The Paraguay Match: Some Followup

England expected a far better score against Paraguay than 1-0 so excuses have to be made, but to blame the weather is a bit rich. David Beckham agreed with Eriksson. “You don’t realise how hot it was out there, we were exhausted”. It just as ridiculous if it was a freezing day and Paraguay won 1-0 and their captain says “you don’t realise how cold it was out there, we were exhausted”. The weather excuse is as old as Methuselah - unacceptable. Try another one Beckham.

Posted from  Australia

haha enzo, I tottaly agree with you. At this point, England have as much a change of reaching the finals as Tobago or Cuba. goodluck england you need it

Posted from  United Kingdom

Look guys, as much as I agree with you about the “weather” excuse, I also have to disagree with you guys with the attitude. It’s only the first game, a victory no less, and I have faith enough to say that they will undoubtedly move on the the final 16. T&T may have had a beautiful match against the Swedes, and congrats to them and their goalie, but I dont think they’ll repeat that feat again. I hate to say it because i dont want to take anything away from T&T, but that was a miracle and a once in a lifetime sort of game.
In spite of the win, England is feeling a bit of pressure which in turn will lead into a definitive victory over T&T, which in turn will amount to 6 points overall.
Be wary of a desperate Swede team, however, in my opinion, England will prevail.

Posted from  United States

I was expecting England to score more than one and I am disappointed with their performance,especially Owen,I don’t see he is as active as he was four years ago…

I hope they will do better in the next ones.Good luck England!!!

Posted from  China

Although Paraguay was the underdog, I’m still very dissapointing by what they did against England.More dissapointing was the labor done by the English team. There was such a hype created by the media regarding the chances of the team winning the cup, but in the end,only an autogoal gave then a very norrow win over their couterpart.
Overall, the game was very poor. I hope the next game for both team will be much, much better. Although Paraguay is the one feeling the heat and pressure to win their last two games if they’re hoping to advance to the next round.

Posted from  United States

People are judging England by this first match and seem to think this is the best they will play in all their games…

It’s only the first match, England have time to pick their game up, they don’t usually do well in openers anyway so this was better than usual. Paraguay are a good team - they held off a well played 0 - 0 draw against Brazil before.

Also can people not see that the own goal was basically forced on him by Beckham, as we saw the exact same thing happen in the Jamaica game from a Beckham kick? I think Beckham played very well.

And at the end of the day it could have been a whole lot worse, but we got a goal and three points so we’re one match win away from securing a place in the second round. We can still have a chance.

Posted from  United Kingdom

Sven is notorious for his defensive and boring tactics.

As far back as I can remember, no teams that play boring football ever won the World Cup.

Boring football may be able to win you the European Championship (like Greece for example), but this is the World Cup. England is lucky to be in a weak group.

Posted from  Australia

I’ll wager that most teams would be happy with a dodgy 1-0 win from their opening game…Australia included.

Posted from  United Kingdom

I agree with DT, as soon as England score, they tend to start defending instead of trying secure their advantage by scoring more goals. Sven has got some of the best players in the world, but I always feel he doesn’t know how to use them, and Alan Shearer is right, Sven’s substitution tactics are rubbish. Some might say that even if they are great players as individuals, they don’t play well together as a team, I think that’s rubbish, it’s just the tactics that are wrong, they should try attacking. As for blaming the weather, it just strikes me as a very unprofessionnal excuse. I know England can do better than that, and I really hope they will.

Posted from  Switzerland

england have excellent players, that is not the problem. england doesnt have a good team, and that is because it has a lousy strategist behind. that is the bottomline. translation: if they get to the last eight, they are lucky.

Posted from  United Kingdom

breaking news England fans may enjoy:

http://tsoya.blogspot.com/2006/06/world-cup-news.html

Posted from  United States

Hey ….it`s the WORLD CUP 3 points is 3 points you would not feel so bad if your team won 3 points in your league games would ja!! Eh !!Leave the lads alone and let them play their matches after all you aren`t on the team are yer .So Belt up and lay off the lads .

Posted from  Canada

Isn’t it typical that the first thing that happens after England takes their initial 3 points is that they start complaining and moaning. Heading the critics is former England striker Ian Wright who is hardly objective being the father to Saun Wright-Phillips who didn’t make the English team. What about the game? After a good first half the English team got critised to play defensivly in the second after Micheal Owen’s substitution. To be fair they didn’t play defensivly, they played plainly poorly and this from the start of the second half. They lost their dominance and let Paraguay into the game. This is not first time it happens. Remember the England-France game in Euro 2004? After an initial 1-0 lead they started to play poorly and let France into the game loosing with 1-2. The Euro cup 2004 against Portugal, England took a 1-0 lead. Started to play badly allowing Portugal to score in the 83rd minute which later lead to they lost in penalty shoot outs. The World Cup against Brasil, England started excellent with a 1-0 lead. Later let the Brasillians into the game and lost with 1-2. The truth is that England always have difficulties to keep their game.

Posted from  United Kingdom

As for the England team, get over your racism. The only way England will move on is to start by using more of your great black players.

Posted from  United States

England think that they better than they really are. If they played any good team they would of got thrashed

Posted from  Australia

Come on it is very hard for the english team to play on the tropical european continent.

It is a huge advantgae for the host nation or countries like poland to have experiance to this very extreme weather conditions here in carebean germany.

Posted from  Germany