Today I'm going back three years to 2018 and England's Nations League match against Spain at Wembley.
The Nations League is a new concept in European international football and, so far, despite the apparently complicated structure of the competition, it seems to have been met with the approval of the football community. The basic idea is that, instead of playing non-competitive friendlies, international sides in Europe will be matched against sides of a similar calibre in a home and away league format with the winners either gaining promotion or, in the case of the top level leagues, going forward to a bi-annual Finals tournament. Similarly, sides finishing bottom of their league face relegation. Where it starts to get really complicated is that Nations League standings are also used to determine who gets a second bite at the cherry in qualifying for the European Championships and the World Cup. In short, Nations League results do matter and that's so much better than a meaningless friendly.
The competition in 2018/19 was the inaugural one and England were drawn in a three team Group with Spain and recent World Cup finalists Croatia. It's hard to imagine a tougher proposition and the featured game was the opening game in the Group. England took an early lead with a goal from Marcus Rashford in the 11th minute following a superb through ball from Manchester United colleague Luke Shaw. However, Spain were level within just two minutes with a goal scored by Saul (pronounced Sow-ool) or Niguez Esclapez as he was listed. 32 minutes gone and Spain had the lead from a set piece free kick which was knocked in by Valencia's Brazilian-born player Rodrigo who has since joined Leeds United. To date Rodrigo has scored 8 goals in 25 appearances for Spain. Sadly there was to be no more scoring in the game although Spain's David de Gea had to make a couple of superb saves to deny Rashford further goals and, in added time, Danny Welbeck had an opportunist equaliser harshly ruled out. It was a great game however and a good advertisement for the new competition.
It was also to be England's only defeat in their four Nations League games that year and they exacted full revenge on Spain in Seville the following month by beating them 3-2. England surprised many, especially after the opening defeat, by winning the Group and qualifying for the Finals tournament where they went on to finish third, by no means a bad start.
CRB Match No. 2247
Comments
Post a Comment