Post Mortem

Almost feel ready to blog again now. Still getting over what happened on Thursday night. It wasn’t really to do with the fact we went out or the nature of our exit. I think the real reason I was feeling like this was because I thought, as did a lot of us I’m sure they we really had a chance this time around. You could argue all day, as many did in the pub after the game, about the Swiss referee not giving Sol Campbell’s ‘goal’ but in my opinion this was irrelevant.
England were 1 up after 3 minutes against a side that had not looked convincing going forward in their previous 3 games. Yet as soon as the goal went in we adopted a negative approach allowing them to come at us for 90 minutes. All tournament Portugal’s crossing has been poor but give anyone as many chances as they had to cross the ball in and eventually they’ll get it right, that’s just Law of Averages stuff that. We should have been at Portugal from the off. Had they been I believe that we would have been 2 or 3 up when Rooney was forced to leave the feel and the outcome would have been very different. Instead, well you all know what happened.
The tournament for us then is over, Milan Baros’ brace last night means Rooney’s slim chance of finishing top scorer in the competition has gone as well.
Yet through all this I believe we should look at the positives, these are mine.
1. Wayne Rooney - Goes without saying the boy was awesome, by 2004 in Germany he’ll be even better.
2. Ashley Cole - Had it not been for Rooney Ashley would have been England’s, player of tournament. He has been criticized by many over his ability to defend but I think he showed in Portugal (especially against the host were he kept woderboy Ronaldo in his back pocket) that he has grown into possibly the best left-back in the world. Plus he’s still only 23!
3. Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard - Not so much as individuals but as a central midfield partnership. The idea that there were some doubts over whether Lampard should play in the middle at the start of the tournament seems laughable now. These two gelled well together and I feel there is a lot more to come from the pair, hopefully though only in England shirts at not in the blue of Chelsea.
4. Kris Kirkland - Now as 2 years in which to establish himself as England number 1. If he can go 2 years without injury that won’t be a problem.
5. A youthfull squad - Of the four players just mentioned Frank Lampard is the oldest at just 26. The average age of the England team was the youngest in the competition, hopefully this means there are plenty of years left in them.
So with that I say no more about England, at least until the world cup qualifiers start on 4th September, Come on England.