England 1-1 Republic of Ireland: 6 Things We Learned

As a contest, Wednesday’s international friendly between England and the Republic of Ireland started brightly, produced a goal for each side and then fizzled after the restart.

That Ireland took the lead was probably a positive thing for the neutral in retrospect, but once Frank Lampard had equalized, the match slowly changed from exciting to docile.

Ashley Cole’s 100th appearance in an England shirt was likely the major talking point of the evening—a close second was likely the shirt itself, criticized in some quarters for looking a bit too much like the top worn by the West Germany sides of the 1970s.

But there was no mistaking that it was England in the kit and not Germany. For while the Three Lions laboured to a 1-1 draw at home to the Irish, Die Mannschaft beat Ecuador 4-2 in Florida.

Even so, there were a few takeaways from the match at Wembley. Following are six of them.

Frank Lampard Still Has It

Frank Lampard will turn 35 next month, but he remains one of England’s more illustrious midfielders and found the back of the net for a 29th time for his country in Wednesday’s match against Ireland.

There was an element of fortune about the strike, as Sean St Ledger failed to deal with the Daniel Sturridge cross that eventually fell for Lampard. But with the goal, the Chelsea playmaker now has six international tallies in his last six appearances for his country—a rate of return none of his England teammates can boast about.

With a new one-year contract freshly signed, Lampard will be expecting to play plenty of football for Chelsea next season, and with England heading into a World Cup year and devoid of options in the centre of the park, they’ll need him to maintain his typically high standard of form.

Ashley Cole Still Has It

He might have done better to close down Seamus Coleman in the buildup to Shane Long’s opener in the 13th minute, but captain-for-a-day Ashley Cole still impressed over the 53 minutes he remained on the pitch, reinforcing his stature as England’s undisputed first-choice left-back.

Say what you want about his personal life, the fact remains that Cole, 32, is one of England’s better, more consistent internationals, and that he tends to save his best performances for big matches only bodes well for them as they look to seal automatic World Cup qualification.

In the finals of both the Champions League and Europa League, he was among Chelsea’s best players, particularly in his own half of the park, which isn’t necessarily the case for every full-back.

Glenn Whelan Remains Unfortunately Underrated

That iconic Italian manager Giovanni Trapattoni picks him to start every international match for which he is available should tell you all you need to know about Glenn Whelan.

The 29-year-old midfielder is Irish tenacity and self-belief personified. He delights in disrupting the opponent’s attacking play and can put through a decent pass of his own. For Stoke City this past season, he completed 82 percent of the passes he attempted.

But it’s with the Republic of Ireland that he gets a bit of a stage, and on Wednesday, he was one of the only players from either side who put in a midseason effort.

England Continue to Lack Creativity

Especially in the second half, England managed to create very little. Even as they controlled more and more of the balance of play, you just felt they wouldn’t get a goal out of it.

While Theo Walcott and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain occasionally made something happen down the wings, their teammates in the centre of the park struggled for invention and ingenuity.

This is nothing new for England, but unless Jack Wilshere is fit (and most of the time he isn’t), you just wonder where they’ll get any meaningful creativity from. Michael Carrick certainly didn’t provide it on Wednesday.

Only a Single Firework, and Thank Goodness for That

Someone lobbed a green smoke-bomb onto the Wembley pitch midway through the first half on Wednesday, but that was about it as far as fireworks were concerned.

And thank goodness.

Eighteen years earlier, a friendly between the two sides (the term “friendly” is used loosely in this instance) had to be abandoned midway through the first half due to crowd rioting. Fifty people were injured as a result.

Nothing of the sort occurred on this occasion, and both sets of fans even managed to behave during the national anthems.

Is It Summer Yet?

Both England and Ireland put in an offseason effort on Wednesday, and you can hardly blame them.

Many of the players on either side came into the match having played 30, 40 or 50 matches since August, and with preseason training barely a month away for many of them, their minds, inevitably, were elsewhere.

But neither set of players gets their holidays just yet.

England flew to Brazil immediately after the final whistle ahead of Sunday’s match against the World Cup hosts at the Maracana, and Ireland have three upcoming matches against Georgia, the Faroe Islands and Spain before breaking for the summer.