Results for tag: ukraine
Posted by:
LeeDixon
on Sep 11, 2012 at 08:09:53 AM
Friday night saw a winning start for England and a clean sweep for this column. You can't say fairer than a 5-0 away win and you can't argue with three successful bets. England were excellent in Moldova and, while nobody is getting carried away after hammering the 141st best team in the world, you can only beat what's in front of you.
At the start of a World Cup qualifying campaign, getting the simple things right is essential. That's what Roy Hodgson's men did in Chisinau and they now have a decent platform to build on. Tom Cleverley won plaudits for his performance on his first competitive start. Rightly so, he benefited from having Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard behind him, and his surges in to the box were a key part of England's dominance.
I was very impressed by Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain....
Posted by:
LeeDixon
on Jun 19, 2012 at 09:13:53 AM
The biggest positive from the Sweden match was obviously the result. Over the course of a long season a manager will look at the performances as much as the results because you can't keep on getting results over the course of nine or 10 months without playing well. But in a tournament like this, one bad result, however well you played, is normally enough to send you home. So England will take those three points and not worry too much about how they got them.
The other big positive from the match was the spirit the England players showed. At 2-1 down they were going out. And they weren't passing the ball that well and having long spells of pressure so a comeback looked pretty unlikely. But they showed belief, togetherness and fighting spirit and in the end were probably just about good...