Frank Lampard believes the fear of having to fly home early will motivate England in their crunch clash with Uruguay in Sao Paulo.
Vice-captain Lampard, who will win his 106th cap if he comes off the bench later today, believes that the thought of a premature exit will have a motivating effect on Roy Hodgson’s squad.
“There’s a definite fear factor, you don’t want to go home and watch the end of the tournament on the television,” he said.
“It’s not a negative thing, you just don’t want it to happen and I think we have to take that with us into the Uruguay game.
“We do not want to go home, we’re not done here yet. We have got an exciting and young team that showed glimpses against Italy of what we can do.
“If we focus and do all the right things we are doing in training and behind the scenes, then we will go and get a result. Then it all opens up for us a bit more and everything changes.”
While a share of the spoils with Uruguay will not mathematically end England’s hopes, Hodgson wants to leave nothing to chance.
However, at Mexico 1986 England followed a defeat to Portugal in their opening game with a draw against Morocco and a win against Poland, progressing to the knockout stages on goal difference.
And four years later, Bobby Robson’s Three Lions amassed two draws and a win in the group stages and went on to make the semi-finals at Italia 1990.
“We realise it’s not as drastic as two must-win games – you can get through with four points – but we are not really counting on that,” said Hodgson.
Meanwhile, Uruguay manager Oscar Tabarez is ready to ring the changes with his squad.
The oldest and longest-serving coach at the World Cup is dubbed ‘The Teacher’, starting his career coaching a primary school team before taking charge of the national squad for the first time in 1988.
He guided La Celeste to the semi-finals four years ago and a record 15th Copa America title in 2011.
But a 3-1 defeat in their tournament opener against Costa Rica puts him under severe pressure from an expectant nation.
“We are going to change everything,” he said. “We need to win but so do England. We need to change our attitude and put different measures in place. And we need to be aware of that.
“England were very unlucky against Italy. They have a lot of young players in their squad with great potential. They are very fast and take quick decisions. They get into the right areas. We have to look to limit that. We can’t have them doing that against us.”
Images courtesy of England Football Official via YouTube with thanks
