Carroll being tipped to start. Graham Poll claimed that before the 2006 World Cup refs were briefed to "watch out" for Peter Crouch. Carroll might be a good choice for this game provided he isn't penalised to death.

I remember Crouch getting penalised to buggery in '06 just for challenging for the ball/being tall. If the refs were briefed to 'watch out' for him, how can that be even remotely fair?

Agreed, England probably need to go for it tonight so playing two CF's would be the best option, but I too would worry about Carroll getting hammered by the refs.

Agree on that but I do like Lawro with his comedy lines, which are hit and miss but you get the odd belter. Seedorf is still playing I think.

Nice move tonight going with The Divine Comedy Ponytail. Despite his hit and miss form during the season I am a fan of his. Us longhairs have to stick together.

If they are told to 'watch out' for tall players when we are playing SWEDEN we will surely be getting free kicks all night!
In the words of Graham Taylor, "we dont have big lads like them!"

It'll be Scott "If I make contact with my knees it's okay, right?" Parker this time.

Lovely weather

Not sure why they started the game. They said on the radio an hour earlier that a major storm was expected to reach the ground around ko time. These days they can track these storms to within 5 mins and would have known how severe it is.

Will it delay the England KO? Need to know when to head to the pub.

6pm (UK time) check. If it can't be played today, replayed tomorrow.

8 o'clock K.O now apparently.

Looking at Shevchenko tonight, he's thirty five, still doing it for his country and still having a good career at club level. Makes you think what Michael Owen could have been had he not been a completely despicable c*nt. Could have gone to a club and carried on playing, potentially furthering his international career or possibly even his club career. Instead, as he put it, he'd rather sit on his backside at a big club than play football. What a tw*t.

I don't think he would have put it like that. I think he'll have said that being on the bench and helping Man United compete for the biggest prizes is a far better place to be than struggling to help Bolton fight against relegation. Everyone, apart from bitter scousers, would accept that.

You're only bitter because he left your precious club. Your bitterness and anger towards Owen says far more about you, and LFC, than it does about Owen.

Really? So you think it's better for a player not to play than to play? Owen wasn't helping anybody out being at United, he was far too sh*t to get a game there, but he quite happily stayed as fifth/sixth choice or whatever he was, probably on a pay-as-you-play deal, than go out there and further his career by playing and helping other clubs. He said he'd tried playing for a smaller club and it wasn't for him, conveniently forgetting how sh*t he'd become.

I'm not bothered about Owen leaving Liverpool, he gave us his best years and missed out on a CL. I just don't like him, he's a tw*t.

Few of my Liverpool fb friends seem to be using Englands first goal as some sort of salvation for their failure of a premier league season.

At least something has been done about England's right side ineffectiveness. Not sure Walcott is the answer.

Hmmmmmmm!!

Boring Boring England.

Indeed. Dramatic, but utterly crap football. Again.

Can somebody explain what Ashley Young actually brings to the side??....He is rubbish, simple as. It comes to something when I'd take Downing on the left over him.

For the next game, I'd be inclined to bring Baines in on the left....I think Cole will feel more confident about moving forward and it'll shore up that left side defensively and give us a better quality of ball to Carroll.

Good job we have a top coach who knows how to change a game that's going away from us???....

Ashley Young brings the ability to dive and get a penalty and even a player sent off.

Yes, I must admit among all the mistakes he made, mainly involving giving the ball away, I did notice he did one of those salmon-like dives that he has made his very own.

He's a waste of time, utter toss.

So

Despite having numerous players out through injury, despite missing our best player for the first 2 games with suspension, despite having a new manager only 3 weeks in the job, despite being in a group with the host nation, a team we've never beaten in a competitive fixture, and a team over 20 games unbeaten......

We are just a draw away from qualifying for the quarters with our best player to return.

That's not too shabby in anyones book.

He was awful tonight, agreed. He definitely deserves to he dropped.for the next game in place of Walcott or The Ox. Have been impressed with Welbeck so far, for a change. Rooney and Carroll could be devastatingly good though.

Agreed. An even better job that we have such a world class line-up of commentators and pundits that are soundly advising him as well. Line of the night came from Lawro: "England's defenders seem to be running back."

Not to mention Hansen, should of heard him the other night on about Ibra, doesn't do enough, doesn't rate him and doesn't score enough goals apparantley.