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I think I know why the hapless Robert Green conceded the softest goal in World Cup history. He was mesmerized by Clint Dempsey’s double pirouette  before he unleashed his little dribbler toward the clearly dazed Mr. Green. Wasn’t Mr. Green last seen in “The Usual Suspects? I’m sorry, I digress.

The goal tender, sorry the goal keeper, has to accept the blame for committing one of the biggest howlers in world soccer history, but he cannot be saddled with England’s failure to defeat the USA. There were 55 minutes remaining for England to regain the lead, but they were clearly bereft of ideas or any kind of imagination.

England’s overpaid and overrated Italian Coach, Fabio Capello, had obviously taken a leaf out of the Diego Maradona coaching manual and behaved like a tormented chimpanzee gesticulating manically along the sideline during practically the whole game. He was obviously demented by the obnoxious sound of the hundreds of vuvezelas (African horn) constantly buzzing and droning in his ears. Initially I assumed there was interference on the TV Channel, but I was quickly informed by the help desk to get a life and switch over to a daily soap.

Following a very successful qualifying session, England arrived at the tournament as one of the favorites alongside the venerable giants Brazil, Spain and Argentina. Somehow, Capello has developed a bad case of the jitters in his selection policy which was pretty obvious on Saturday. I’ve said enough about Robert Green who was embroiled in a relegation battle with West Ham last season. James Milner had been laid low by a   stomach virus and had not trained for several days. He was clearly not up to the task and substituted after only 30 minutes. To my astonishment, he was replaced by Shaun Wright-Phillips who never plays on the left and unsurprisingly looked like a fish out of water.

I love Lesley King who captains my favorite team, Tottenham Hotspur. However he has a history of knee problems, and it’s well documented that he is unable to train between matches in the premiership. So it was no surprise that he didn’t emerge for the second half. It is now reported that he suffered a groin injury and will take no further part in the World Cup. His replacement, Jamie Carragher, retired from international football almost 3 years ago, but was persuaded by Capello to come back for the World Cup. He was never the quickest of defenders, but at 32 years old his lack of pace was quickly exposed by the USA.

Emile Heskey is a supporters’ enigma. He is not even first choice for his club, but his fellow players love having him in the team for his unselfish attitude and support to team mates around him. Nevertheless 7 goals from 53 games is not an acceptable return from one of your strikers. Admittedly, he did provide the final touch for Gerrard to open the scoring and later left an indelible imprint on Tim Howard’s chest, but it’s just not enough at this level. He was later replaced by a stick insect, Peter Crouch, who at 6 foot 7 inches attracts route one football but surprisingly is not very dominant in the air.

What happened to the much vaunted Chelsea trio? Well, Lampard was almost anonymous having to play the holding role in midfield which is completely alien to his attacking genes. Some observers believe Ashley Cole to be the best left back in the world. He gave a competent performance in defense but did not provide any attacking options down the left flank while one paced John Terry looked bewildered most of the time. Steven Gerrard played extremely well for 25 minutes until he fell back into the general medioricity of Team England. Wayne Rooney was obviously sedated to limit his foul mouth, but as a result his general play was ineffective and he needs to step it up if England are to progress in this competition.

Slovenia’s 1-0 victory over Algeria places a lot of pressure on USA to earn a win against them in the next match. Slovenia will be content with a draw which will not be enough for USA to progress to the next round. Appearances can be deceptive but Landon Donovan was made to look world class by England’s inept performance. Donovan provides USA with its best scoring option which will not unlock the best defenses, and I don’t believe USA has the ability to beat Slovenia. England, however,  has the potential to improve and should have enough in the tank to overcome Algeria in their next fixture.

Germany looked ominous in their 4-0 thrashing of Australia, while Ghana achieved the first victory for an African nation in the tournament. Argentina did enough against Nigeria to send a message to their opponents that they are ready to play. Italy are notoriously slow starters and will be content with a draw against Paraguay. Holland brushed away Denmark’s challenge and are capable of beating anybody on any given Sunday.  Brazil, Spain and Portugal have yet to make appearances, so the tournament is just beginning to warm up. I am very keen to see what magic Ronaldo can weave with this new ball from free kick situations.

This entry was posted on Monday, June 14th, 2010 at 8:59 pm and is filed under Association football, Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.