England v Hungary, Manchester

One of the good things about working in sport is that attending another sporting event generally counts as work. Thus on Tuesday afternoon we set off to Manchester to see the England v Hungary pre-FIFA World Cup friendly at Old Trafford. We had amazing seats courtesy of the FA and were about 4 rows behind Wayne Rooney - the wunderkind who broke his ankle a couple of weeks ago meaning the 'will he/won't he' play debate has been all over the papers since.



First half was boring - I think they were playing at about 70% intensity - but the second half improved with 2 England goals in the first 5 minutes. Interest increased again when Sven put Theo Walcott on the field (no. 23 below), the 17 year-old Arsenal player who was picked to play for England without (a) ever having played a game for Arsenal and (b) ever being seen play by Sven. However he was overshadowed by no. 24 below - Peter Crouch - who is incredibly tall and extremely lanky but kicked England's third goal and did the robot in celebration. The event was a spectacle but the football generally was a bit underwhelming.