World Cup

I'm sitting here watching Australia vs Japan (I have a feeling it will turn out to be a cracking game) and not yet once posted on the World Cup. I tried on the opening night but blogger.com was being a tempremental shit and the weekend was just too busy.

England won their first match against Paraguay of course, although as usual it wasn't a great game (It never is with England) and I was thankful that we held on for the victory. Ok, so Paraguay never really threatened to score but then again, in the second half certainly, neither did England and that's a worry.

In the past 11 tournament matches England haven't scored in the second half (If my memory of what John 'Useless old cunt' Motson was babbling during the commentary is correct), which brings up dreadful memories of the dismal surrender to Brazil in 2002 when England didn't even have a shot on goal in the entire second half.

That can only be, well in my mind anyway, down to Eriksson and his woeful tactics - get an early lead and sit back, ever deeper, absorbing the onslaught - and his baffling subtitutions - Owen Hargreaves making his first appearance. If England carry on in that vein, then we won't last longr than the second round or Quarter Finals at best, when we run up against the stronger teams with the ability to break down stubborn defences.

We looked weak going forward too, with only a few long range Lampard and Gerrard shots (Which mostly ended up in Row Z) to accompany Beckhams flukey opener. Let's hope Owen was injured (Although only ever so slightly of course) as the alternative, substituted after 56 mins for Downing (Who looked pretty amateurish with his punt it past the defender and sprint as fast as you can style of play) for tactical reasons can only lead most England fans to despair.

Nevermind though, the boy Rooney looks like he might be making the return of the prodigal son to the England starting XI and it doesn't come a moment too soon after watching the match against Paraguay. Unless he re-breaks his foot in the first tackle of course.

The talk is that he could be back in time for Thursday's game against Trinidad & Tobago, who actually did us a favour by playing so brilliantly with 10 men against Sweden and holding out for a draw. While it was a fantastic display (And celebrated as if they had won the final itself by the players) it will hopefully play to our advantage when the two sides meet in a few days.

Playing with ten men is always pretty exhausting (Arf, sounds dirty!) and to recreate that performance again only days later is a big ask for the T & T players. They may reach the same heights against England but I doubt it and can see them losing. While most England supporters will be demanding a display that blows Trinidad & Tobago completely away as they did Jamaica in a friendly last week, the reality will probably be a 2-0 or 3-1 victory.

OOOOOHHHHHH and the Japanese almost opened the scoring with a shot that flashed just wide of the post. It's a good, open game so far with both teams looking to attack at every opportunity. Come on Japan!

FUCK!!! Just sorting out my links and the Japanese score! It's a bit controversial but looked good to me, seemed the Japanese player was buffeted into the Aussie keeper which allowed the ball to float over them all into the back of the net.