GERMANY 1 England 5. Who in their senses could ever have predicted such a result in that World Cup qualifying match in Munich? Beforehand, a seemingly confident German team, a super confident former captain and manager Franz Beckenbauer seemed confident that they would beat England as they had at Wembley. A draw was the least and worst they expected, and that would give them comfortably half a dozen points ahead of England at the top of their eliminating group.
When, after just six minutes, feeble England defending gave Carsten Jancker an easy chance to put the Germans in the lead, who could doubt their eventual victory? After all, they had recently won a friendly in Hungary while England, admittedly well under strength, had capitulated embarrassingly to the Dutch at Tottenham. But very shortly before half-time, two crucial things happened. Causing the Germans bitterly to regret the blatant missed chance by the young mid-fielder Sebastian Deisler which would have doubled their lead midway through that half. First, David Seaman, whose slow reaction in the English goal at Wembley to Dietmar Hamann's free kick had given Germany their 1-0 success, made a fine and crucial save. Shortly before that, he had badly missed what seemed a simple cross.
But now when Bohme, at 1-1, struck the ball powerfully low and left-footed, Seaman launched himself down to his right to beat the ball away with one hand. Not bad at all for a veteran goalkeeper. And hard on the heels of that came England's second goal. It was skilfully made and taken, Rio Ferdinand elegantly playing the ball back from David Beckham's left-footed cross for Stephen Gerrard, who had called for it, striking a tremendous, if deflected, shot past the much vaunted German 'keeper, Oliver Kahn. 2-1 to England and the floodgates would now open.
Kahn had already looked strangely shaky, rushing panic-stricken out of his goal when England equalised through Michael Owen, mistakenly handling an admittedly suicidal back pass and thus giving England a free kick inside the box. Did his own lack of confidence spread to the rest of his three-man defence?
Certainly Christian Wurns, playing on the right of the three, was already having a thoroughly uneasy time of it. Now his partners in the rearguard, the usually solid and reliable Nowotny in the middle, essentially sweeper, position and Thomas Linke on the left looked equally shaky. So much so that well before the end of the game it seemed that almost every ball England played straight down the middle turned into a devastating through pass.
The dynamic wonderfully elusive little Michael Owen, who had recently tormented the Bayern Munich defence in the so called Super Cup game won by Liverpool in Monaco, had already been a major threat in the first half. Now, the German defence seemed incapable of containing him. Just a couple of minutes into the second half he had made it 3-1 to England, when big Emile Heskey knocked down David Beckham's cross to him. He would complete his hat-trick and Heskey would score another. 5-1. And at this point you surely have to ask yourself not only how good were England, but how strangely and incredibly bad were Germany.
It takes, as they say, two to tango, and while England were dancing, Germany were giving what was surely the worst performance by a German team in living memory. Soccer, bless it, is a game full of surprises, but few in recent seasons have been as great as this. By comparison, Germany's humiliating defeat by Croatia in the last, 1998 World Cup was a model of morale.
And there, surely, is the word: morale. One of the salient qualities you would associate with German teams is - or was - precisely that: high morale. Resilience. Psychological solidity. A determination to battle to the end. Not this time, in Munich, at the very stadium where Germany despite going behind to a seemingly rampant Dutch team so early in the game, rallied to win the 1974 World Cup Final.
It was all too painfully plain that the Germans had simply collapsed. There was no Franz Beckenbauer, no Lothar Matthaus, who'd soldiered on, diminished, it is true, to the finals of the 1998 World Cup, to rally the troops. Heads palpably went down, resistance collapsed, and a joyful England team romped to its victory. A soccer surprise, indeed.
Earlier that day, there had been another surprise. Not quite such a cataclysmic one, but a surprise nevertheless, confirming the infinite unpredictability of this remarkable game. It happened in Dublin, where Ireland were playing Holland in another World Cup eliminator. The Irish had drawn in Holland and very nearly won, Portugal were clearly going to win the group, but the Irish still had at least a mathematical chance of finishing ahead of Holland in second place and thus qualifying for the play offs; which, enticingly, would be against only the fifth placed team in the Asian group.
Holland, having so easily defeated England, and having such a clutch of world class strikers (though badly missing Edgar Davids), seemed clear favourites against an Irish side which lacked several key players. The Dutch should have gone ahead very early in the game when Gary Kelly, the Irish right back, who had a fearful time of it, let Patrick Kluivert slip past him, only for the Dutch striker, with only the 'keeper Shay Given to beat, to shoot wide of the right hand post.
When after just 12 minutes of the second half Kelly was properly sent off for the second bad foul on Marc Overmars who went past him at will, what hope did there seem for the depleted Irish? Yet with Given doing great things in goal and Holland finishing poorly, what happened? By a huge irony, the very man brought on by the manager Mick McCarthy as defensive substitute, Fulham's Steve Finnan, traipsed upfield, beat his man on the right with enviable skill and put in a left-footed centre which Jason McAteer converted for what proved the winner.
Comments
SHARE