Brazil 1-0 England

November 15th, 2009 | by: Matilda | Comments Off

Well all in all it wasn’t a bad result. Though I watched the game alone I had a little liveblogging adventure with Daryl and various commenters. If you missed the game I’ll give you a link to some highlights, and my pity (it was a good game). It was also, despite the fact it was a loss, was an encouraging result for England.

As I’m sure you’ve heard by now, England had 12 players injured or rendered unavailable for a variety of reasons. Give or take a few players this was basically a second string side. So losing 1-0 to a slightly understrength Brazil isn’t too bad. Many players gave encouraging performances. That being said, Brazil fully deserved the win, and we were outplayed through the whole match.

I was the most worried about our back four, especially since they would be facing someone so fear inspiring at Kaka. With Ferdinand, Terry and Johnson out, it was thorough improvised made up of Brown, Upson, Lescott, and Bridge. You can see why I was worried? But through most of the game, with the obvious exception of the one goal (Nilmar just zipped straight through Bridge and Upson), they were pretty effective at shutting Brazil down. Brazil were pretty effective at launching attacks, however Foster wasn’t forced to save that much thanks to his defense.

Which brings us to Foster. I am not his biggest fan, I think he always looks extremely panicked in games, which is definitely not desirable in a keeper. And while that crazy look crept into his eyes several times, for the most part he kept his head. Of course, as I said earlier, he wasn’t really tested that much but hopefully this game will serve as a confidence booster (the goal conceded really wasn’t his fault).

Our attack was pretty much nonexistent. When we did get past the halfway line (which was not very much) we lacked width, we lacked inspiration. Rooney, Bent, and eventually Defoe (when Bent made room for him) were rendered mostly useless. Whenever Rooney actually got the ball it was because he dropped incredibly far back, a place where not even he could score. The midfield had trouble getting the ball forward and bursting up the wing. Young James Milner looked really good on defense, chasing balls down left and right, but needs to work on his long balls and passing in general.

Of course this is just a friendly, but it could have some ramifications. There is a chance that we would have to field this side in the World Cup, it’s unlikely but not impossible. And really, considering they were playing a quite good side they did alright. Hopefully the players came away with a clear picture of what they did well and what they need to work on between now and June. I’m sure Mr. Capello has a very clear picture of what he wants them to work on.

Our illustrious captain Wayne Rooney said:

“It was a difficult game for us. We created some chances but Brazil were the better team and deserved to win, that’s disappointing. Brazil move the ball so well, they make you chase every yard, and that’s hard over 90 minutes, but we’re better than we showed tonight. We’re looking to improve with every game and thankfully this is only a friendly, so we’ll try to move on.”

I know, I’m surprised at the relative eloquence as well. I agree with everything he said. That game is done, England will move on. We don’t play again til March, so there’s a lot of time for tweaking to be done.