FRANCE 98 – Match preview n°32
The England team may have given up baked beans but the 1994 World Cup quarter-finalists Romania will be hoping that star striker Adrian Ilie puts the wind up the increasingly confident 1966 World Cup winners when the two sides meet in Toulouse on Monday in Group G.
The 24-year-old Valencia forward, who scored a superb goal against Colombia in Romania’s opening 1-0 win, has boosted the squad’s morale ahead of the potential top-of-the-table decider by shrugging off the leg muscle injury he picked up last Monday. Ilie’s pace and mobility will worry the three man England defence and should Gareth Southgate fail a fitness test later on Sunday coach Glenn Hoddle is likely to call on the more athletic Gary Neville rather than Martin Keown to fill the Aston Villa man’s position.
Ilie has no doubts that his ability to score goals allied with the experience gained in the English Premiership by Chelsea’s Dan Petrescu, former Spurs libero Gica Popescu and Coventry striker Viorel Moldovan can deal a blow to England’s momentum following their impressive win over minnows Tunisia last Monday. ” Dan in particular knows the English game inside out and his information is invaluable, “ Ilie said.
Petrescu, an integral member of the 1994 Romanian side that were beaten on penalties by Sweden, is bursting to get at the English, particularly as he will be going head-to-head down the right wing with Chelsea teammate Graham Le Saux. ” If we win I’m not sure what sort of welcome I’ll get when I return to Stamford Bridge next season, “ the 30-year-old said.
However, the player that England fear most is the ageing playmaker Georghe Hagi, who has recovered from a knock that he suffered in the Colombia match. ” He is a dangerman and still the chief of the Romanian team. If he fancies a free kick he’ll be there taking it and he is someone we’ve got to beware of, “ said England Under-21 coach Peter Taylor, who watched the Romanians beat Colombia. Taylor, though, would appear to have been watching a different match as most observers thought the 33-year-old, otherwise known as the ‘Maradona of the Carpathians’, spent most of the second-half passing the ball superbly … unfortunately it was to the opposition. Romanian coach Anghel Iordanescu, who goes off to coach Greece after the World Cup, finally lost patience and pulled him off.
His teammates will hope that that humiliation will inspire him to repeat one of his USA 1994 vintage performances as he prepares to leave the international stage.
England, who showed against Tunisia that they were not missing former idol Paul Gascoigne, have no other injury worries apart from Southgate and it remains to be seen whether Hoddle retains fragile right wingback Darren Anderton or brings in his former ‘Golden Boy’ David Beckham. Anderton, who at one point appeared to only have to see a training ground before breaking down, played well in patches against the Tunisians but he left worrying gaps behind him when he attacked and the Romanians have the ability to punish those errors. The benefit of recalling Beckham, who was the only player to play in all of England’s eight World Cup qualifiers, is that he is more effective in the tackle and his crossing and goalscoring ability are in general far better than Anderton’s.
However, Hoddle, a former Tottenham player, has shown a tendency to prefer players from his old haunt and Anderton will probably win out again in their duel.
Both sides would probably settle for a draw but if Hagi is sufficiently motivated then 12 years on from the ‘hand of God’ another England side will know what it’s like to lose to a man known as Maradona.