Germany 4-1 England.

I must admit, I thought England would do better. Unfortunately we saw 3 different England teams in the match.

The first team was the one that started the match and went down 2-0. Upson was awful. Terry was a joke. David James played very well until the second goal, which he could and probably should have saved. Milner wasn't crossing too well. Defoe and Rooney again not combining well.

The second team was the one that pulled the goal back, and then scored a second but for no good reason it was disallowed. At 2-1 England looked really really good; sharp, moving the ball quickly, and most important, they were confident. Gerrard looked like he gave a flying fuck; a rarity. The defence were strong. Defoe was darting around. Lampard was dangerous. However, in our strive to get forward and attack we let in two goals. Leading to the third team.

The third team was the one that played from 4-1 til the end of the match. They just didn't care, they gave up, which I guess, would be fair enough at 4-1 in a friendly against a very good team. But in a knockout game of the World Cup against a shaky-at-the-back Germany it wasn't really good enough.
Lampard and Gerrard proved they can't play together in the midfield properly. I couldn't put it better than Harry Redknapp who said "You need a goal, so you take off Jermain Defoe and bring on Emile Heskey?". Not really a brilliant decision but by then it didn't matter.

I'm afraid that no matter how you look at it, that travesity of a goal that never was most likely cost England the game. At 2-1 we looked better, and at 2-2 we wouldn't have been chasing the game and sending our defenders way up the pitch to attack.
Germany caught us on the counter attack for 3 of their 4 goals, and I think at 2-2 it would have been a completely different game, with England confident from having come back from 2 goals down.

Everyone who I talked to about this before the match and tournament agrees there is no good reason not to have video referees, and I think this is just the final proof from an English perspective. That decision made a third of the match unwatchable, and I'm sure it has had consequences for many different teams, not only in terms of goals, but in terms of penalty decisions, red cards and litte things like whether something was a corner or a goal kick.
There is no good reason not to have video referees.


Overall, these are universal truths about the match:

Rooney was rubbish.
Barry looked unfit and contributed nothing.
Johnson was lazy on the ball and lost it almost as much as Barry.
Rooney and Defoe didn't ever combine well.
Lampard and Gerrard didn't ever combine well.
James made two or three excellent saves, and also let in two goals that Rob Green or Joe Hart would have saved, showing the kind of inconsistancy that he is famous for.

Overall, these are universal truths about our World Cup:

Rooney was rubbish.
Barry looked unfit and contributed nothing.
Rooney and Defoe didn't ever combine well.
Heskey and Wright-Phillips were a waste of space.
Ashley Cole worked hard every time and was our best player.
Milner is the only winger who could cross.
England looked good and up for it when things were going well, and awful when things were going badly.