WEM–B–LEY!
Let’s start with some England team news. Nigel Spink is in goal, with a back four of Danny Thomas, Nathaniel Clyne, Russell Osman and Frank Lampard senior. Midfield is Mark Barham, Danny Drinkwater, Nick Pickering and John Gregory, and up front we have Peter Ward and Francis Jeffers. This England XI is comprised of fringe players who were capped against Australia. In four cases – Spink, Pickering, Ward and Jeffers – it was their only cap. England have played Australia seven times in international football, and all seven games have had the whiff of a ‘B’ international.
Tonight’s game at Wembley feels the same, with Gareth Southgate confirming that back-up players such as Levi Colwill, Eddie Nketiah and Ollie Watkins are likely to get a piece of the action. “We need to give people opportunities,” said Southgate. “We have six matches before we name a squad in all likelihood for a European Championship … We want to see as many of the squad as we can this week … There is a reality with England that you have to take your chances when they come. As a former player, you knew the moments when you felt: ‘OK, I have got to deliver tonight.’”
Southgate’s sales pitch was impressively delivered, and made Football Daily reflect for at least 30 seconds on whether we should watch the game instead of Gardeners’ World, but Frances Tophill is in her new garden, assessing the tomatoes in her upcycled greenhouse, while Rekha Mistry shares the successes and failures in her new vegetable garden, and watching Jarrod Bowen make a penetrative third-man run just can’t compare.
At least Southgate will learn something, because in terms of the result it’s a can’t-win game. If England beat Australia, meh. If they don’t, social media’s finest will have the hashtags out by 10pm and the rest of Britain/Europe/the world will sink pints of schadenfreude until the small hours. England’s only previous defeat to Australia was that peculiar game 20 years ago when Sven Göran-Eriksson changed the entire team at half-time with Australia 2-0 up. One good thing did come out of that game: one of the 11 substitutes was a teenage beast called Wayne Rooney, who became England’s youngest-ever player. Colwill and Nketiah, the uncapped players in tonight’s squad, have a lot to live up to.
LIVE ON BIG WEBSITE
Friday night international friendly action! Join Scott Murray for England 0-0 Australia, live from Wembley, kick-off at 7.45pm BST.
‘THEY SHOULD STAND FOR US’
Ayal Young, a Tottenham fan from Israel who was shot and seriously injured when Hamas attacked his kibbutz last Saturday, has told Jacob Steinberg it is a “disgrace” the FA will not light the Wembley arch in Israel’s colours for Friday’s England game.
“If they stand for one side – they stood for Ukraine, [and] for France, for Belgium after the terror attacks – they should stand for us,” Young said from his hospital bed. “More than 1,000 terrorists came to slaughter us. It’s not like we went to bomb them and they attacked us back. We defended our homes and families.”
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“I was hugely proud to play for San Marino. I didn’t need to psyche myself up. My adrenalin was so high, I could have run for two hours without stopping. Some people might think ‘what on earth are you doing, playing for San Marino who lose all their games?’ But whoever says that doesn’t know what it means to play international football” – Roberto Di Maio, who made his international debut aged 40 against Northern Ireland in March, on representing the world’s lowest-ranked national team.
FOOTBALL DAILY LETTERS
“Thursday’s trip down Memory Lane certainly evoked a memory for me, as I attended that game on the Kop 46 years ago with my ultimately crestfallen Welsh mate, Alwyn. It was the strangest ‘home game’ I’ve ever attended, with Scots outnumbering their Welsh counterparts by at least three to one. It was also the match that gave rise to an oft-asked quiz question: who scored a goal, playing on his home ground, for the away side, and it wasn’t an own goal? Kenny [Dalglish] of course” – John Myles.
“One of my favourite things to do during the international break is to look around at what other fixtures are going on around the world. Last night I chanced upon a resounding away victory in the Viktoria Derby (not Shire), a win for my daily drinks order over Dire Dawa City and perhaps the greatest football team name ever. Simple things and all that ...” – Noble Francis.
“Now Junior Stanislas has retired [Thursday’s news, full email edition], can we start referring to him as Senior Stanislas?” – Mike Hulse.
Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’ the day is … John Myles.
THE MITRE MYSTERY
Wednesday’s Memory Lane [full email edition] featured a fresh-faced Michael Owen holding a Mitre ball back in 1993. We called it the Multiplex, and plenty of you emailed in to correct us. But what type of ball was it? Some said the Mitre Final; others the Pro. Five solid minutes of searching online couldn’t provide an answer, so we went to the source. Welcome to a new occasional/one-off series, Football Daily Investigates …
“Hi Football Daily, thank you for contacting Mitre. Due to the age we are unable to identify the exact football, however we can confirm this is not a Multiplex. We are sorry for any disappointment this may have caused.” Gah. So, they can’t answer but do know we’re definitely wrong. Case closed. All we know for sure is that it would have stung like nobody’s business on a cold winter morning.
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