Kazakhstan-England. Full time. Mission Impossible.
Culture and History, KazakhstanOne Comment
English national football team’s arrival to Almaty brought obvious excitement – for the first time Kazakhstan hosted such a renowned team.
Last year’s Wembley game, despite Kazakhstan’s 1-5 defeat, gave some sort of hope – our young footballers (with almost half of them having made their national debut) played fearlessly. But after the team lost to Belarus, 1-5 again, Kazakh supporters’ ardour cooled.
Nevertheless the beginning of the game could have turned a cold shower for visitors with their all-star lineup. During first seconds it took a last-ditch block from English captain John Terry to deny Sergey Ostapenko’s shot.
17 minutes later Ostapenko’s goal was ruled out for offside to the crowd’s obvious despair. Almost right after that Ostapenko’s unfortunate injury forced him to leave the field. English side seemed to struggle during first 30 minutes that made the coach Fabio Capello very nervous. But visitors managed to score by 40th minute when Gareth Barry headed in Steven Gerrard’s cross. Right before the break Gerrard and Emile Heskey tricked the Kazakh goalkeeper Alexander Mokin, forcing him to make a mistake, 0-2.
In the second half England seized control of the game, not bothering Mokin much though, Kazakh footballers were awarded some long-distance free kicks. On 72nd minute after saving Wayne Rooney’s first shot Mokin failed to deal with his amazing second kick. 5 minutes later Frank Lampard scored on a penalty kick, 0-4.
Thus, English national team celebrated 6th successive victory maintaining its 100% record in this World cup qualification, while Kazakhstan got another lesson.
P.S. Unfortunately, our U-21 team was also defeated next day by Montenegro, 0-2.
RSS Feeds
Podcasts
[...] Dina reports that the England national football team’s arrival to Almaty, Kazakhstan, brought obvious excitement, but the final score was below expectations of the fans. Cancel this reply [...]