England B 1 Belarus 2

We were not to expect much from this game other than seeing an XI aiming to support their inclusion in the squad and a run out for the little known in the Three Lions shirt. The match kept up to a lively pace and I thought England began well enough, particularly through Aaron Lennon on the right wing, similar to Shaun Wright-Phillips. On occasion he would jig a little then touch and go, and the Belarussians had no answer to his immediate bursts of pace. Michael Owen had a chance on the left, came to a tight angle, could have played it easier to Peter Crouch parallel to him but decided to go with a shot instead which cannoned off the keeper, Crouch indicating the easier choice. Crouch was more or less in the game and showed his ability to hold the ball and touch it off, played in one or two or simply played it back so he had a decent game, albeit I wished he could have been utilised more in the box. Stuart Downing looked good, again good co-ordination with Ashley Cole on the left, Jermaine Jenas took time to come into the game and had a excellent run to increase the lead, Owen to his left but then ran out of focus and was fouled.

Jenas' goal came courtesy of a Downing floated freekick that actually found Owen in an offside position, blatantly so I wondered what it would take for the officials to have noticed it. Owen headed on well, it came off the post, the keeper was stranded and an open goal invited Jenas to head in. Jamie Carragher and Sol Campbell kept good command at the back, David James keeping well in goal. Come the second half, come one change of James for Robert Green, who then quite incredibly went to take a goal kick and miskicked the ball, dropping to the ground in some major discomfort. The ball came to Sampdoria man Vitaly Kutuzov and he deposited the goal into the net. It has been suggested Green had ruptured his groin initially by going down to stop a Maksim Romashchenko freekick, which went through his hands and legs but wide, and then it was aggravated when he took the goal kick. This spells a non-participation for the Norwich keeper in the World Cup, sadly, and our best wishes for a full and speedy recovery go to him. Liverpool's Scott Carson took over.

So the goal counted and the game went on. Crouch was getting into the game much more with some neat touches and ball control, at one time leaving three Belarus players behind during one attack, but nonetheless England couldn't make out enough pressure on the Belarus goal to score. Belarus continued to have trouble with Lennon's pace, and Sergey Omelianchuk fell to the bait on occasion, booked for one foul and then again unceremoniously minutes later for his dismissal. I think David Platt said it best that though England linked up well in Belarus' half, we didn't have enough cohesion to actually make more of an impression on the visitors. Matt Dawson came on for Stuart Downing, Carragher would move to right-back, Owen Hargreaves to centre mid, Cole to left midfield, Dawson with Campbell. Two minutes later Belarus picked up in our half and were allowed to break into the box through Sergey Kornilenko , who was followed by Dawson but still managed to cut an angled effort before Dawson's block, past Carson. I think England hadn't recovered from Green's injury.

That is how it ended. The result for me was not an issue, the individual performances were. Overall we had done good, Lennon clearly showed he has something he can add to our strengths to give us an edge, Theo Walcott came on officially for Jenas but replaced Owen upfront and he made his mark quickly in the game with an abruptively stopped dash and then a shot from some 25 yards. Downing and Michael Carrick had a decent game too, there were a number of pluses which were good and that is what we needed to come out of the game more than a result.


RedsMan.