International Football October 2008

Wembley enjoys late flurry

England 5 Kazakhstan 1 (London 11 October 2008 )
Dominant England left it late to sweep Kazakhstan aside. After a tame first half in which Theo Walcott's low delivery across the face of goal presented England with the only chance, Rio Ferdinand opened the scoring with a simple header from a corner-kick in the 52nd minute. A minute later Nusserbayev forced David James into a save, but the lead was doubled in the 64th minute when Lampard floated in a free-kick which skimmed off the head of Alexandr Kuchma and past his own keeper. Ashley Cole inexplicably lobed the ball towards his own penalty box in the 68th minute gifting the opportunistic Zhambyl Kukeyev the chance to put the ball past David James for a Kazakh goal. A cross in the 76th minute found an unmarked Rooney who picked his spot with a header and restored England's 2 goal lead. With 4 minutes remaining Kazakhstan once again failed to deal with a cross and Rooney slid the ball in from close-range. Jermain Defoe came on for Rooney and was set free to beat Mokin in the last minute to seal a 5-1 win for England.

Rooney celebrates double with a smile

In other European matches Scotland and Norway drew blanks at Hampdon Park while Ukraine v Croatia, Sweden v Portugal and Bulgaria v Italy also finished goalless. France fought back to earn a 2-2 draw in Romania, and Lithuania came back down to earth with a 3-0 defeat in Serbia. Germany and Poland enjoyed 2-1 home victories against Russia and the Czech Republic respectively while Turkey achieved the same result at home to Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Faroe Islands held the visiting Austrians to a 1-1 draw while 2 late goals ended the Northern Irish resistance in Maribor.
In Africa Emmanuel Adebayor lead the way with 4 goals as Togo thrashed Swaziland 6-0. There were easy 5-0 wins for Cameroon against Mauritius and Tunisia against Seychelles, while Nigeria defeated Sierra Leone 4-1 and Morocco enjoyed the same result against Mauritania. The Ivory Coast and Ghana had 3-0 wins against Madagascar and Lesotho respectively, but Senegal were held to a 1-1 home draw against Gambia.
In the South American section Colombia suffered another home defeat losing 1-0 to leaders Paraguay while Argentina won 2-1 at home to Uruguay and Brazil scored 4 without reply in Venezuela. Bolivia celebrated a 3-0 victory against Peru.
The United States made easy work of Cuba winning 6-1 in the North American section where Mexico were rocked by a 1-0 loss away to Jamaica.