England Qualify from the Group Stage with Ease

Hello Readers! It’s time for the post about England in the European Cup Group Stages. Just in case you didn’t know, we were drawn in a group with Serbia, Ukraine and Turkey.

The first match was against Serbia. Here is the screenshot for the game. I was pleased with the win, especially as we went behind early on, to a beauty from Nikola Zigic. Aaron Lennon equalised with a shot into the top corner from the edge of the box at a tight angle. I was very pleased with this as it was against the run of play, and I was starting to worry as our passing was poor. I was especially pleased when Young gave us the lead with a curling shot from the edge of the area. This settled us down and after that we started to play much better. The match then petered out a bit with no real chances created until Rooney scored a placed shot from close range, in the last minute.  Looking at the match stats, you can see we outplayed Serbia in almost every department, although they had more shots. I think their tactics might have been ‘shoot on sight’ because a lot of their shots were from long range.

I was pleased with this result, because Serbia are a good team with some decent players, so it was great to start off with a win.

The next match was against Turkey, a good team with some very tricky players. This fact was proved when they dominated the first 20 minutes, creating a few chances and we really struggled to get the ball. I was worried when Nihat gave them the lead, with an amazing shot from 25 yards after he had beaten two players. Thankfully after this they seemed to relax, and Gerrard and Lampard started to get the ball, and create chances. The equaliser came when Gerrard smashed in a 30 yard freekick that beat the keeper at his near post. We then started to really dominate after the break and it didn’t take long for Walcott to smash in a rebounded Crouch shot, to give us the lead. Rooney then rounded up the victory with a close range header, and sealed a very good win. If you look at the match stats you can see we created a lot more chances, and a lot of their shots were in the first half hour, when they were on top.

I was very pleased with the result, as it sealed our qualification a game early and meant we could relax slightly for the final game.

The final match was against Ukraine, another decent team. Once again they took an early lead, which now is becoming slightly worrying, because if we do that in the latter stages we will be punished. Thankfully Crouch equalised soon after with a cool finish after a great move. I was very pleased with this as it shows our resilliance after going behind. Rooney then gave us the lead with another header, his second in two matches. Gerrard then finished of the match with a close range header from Young’s cross. We seem to be scoring a lot of headers, although the biggest player in the team, Crouch, hasn’t scored one yet.

Another good result then that finished off a relativley easy qualification passage for us.

This is the final group table, then. Turkey go through with us after a close fought battle with Serbia, so close that one goal took Turkey through.

Portugal await us in the quarter final stage, which will be a very close match I’m sure! Hopefully we can avenge them for the defeat at Euro 2004, I certainly hope so, as I believe we have the talent to go along way in this tournament.

That’s all for now, I will inform you of the latter stages soon. Wish me luck!