By Myles Palmer
Just had this e-mail from Alan Seifert:
Myles
Don’t give up the ANR column! We all got it wrong! I predicted 3-1 to Argentina but couldn’t be more pleased that I was wrong. We need your insightful musings to keep our feet on the ground.
____________________________________________________________
England 1 Argentina 0
_____________________
Beckham pen 44
_______________
Thanks Alan, yours was the most polite e-mail Ive had so far.
And I haven’t returned any phone calls since coming home.
What can I say after that stunner from the Sapporo Dome?
WHAT AN OWN-GOAL by yours truly!
How wrong can you be?
How much more wrong could I have been ?
England won their biggest World Cup match since 1966 today.
We NEVER beat good teams in World Cups, only average
teams.
For 40 years Germany and Argentina have put us out of World Cups.
ENGLAND grafted and worked and Owen hit the post and then Owen got a penalty and Beckham smacked it low down the
middle and then they grafted right through the second half and defended the box and won a heroic victory.
A massive win in the biggest game of the tournament so far.
An epic, memorable,historic,mind-boggling result.
For me, a mind-boggling result on the same scale as
Germany 1 England 5 in Munich.
ARGENTINA had not lost since July 2000 in Brazil.
Sven seems to have a knack of winning the big ones against the old enemies.
THE GAME REMINDED me of Arsenal 1 Parma 0.
A good old George Graham backs-to-the-wall cup performance.
Score first and then defend like demons and keep your nerve and see off attack after attack and ride your luck and have the occasional dangerous break.
It was mental strength beats superior technical ability.It was belief overcoming skill
It was, “One Nil To The Engerland!One Nil To The Engerland!”
Football, after all, is about many things, not just skill.
SECOND HALF was 47 minutes and Argentina seemed to have
the ball for 35 of those 47 minutes.
VERON was awful and Bielsa took him off at half-time.
Maybe he was pyched out by facing his three United buddies
VERONTINA had stuttered in the first half.
AIMARTINA was more promising in the second.
The three Arsenal players were superb!
Ashley Cole was magnificent, taming Ortega, despite that
yellow card.
David Seaman did everything right – flawless.
He is the only goalkeeper who is catching the ball and that ain’t easy with a flesh-coloured ball among a sea of faces, as he pointed out in an interview I didn’t see.
Sol Campbell dominated Batistuta and stood tall during a second half siege.
I’d say the four best players were Cole, Seaman, Rio
Ferdinand and Nicky Butt.
COLLINA was excellent because he gave Batistuta two fouls and a yellow on the third and he gave Ashley Cole two fouls and a yellow on the third – and that set the tone.
It was played in a very sporting spirit, which may have been down to Sven being mates with all their players.
AMAZED that this Argentina performance so closely mirrored
their Nigeria performance, where they were controlled and
constipated until Aimar came on, then played more positive,
flowing football.
To see England keep a clean sheet after taking the lead in 44 minutes was quite astounding.
When was the last time they did that in a serious match?
Glad England won, but very surprised.
Very, very surprised. Absolutely gobsmacked, in fact.
On the seventh day of a 31-day World Cup, the tournament is taking off.
Sweden always struggle to score, but they scored two goals today.
Spain are rubbish in World Cups but they have won both games.Today they beat Paraguay 3-1 after being 1-0 down.
So there you have it. What more can I say?
Myles Palmer got this one wrong, big time.
How far can England go?
Don’t ask me! I’m the last person to ask!
7th June 2002