England outclassed by resurgent France
It was a night of unwanted firsts for Fabio Capello last night as he was beaten at Wembley for the first time in his 33 months as manager and consequently endured his first two-game winless run at home too.
The England manager and his team were booed off after a 2-1 defeat to France, however while there were a few things that Capello could be criticised for - like the deployment of Phil Jagielka at right back - the main reason for the loss was that France had better players at their disposal than the hosts.
There were few positive performances for the experimental Three Lions, though Andy Carroll's work-rate when feeding off scraps on his debut was fairly encouraging, as was Peter Crouch's consolation goal immediately after coming on, proving that it's not only international minnows he scores against.
Steven Gerrard was lauded as England's star performer by some in the media but his failure to track back rendered him culpable for the ultimately decisive goal. Liverpool were left furious too as he played more than the hour they had requested and was forced off late on with a hamstring injury.
Credit has to be given to France for an impressive team performance, and it's difficult to deny that their extreme reaction to their World Cup humiliation appears to have had a greater impact than England's more measured response to failure, as a disappointing year ended on a low.
They have won only four of their nine matches since the start of the World Cup - albeit suffering just two defeats - yet are still [1.28] favourites to qualify for Euro 2012 as Group G winners after taking seven points from the first nine available. Having once again being outclassed in a big game though, we'd hold off backing them to win the tournament at [10.0].
What did you make of England's display? Share your (expletive-free!) views below...
Published: 18 Nov 2010
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