From: Hildegaard Beauregard [ljlife@yahoo.com]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 6:43 AM
Subject: England 1, Argentina 0

The did it. They finally beat Argentina. (Well, for
the first time since '66.)

In the first half, Beckham scored a penalty kick after
Owen was tripped in the box -- a nice dose for
Argentina after all they've gotten away with.

England played an excruciating prevent game for the
last half of the second half, after Owen and
Sheringham came close to scoring. They even pulled out
Owen for another defender. In my opinion, the
protection game is not good strategy: the ball was
near the England goal far too much, Argentina having
too many chances, crosses, corner kicks, throw-ins.
But England did preserve their victory, so the
criticism can give way to celebration for a while. One
thing Argentina did not do was exploit the weakness of
England that Sweden exposed. Sweden's speed and
aggressive pursuit showed up England in the second
half, but Argentina did not have the same. I think
Argentina will have their hands full with Sweden.

Sweden beat Nigeria, 2-1, in an earlier match, so
Sweden have the lead in the group on goal difference.
Nigeria has been eliminated, they cannot advance. If
England beats Nigeria, they advance. Since Argentina
and Sweden play next, England can advance even losing
to Nigeria if Sweden beats Argentina. If England draw
with Nigeria, they can advance if Argentina beats
Sweden, because it will give them the goal difference
advantage over Sweden (Sweden losing by at least one
goal). The bad combination is Argentina beating Sweden
and England losing to Nigeria by such numbers that
Sweden's goal difference advantage of 1 is preserved.
The chances are thus pretty good for England to
advance.

Spain became the first team to clinch advance with a
3-1 win over Paraguay.