June 30th

Heroic 10 Men Army Proudly Wave Au Revoir

The last match of the 16th Finals between Argentina and England, so called 'early favourites clash', succussed by some unreasonable incidents, became a phenominal game beyond any expectations.

It opened with an exchange of penalty goal in just 10 minutes. Then, letting Argentineans to press onward, England enjoyed their pace after the up-and-coming 18 years old Michael Owen ran on his own to score the superb goal at 16th minute. Without any effective construction in midfield, Argentina struggled to equalize until the injury time in the first half, when Javier Zanetti slamned home on the ball from FK in front of English goal.

Then, just after the break, happened 'Beck Incident'. Dane referee, Nielsen pointed out the suttle revenging action by David Beckham and decided to send him off. There started the heroic war by England 10 men army against the waves of attack Aregentina, who still clinged to trying reckless breakthrough.

The exhausting drama stormed into penalty shoot-out, after wasting extra time, and brought a victory to Argentina when Carlos Roa blocked the England's 5th hit by a second-half substituted David Batty.

At Bordeaux, Romanians never looked like the team who superbly beat England in the First Round and Broke down easily to Croatian Davor Suker's penalty goal.

Scorers

[C] Suker:47min.= PK

Ciobotariu

Galca

Filipescu

Bilic

Stimac

Simic

Petrescu(Marinescu:76min.)

Gheorghe Popescu

Munteanu

Hagi(Capt.)(Craioveanu:56min.)

Gabriel Popescu

Stanic(Tudor:83min.)

Boban(Capt.)

Jurcic

Asanovic

Jarni

Moldovan

Ilie

Vlaovic(Krpan:76min.)

Suker

２−２

(Penalty shoot-out after extra time : 4-3 )

Scorers

[A] Batistuta:6min.= PK, Zanetti:46min.(1st Half)

[E] Shearer:10min.= PK, Owen:16min.

Vivas

Ayala

Chamot

G.Neville

Adams

Campbell

Zanetti

Almeyda

Veron

Simeone(Capt.)(Berti:91min.)

Ortega

Anderton(Batty:97min.)

Ince

Beckham(Sent-off:47min.)

Scholes(Merson:78min.)

Le Saux(Southgate:71min.)

Batistuta(Gallardo:68min.)

C.Lopez(Crespo:68min.)

Shearer(Capt.)

Owen