England begins post-Beckham strategies with Steve McClaren and Terry Venables looking to bring a creative stability to a team still trying to forge an international identity. For a country that innovated the modern game, England surely has been the weakest of the “major” soccer countries for a string of years.

 

The last English player to make a true contribution to an English style of play was Gasgoine and that was now a long time ago (Italy 1990). The question is will McClaren and Venables try to forge something inspirational, or will there only be a sputtering engine of complacency from players that play for some of the best clubs in Europe.

 

Otto Rehhagel once had the Greeks in the mold of a strong cold-war German side; however, after their shock win in Portugal 2004, Greece is struggling and stammering as they did not qualify for the World Cup in Germany.

 

England started the McClaren regime with a traditional 4-4-2, with Crouch and Dafoe paired as goal scorers with strong and hungry cover provided through midfield and a defense that returns all Germany 2006 starters. Stewart Downing was given a start on the left as a natural left sided player with the attempt to give England more balance on the wings.

 

Greece was reported to be employing a flexible 4-3-3, which really means a 4-5-1, and will play in a defensive shell. Samaras is slotted in behind Charisteas to provide the counter-attack punch and prove the old saying “the Greeks killed Football.”

 

While the rain came down in Manchester, the real deluge at Old Trafford started in the 1st half with England’s 4-0 drubbing of the woeful Greeks, who all looked like they had been spiked by the same drinks that Van der Meyde had slugged down in Merseyside.

 

The old keeper-by-the-sea, Nikopolidis looked all at sea as he was maker of the first goal [Terry’s header] after failing to clear his defense, as he rushed and parried away a free kick into the area. England made him pay, as they keep the ball alive, playing the ball back into the area for Terry to nod home, only his second England goal. Nikopolidis was again caught out of position on the deflected goal by Lampard.

 

Fyssas, the Greek left back, was subbed before half time, not to mention the riddled mistakes of the center back markers as Crouch was allowed to roam free unmarked for a tap-in-rebound as well as a header from Downing’s cross.

 

The only Greek that looked anything resembling a player was Stelios Giannakopoulos, who made extreme efforts to just advance the ball down the line. The only slight scare for England came after the interval when Ashley Cole cleared the ball off the line twice on the same play early in the 2nd half.

 

Judging from the score, you might even believe the Rooney-hype from a short while ago of “fearing only Brazil.” Though it was a solid performance, England still has a long way to go in developing the beautiful game, even if true only to their standards.

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 20th, 2006 at 12:20 am and is filed under Soccer World, Rick Wall (Head Editor). You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.