What can this game tell us about our chances in 2010? Well not much. The team was a reserve team due to injuries, and so it was billed as a chance for some players to reinforce their candidacy for the 2010 squad. Brazil were practically at full strength. England struggled and with Wayne Rooney captaining the side, the team lacked cohesion and quality.
Capello picked Milner on the left for the first time which readers of the blog will know is advocated by this blogger, in the absence of Joe Cole at any rate. Jermaine Jenas was fast tracked into the starting lineup seemingly circumventing the rigorous selection procedures that Capello applies. Nobody actually played particularly well, Wes Brown perhaps being the worst player on the pitch. Brown has been plagued with injury in recent years, and so this is a major reason why he seems to be a squad player at Man Utd and also in the England team. His cause was not advanced in this game. Foster did ok, Bridge was ok, Upson made a mistake and Lescott perhaps seemed to be the senior partner in the centre of defence. Wright-Philips tried to get involved and sometimes looked threatening though his threat evaporated either by a bad pass or cross. Jenas was very quiet, Bent did not have any support and seemed lost and Rooney, try as he might could not conjure anything worthwhile.
It is good that there seems to be air of reality in the papers over this game and the fact that we do not have the strength in depth that perhaps we thought we might have. This game should firmly keep our feet on the ground concerning England’s chances in 2010 but it has to be said that this was by no means a representative England team. Can we take anything out of this? Not really, we were beaten fairly and squarely by a talented team that did not really need to try too hard. There is only one match we need to focus on and that is our opening game in South Africa.
