Match Summary

England Team

Belgium Team

England began their second game under new manager Roy Hodgson with an interesting contest with Belgium at Wembley, a final warm-up match before the Euro 2012 competition gets under way in a week's time. Belgium, a side packed with familiar players who operate in our Premier League, are an up and coming team, so it was to be a tough test. Once again though, England played solidly, without being spectacular and they again managed a 1-0 win.

It took over seven minutes before any semblance of a chance was created, and it fell to Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, making his first full appearance.  The Arsenal player completely fluffed his shot though after James Milner teed up the ball for him.  That was probably the highlight of the first 13 minutes of the game, but the same player had another effort around that time, and although he hit his 25 yard shot better this time, the ball flew over Simon Mignolet's goal.  England then suffered yet another injury blow, they have had a spate of them recently.  Gary Cahill was trying to shepherd the ball back to Joe Hart and Dries Mertens came in and blatantly pushed the Chelsea man in the back.  The force of the shove pushed him into Hart and he suffered a nasty jaw injury as a result, which ended his night prematurely.  He was replaced by Joleon Lescott and Mertens was rightly booked for the foul.

Belgium were playing neat possession football but rarely threatened a disciplined England back four, although Axel Witsel did see one long-range shot fly just over on 23 minutes, the first decent attack on goal by Belgium.  The other bank of four home players across the midfield also coped admirably with the best that the visitors could muster, and England had a solid look about them again.

Glen Johnson fouled Mertens and the Belgian player made a meal of the challenge, performing a double somersault, twist and roll, with pike!  He was lucky not to receive a second yellow for that wonderful piece of acting.  Mind you, both sides were guilty of some late challenges and Scott Parker was the next to go in the book on the half-hour mark.  The game was going through a scrappy phase at this time, with Oxlade-Chamberlain struggling to get into the game, and Danny Welbeck hardly seeing the ball at all.  Having said that, on 35 minutes came the moment that eventually settled the match.

Welbeck challenged Moussa Dembele in the middle of the pitch, and he was helped by skipper Steven Gerrard.  They managed to win the ball and Gerrard fed Ashley Young.  Young spotted Welbeck's run to his left and threaded a superb pass through to him.  As Mignolet came out the Manchester United youngster stayed cool and chipped the ball over the sprawling goalkeeper and into the open net.  It was a well-taken goal and it lifted the crowd.  England were playing like an away team, in as much as they were soaking up the Belgian attacks and looked to catch them on the break.  On this occasion it worked to perfection, 1-0 to the Eng-er-land!

Hot property Eden Hazard showed some good footwork to fire in a dipping shot for Belgium, but Hart was equal to it.  Before the break it was Gerrard who nearly increased England's lead.  Welbeck again worked hard to charge down an attempted clearance and Gerrard came storming in to side-foot a shot goalwards.  That was blocked by Timmy Simons but it ran back to him and again he tried a shot, this time Guillaume Gillet made a splendid block, which was just as well as Mignolet was struggling.  So at half-time England led 1-0, and with Lescott and John Terry looking in no particular trouble the lead was comfortable.  Overall it had been a scrappy game though, with the England players showing some understandable fears of being injured.  As for Belgium, they lacked the guile to break England down and rarely threatened.

England started the second half well and good attacks came in from Ashley Cole and Oxlade-Chamberlain before Terry headed over the bar.  On 52 minutes Hodgson took goalscorer Welbeck off and Wayne Rooney came on up front.  It was to be the first of several substitutions which were to disrupt the game.  On 60 minutes Hazard tried a curler, but the shot didn't trouble Hart, and then the goalkeeper had to get down smartly to stop Marouanne Fellaini's drive.  England, meanwhile, were guilty of some sloppy passes and they had an irritating habit of giving the ball away too often.  Johnson was particularly annoying at this, and several of the management team on the bench looked as frustrated as the fans were.

On 65 minutes Jermaine Defoe replaced Young and Theo Walcott replaced his Arsenal teammate Oxlade-Chamberlain.  The youngster had tried hard but nothing seemed to come off for him, and several times he lost his footing.  But he has massive potential and his time will come, of that there is no doubt.  Another slight injury worry came when Terry went off to be replaced by Phil Jagielka, and Belgium made several changes too.

Rooney and Defoe combined well in one attack and then Cole did well to block a shot by Romelu Lukaku.  On 77 minutes Belgium had their nearest miss yet as the ball rolled out to the incoming Gillett, who lashed in a terrific shot from 20 yards, that beat Hart all ends up but struck the outside of a post.  It was a good effort and he was unlucky.  Fellaini then had another chance but again Hart saved from him.  A minute later play was down the other end and great work by Walcott set Defoe up, and the Spurs player fired in a terrific cross-shot which cannoned back off the far post with Mignolet beaten.  The ball was cleared and went straight down the other end where Hazard shot over the bar.  At this stage it was end to end football but only because the players were tiring and all the changes disrupted the organisation of the defences.

Fellaini had another chance and Jan Vertonghen headed over for Belgium, whilst Lescott almost reached a Rooney free-kick.  A great turn and run by the lively looking Defoe ended with him combining with Walcott before shooting into the side-netting from a difficult angle.  Two late saves from Hart protected England's lead, the second of those from the hard-working Fellaini again.  In the end though the one goal was enough and with another clean sheet England and Hodgson can be pleased with many aspects of their display.  It wasn't a particularly good game but England are going to be a hard side to beat in the tournament, and they always look capable of getting at least one goal in a game.

Gerrard was given the official man of the match award, but I thought Lescott was the outstanding player, and winning the Championship title has given him a new confidence in his game.  Hart and Terry also played well, Milner did nothing wrong, and both Walcott and Defoe were lively when they came on.

It means that England go into the tournament with a habit of winning, and that's not a bad habit to have.  Long may it continue.
  

Source Notes