Bulgaria v England – live! | Scott Murray

• Press refresh or turn on the auto-update for the latest • Email scott.murray@guardian.co.uk with your thoughts • Follow Simon Burnton’s Euro 2012 qualifier clockwatch • Keep up with all tonight’s international goals here Referee: Frank De Bleeckere (Belgium) England: Hart, Smalling, Cahill, Terry, Cole, Walcott, Parker, Barry, Downing, Young, Rooney. Subs: Stockdale, Jagielka, Baines, Milner, Lampard, Johnson, Defoe. Bulgaria: Mihailov, Zanev, Bodurov, Milanov, Bandalovski, Ivanov, Georgiev, Martin Petrov, Stiliyan Petrov, Popov, Genkov. Subs: Vladislav Stoyanov, Iliev, Marquinhos, Sarmov, Raykov, Kostadin Stoyanov, Kostadin Stoyanov. The pitch: Good for grazing. England team news: Frank Lampard is dropped in favour of Stewart Downing, who plays alongside Theo Walcott, Ashley Young and Wayne Rooney in an attacking line-up. At the back, Chris Smalling is handed his debut, while Gary Cahill gets the nod alongside John Terry. Kick off: 7.15pm BST. This should be a shoo-in for England, you’d think. “A win for England is virtually taken for granted,” writes our man in Sofia, Kevin McCarra, riffing on Fabio Capello’s excellent away record (nine wins in 13). Let’s see, then. Bulgaria’s main goal threat: Film noir’s Dimitar Berbatov, who has prematurely retired from international football, in order to suck down filterless cigarettes, wear wide-brimmed hats, discuss existentialist philosophy in bistros over very strong cups of coffee, and listen to west-coast jazz. Historical records only count for so much, that is true. But the last of those nine games was a 4-0 tonking at Wembley 364 days ago, in the opening game in this Euro 2012 qualifying group, Jermain Defoe the hat-trick hero. Today’s England line-up includes Wayne Rooney, Ashley Young and Theo Walcott, all of whom are bang in form, excellent in attack during that 8-2 game at Old Trafford last weekend as they were. Bulgaria’s attack, meanwhile? Their main man Stiliyan Petrov says it all: “Our game plan is to frustrate England by staying solid at the back then exploit their growing anxiety with a winning goal. The problem is where that goal might come from.” Good evening, dear people. Now then. England have a very good record against Bulgaria. In nine games since the two teams first met at the 1962 World Cup finals in Chile, the English have won five times, drawing the other four, scoring 13 goals along the way while conceding a mere two. Euro 2012 qualifiers Euro 2012 Bulgaria England Scott Murray guardian.co.uk

Posted by on September 2, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.