FIFA World Cup 2010: England Coach Fabio Capello’s chooses Five penalty takers, Lampard and Gerrard included
The round robins are almost done and the line ups for the first knock out rounds are almost decided and no other match is as big a clash of the titans as England against Germany. Unless Spain lose to Chile tonight to book a second round clash against Brazil and make this England Germany clash look like something ordinary.
With the knock rounds come the tension of the extra time and the hyper tension of the penalties. As it emerged today Fabio Capello has already chosen his five players who will be responsible for taking the spot kicks for England.
Steven Gerrard, Wayne Rooney, Frank Lampard and James Milner have been taking spot kicks at venues before their group matches as part of the Italian’s meticulous training regime.
The fifth and final choice is the former Aston Villa penalty specialist, Gareth Barry, who despite being sidelined by his injury has been practicing spot kicks after his return to fitness.
Although the whole squad has been practicing penalty kicks, the “fab-5” is putting in extra shifts just to master the art of spot kicks.
The likes of Ashley Cole, Jermain Defoe and John Terry have volunteered for penalty duty but Capello is set to take on his first opponents in the knock out phase with his mind set about his first choice penalty takers.
In addition to the extra work put in by the players a specialist stats guru has also been hired by the English Three Lions and the players are being told where exactly to hit their kicks when the moment of truth arrives after being monitored in training as well as while on duty with their clubs.
This is basically to say that the players basic traits have been observed all throughout and the highpoints and his strong points have been pin pointed and the players are asked to stick to their guns.
Coach Stuart Pearce, aka Psycho, who has his not-so-happy memories from the Italia 90, is the pioneer of this scientific method of dealing with the extreme pressure of the penalty kick scenario.
The England stars, especially the chosen five have been practicing penalty kicks regularly after the training sessions and the backroom staff has constantly been monitoring which are the areas of most success for each player, and which players have the best conversion rates.
Pearce is a man of method and the days of wandering around the pitch at the end of gruelling extra time and coming up with a list of players ‘who fancy it’ are over.
Capello, given his immaculate methods, was anxious to choose his five players, that will carry the burden of the nations hopes on their shoulders should a match go to the penalties. Although, Lampard has missed his last two spot kicks, he is still the designated man to take on the responsibility of taking a normal spot kick and will also be the man to take the first of five England penalty kicks in a penalty kick scenario.
Gerrard was the man who missed his spot kick in the quarter final against Portugal but is the second man to take the responsibility of the spot kick. Despite the Chelsea captain volunteering amid his miss in the Champions League final in Moscow two years ago, Terry is not among the chosen five.
England has lost twice to Germany and on both the occasions they went out on spot kicks in Euro 96 and Italia 90. They are hoping for better luck this time around as they have opted to wear the lucky all red strip for their match against Germany.
Germany were given the choice of which kit to wear and after the Germans topped their group, they opted for their all white strip meaning England will be clad in all red at Bloemfontein.
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