Eriksson: 'We were patient and scored two great goals'
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Your support makes all the difference.Sven Goran Eriksson claimed that England's profligacy in front of goal, and not the level of performance, was the principal reason for 83 tortuous minutes against Trinidad & Tobago last night.
Late goals from Peter Crouch, who broke the deadlock seven minutes from time to record his sixth goal in his last five international appearances, and Steven Gerrard ensured England qualified for the knock-out phase of the World Cup with a game to spare despite their obvious difficulties against a team ranked 47th in the world by Fifa. They would have been confirmed as winners of Group B last night but for Sweden's late victory over Paraguay in Berlin.
Crouch, Frank Lampard and Michael Owen all squandered excellent chances to make the game more comfortable, and to perhaps lessen the temptation to throw Wayne Rooney into the fray he came on after 58 minutes although England's display again raised questions over whether Eriksson is maximising his rich potential.
The England manager, however, said: "We played better than Saturday, especially in the second half and showed a lot of patience. It is always difficult to play against a team with nine or 10 men behind the ball and a lot of discipline, and when you don't take your chances it will be like this.
"If we had taken our chances in the first half the game would have been totally different. I am extremely happy with the result. We were patient and scored two great goals through Crouch and Gerrard. We deserved it."
Crouch's 83rd-minute header was the first goal England have scored in the second half of a World Cup finals' game since 1998, and the captain, David Beckham, admitted: "It's nice to score goals in the second half which we haven't done in big competitions. We had to put that to bed." Beckham added: "We knew it would be difficult but we should have put more chances away. We knew, though, that we had the players to score goals in the end. It is always nice to score late on and a second clean sheet is another positive."
The opening goal from Crouch who revealed that the England players had been given ear-plugs to help them sleep at L'Meridan Grand Hotel in the centre of Nuremberg on Wednesday night was a personal release after his earlier misses had prompted England fans to chant for the introduction of Rooney before the 58th minute.
Crouch said: "That was a special moment for me scoring in the World Cup. It was a great feeling. I was still thinking about that earlier miss. It was disappointing, I should have done a lot better, I know that, but you can't let your head go down. You've got to keep plugging away and hope that another opportunity will come and with our delivery especially from David Beckham on the right we've always got a chance. Thankfully, I got another one. I've got six goals in my last five games for England and I'm really enjoying it."
The Liverpool striker added: "We're ready to kick on now. We've ground out two results but if you had said at the start of the competition that we'd have scored three goals, conceded none and got six points, I think we would have taken that. We do know that we can play better and we expect to."
It was left to defeated Trinidad &Tobago captain, Dwight Yorke, to sum up England's World Cup campaign thus far. "People say it's not the kind of champagne football that they are expecting, but it is effective," he said. "It is really hard to bear losing like that, but we always knew we were up against it. We thought that we had to come and make it difficult, and in the end we probably thought we were going to make it."
Laid to rest: The second-half jinx
Before Peter Crouch headed his 83rd-minute goal last night, England had not scored in the second half of a World Cup finals game since 1998.
22 JUNE 1998 Romania 2 England 1 (Owen, 79)
30 JUNE 1998 Argentina 2 England 2 (Shearer, 10 pen; Owen 16)
2 JUNE 2002 England 1 Sweden 1 (Campbell, 24)
7 JUNE 2002 Argentina 0 England 1 (Beckham, 44)
12 JUNE 2002 Nigeria 0 England 0
15 JUNE 2002 Denmark 0 England 3 (Ferdinand, 5; Owen, 22; Heskey, 44)
21 JUNE 2002 England 1 Brazil 2 (Owen, 23)
10 JUNE 2006 England 1 Paraguay 0 (Gamarra og, 3)
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