England’s final game at the 2014 World Cup has arrived already; has it come sooner than you expected? Read on to find out how Hodgson’s men got on against Group D leaders, Costa Rica.
Costa Rica started pretty brightly with Joel Campbell going pretty close for the group leaders early on. In the opening minute the Arsenal forward struck at goal only for his effort to deflect off of the England defence; the ball looped over Foster and looked to be heading for the top corner to give Costa Rica a perfect start but the ball didn’t drop right and went out (wrongly) for a goal-kick. As has been a fixture in this tournament so far, the opening 10 minutes were very open with neither side managing to maintain possession; both sides were having half-decent chances but were unable to finish any of them off.
England grew to control the game as Lampard, Barkley and Lallana were all working well and finding sizeable pockets of space in midfield enabling Hodgson’s men to keep possession well. England have done well in this tournament most of the time to keep their shape and move well as a unit and its that cohesion that allowed them to get a foothold in the game here. Although equally in the final third in this tournament England, one way or another, have been pretty poor either through not taking chances or not creating them frequently enough; these problems resurfaced a bit in this match as Sturridge had countless opportunities to test Keylor Navas in the Costa Rica goal but didn’t make enough of them.
On one occasion though, Barkley played Sturridge into a good position in the box and, unlike other occasions, didn’t hesitate too much to take the shot but was instead taken down by what looked like a definite foul by the defence. It was a pretty good shout for the penalty as the defender made no contact whatsoever with the ball but took Sturridge clean out; one of England’s best chances so far. Sturridge soon had another good chance from a corner as Phil Jones at the far-post headed the ball back across the six-yard box towards Sturridge who could only head over. England were very much in charge in the opening 35 minutes but were repeating the mistakes of the previous two games by not taking the chances they were now quite frequently creating.
Costa Rica had chances of their own in the first half; the best of which was from a free-kick just outside the box. The ITV punditry team at half-time hailed the effort as Beckham-esque and that’s probably the most apt way of describing the effort; Foster was equal to it though as he palmed it out to safety. Barkley then started and nearly finished a great move for England as he won the ball deep in his own half then gave the ball to the busy Luke Shaw who advanced down the wing. He then cut the ball inside towards Wilshire on the half-way line who fed back to Barkley and played a give-and-go with Sturridge before heading into a wide position on the edge of the box but hitting his shot just wide. There was no end product for England in the first half but they were demonstrating some pretty positive play; story of their tournament?
England started the second half with the same gusto that they finished the first with; Sturridge fluffed two great chances within the opening five minutes of the restart. Understandably, after the interval Costa Rica looked much fresher and after surviving the brief English dominance at the start of the second half they were much more comfortable in possession and looked like creating a few chances of their own again. Sturridge then had another glorious chance for England after playing a lovely give-and-go with Jack Wilshere. Taking the Costa Rican defence on with a few step overs, Sturridge nudged a short pass towards Wilshere who waited for Sturridge to make the run before feeding a ball back in behind the defence for Sturridge to run on to but the Liverpool forward could only curl his effort past the far post.
Much like his performance against Italy, and Rooney’s against Uruguay, Sturridge had had countless chances but had not yet taken one – one came for him and Rooney in both of those games though and he still had twenty minutes to go to make one count here. Some of his Liverpool teammates soon joined him on the pitch as Gerrard and Sterling were brought into the game before Wayne Rooney was brought on to play on the left flank in the place of James Milner. The tempo of the game dropped considerably after the substitution as both sides seemed fairly content with their situations. Focus seemed to shift very quickly from this game to the other game in Group D as Italy had a man sent off, went behind thanks to Diego Godin (who arguably should’ve been suspended as he should’ve been sent off against England) and saw Luis Suarez appear to go back to his wicked ways as replays showed the Uruguayan apparently biting Giorgio Chiellini. Be sure to check out our upcoming match report for that game soon!
As for this fixture, England’s new lions played pretty well. Shaw, Barkley and Lallana played key roles in what was a positive display that boded quite well for England. Their old issues still hung over them; the lack of sharpness in front of goal was a real concern and the defence wasn’t tested very much either so it is hard to say where England sit in that regard after this performance. One thing is for sure – there are a lot of positives for England to work on over the next two years but unfortunately they’re not going to get any more chances to work on it in Brazil as they’re out of the FIFA World Cup and will be on the next flight home. Stick with us here at Fortitude to see how the remaining teams get on in the tournament.