International Football 15 November 2011

Barry buries Swedish jinx

England 1 Sweden 0 (Wembley friendly 15 November 2011)
England put to rest a 43 year-old wait to beat Sweden, with a deflected goal from Gareth Barry. Midway through the first half Barry's glancing header took a slight deflection off Majstorovic to find the corner of the net past the diving Isaksson for England's 2000th international goal, and as England continued to push forward Rodwell saw his volley deflected wide in the 37th minute and 4 minutes later Jones burst through only to toe-poked the ball past the upright, but England came closest 2 minutes before the break when Rodwell's close-range header clipped the post. Downing tested Isaksson with a low shot in the 66th minute and Carson who had replaced Hart in the England goal for the 2nd half palmed away a 78th minute cross from Larsson that came close to dipping under the bar. England did enough to pick up their 2nd 1-0 win in 3 days and end the year unbeaten.

Rodwell header clips the post

The European qualifiers ended with 4 teams securing the final 4 places in the finals as Estonia failed to produce a miracle, bowing out to the Republic of Ireland in Dublin despite a creditable 1-1 draw, and the Turks suffered a similar fate after their 0-0 draw in Croatia while the Czech Republic added another goal to their 2-0 first-leg lead against the run of play in Montenegro and Portugal opened the floodgates to bury Bosnia and Herzegovina 6-2 in Lisbon.
In Asia China won 4-0 away to Singapore but had their World Cup hopes extinguished by Iraq who were 3-1 winners after falling behind in Jordan with Nashat Akram scoring a double. Iran sailed 4-1 past Indonesia in Jakarta and a single goal gave Australia a win in Thailand while Japan lost 1-0 in North Korea. South Korea were stunned 2-1 in Lebanon and the UAE lost by the same result in Kuwait while there were goalless matches for Bahrain in Qatar and Oman in Saudi Arabia. Uzbekistan defeated their visitors from Tajikistan by 3 clear goals.
In South America Argentina got back on track with a 2-1 victory in Colombia while Ecuador and Chile had 2-0 home wins against Peru and Paraguay respectively, and Venezuela picked up 3 points with a goal at home to Bolivia.
Among African matches Tanzania lost 1-0 at home to Chad and Congo were held to 1-1 draw at home to Sao Tome and Principe while Adebayor scored the only goal for Togo at home to Guinea Bissau and Equatorial Guinea lost 2-1 in Madagascar. Swaziland were swamped 5-1 in DR Congo and Kenya sank Seychelles 4-0 in Nairibi while Lesotho lost 2-1 in Burundi and Rwanda sent Eritrea home 3-1 losers.
In North America St Kitts and Nevis were defeated 4-0 in Canada and Suriname lost by the same result in El Salvador while Saint Vincent and the Grenadines lost 2-0 at home to Belize and Dominican Republic were held to a 1-1 draw at Cayman Islands.
In friendly matches Spain came from 2 down to draw with a last-minute goal in Costa Rica and the Netherland lost 3-0 in Germany while an early goal was enough to give Uruguay victory in Italy and Slovenia lost 3-2 to their American tourists.