Deacon’s Blog: This is England’s biggest game for 4 years

Any game between home nations bears a huge significance, but this one, has that little bit extra significance for that failure for the three lions here could hold extra bearing. We all know that half a century ago was the one and only time England won a major tournament, but recently our major tournament results is not one in which such a prestigious football nation such ourselves should have. Apart from the group stage exit from the World cup, since Sven left England we have only made one Quarter final, at Euro 2012, simply not good enough.

This is a young squad, the youngest in the championships and you feel should they keep the level of progression up, can be a threat at a major tournament, but unfortunatly are caught in the development stage at a time when expectation to succeed is high due to sustained periods of failure. Is it fair? Probably not, but that is the harsh reality of tournament football but if this squad does have somehting is a togetherness and a will to succeed.

Wales will fancy their chances and in my opinion rightly so. After a 58 year absence from major tournament football claim an impressive 201 victory against Slovakia and have pole position. They also know how England have famously suffered with clinchers desease and they know that if they get anything out of this match, even a draw, would be enough to qualify them for the last 16.

This is for England a game that will define them. It was an unlucky draw against Russia, if there is such a thing, but as many pundits are saying a performance of the same magnitude should be enough to win two matches, but lets just hope that England don’t rely on what they always rely on. The thought that if they had bad luck after a bad performance, stay the same and try to win. When as that worked, we did that under Capello and we see what happened, lost 4-1 to Germany for goodness sake.

This match will define a whole heap of factors and now we can talk about the Football, lets hope that both teams can produce and both can make their way out of the group.