England 3 Egypt 1

Match 49/09/801 - Wednesday, 3rd March 2010 - International

England (0) 3 Crouch 56, 80 Wright-Phillips 75
Egypt (1) 1 Zidan 23
Att. 80,602

Entrance: £25
Programme: £6
Mileage: 100/5,517

Match Report

As this is a Matchday blog I’ve not had the opportunity to cover the sorry tale of John Terry, his tangled love life and its impact on England’s World Cup hopes.

So for historical purposes here is a potted version of the soap opera that has dampened England’s expectations of success in South Africa. Footballer gets an injunction against a national newspaper that threatens to expose a wrong-doing; newspaper gets injunction overturned and Terry is alleged to have had an affair with ex-partner of team mate Wayne Bridge; Capello ditches Terry as captain; the cuckolded Bridge decides to remove himself from the squad.

On the field, Rio Ferdinand was made captain, but was injured, so the armband passed to Steven Gerrard (who passed the armband to Wayne Rooney when he was substituted, who passed the armband to Gareth Barry when he was substituted) and Leighton Baines took over the left back spot from Ashley Cole, who was injured, but embroiled in his own domestic problems, following the plot so far!

As the controversy surrounding Terry gathered pace, his form also faltered thus he came into the game facing greater scrutiny than ever before. Wayne Rooney had made a rather futile attempt to try and stop England fans from booing their ex-captain, but in truth Terry was not the first, and won’t be the last, England player to face abuse from a Wembley crowd, remember the crap that was heaped upon Gary Neville in the past. As it happened there were boos when his name was announced and when he touched the ball for the first time, hopelessly misplacing a pass, but when a bigger number retaliated and sang his name his detractors were quickly quietened. After the shaky start, he went on to play a reasonably good game.

Egypt were a pleasant surprise. In the first half they were well worth their goal lead and were technically very good against an England side that was struggling to find any sort of cohesion. Up front, Mohamed Zidan was a constant threat and when Matthew Upson slipped he took his chance to fire past Rob Green.

Fabio Capello had seen enough in the lacklustre performance to make half time changes. Jermain Defoe, who did very little to enhance his chances of a starting place, made way for Peter Crouch and Frank Lampard, who wasted a couple of good first half chances, made way for Michael Carrick.

Crouch, too often portrayed as some kind of pantomime character, but with a goal scoring record for England to rank alongside the best, quickly restored parity and emphasised his own credentials to his coach. A fine team move ended with Gareth Barry crossing for the lanky striker to sweep the ball home.

Theo Walcott, another that had failed to rubber stamp his plane ticket on the night, was replaced by Shaun Wright-Phillips who went on to pose a constant threat to the Egyptian defenders. After 75 minutes, Essam El Hadary in the African champions goal, failed to deal with a James Milner shot and did even worse with the return shot from Wright-Phillips to give the home side the lead.

Five minutes later and the two substitutes combined again for Crouch to steer the ball home from close range to seal the win following a satisfying second half performance.

Peter Crouch picked up the man-of-the-match for his 45 minutes work and must be a certainty for the squad and certainly enhanced his claims for a starting place. With Aaron Lennon struggling for fitness and Theo Walcott not taking his opportunity to press home his claim, Shaun Wright-Phillips did his cause no harm in his half-hour on the pitch.

Fabio Capello must now be hoping for a quieter run in to the naming of his preliminary squad on 16th May and the final 23 which will be announced on 1st June. The furore surrounding Terry and Ashley Cole will hopefully be shifted from the front pages by an up-coming General Election or perhaps Peter Andre and Katie Price could muster a few column inches to remove any England players from the heat.

Of those on the treatment table, the coach must have everything crossed that Cole, Ferdinand and Glen Johnson are going to return to fitness sooner rather than later and if Wayne Rooney could be wrapped up in cotton wool and told to rest up with Coleen and baby Kai, then the nation would be eternally grateful. But no doubt Sir Alex has other thoughts.

A final thought on the Wembley night would be that a far better than expected crowd of 80,000 created a good atmosphere largely due to the substantial following for the visitors and they watched a far better than expected game.