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England 2 Japan 1 Graz Austria 30 May 2010
In their last match before the World Cup finals, England missed a penalty but came from behind to beat Japan with 2 own-goals late on in the match.
Endo swiftly took a low corner which Tulio whipped home to give Japan an unexpected lead in the 7th minute. A jittery England created very few chances in the first half, but looked more positive after the break with the change of personnel in every position. A handball in the Japanese wall defending a free-kick gave Lampard the opportunity to pull England level from the spot in the 55th minute but Kawashima dived low to keep Japan ahead with a strong arm at his right post. Morimoto turned well in the box and brought out a good reaction save from Joe Hart in the 67th minute, and 2 minutes later the flying Kawashima tipped Rooney's shot over the top corner. Japanese goal scorer Tulio met a Joe Cole cross with a diving header for an own-goal in the 72nd minute and with 7 minutes to go a low cross from Ashley Cole went in off Nakazawa gifting England a narrow win before they embark upon the World Cup.
In other weekend matches in Austria, Spain scored in stoppage time to beat Saudi Arabia 3-2 and New Zealand shocked Serbia with a single goal with South Korea suffering a similar fate against Belarus while Cameroon drew 1-1 with Slovakia.
Paraguay came from 2 down to draw with Erikson's Ivory Coast in France while the French were drawing 1-1 away to Tunisia. Germany triumphed 3-0 against Hungary in the Ferenc Puskas stadium while Mexico hammered Gambia 5-1 in Germany. The USA trailed to the visiting Turks but ran out 2-1 winners and Colombia drew 1-1 with Nigeria in London.
Chile who made history by playing 2 matches on the same day beat Northern Ireland 1-0 before picking up a 3-0 win against Israel.
A report on matches played in june before the start of the 2010 World Cup can be found at Ziaian football reports under the title "warming up for the World Cup".
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