Cobra rises above sleepy affair

Anyone who thought England had been given an unfavourable group when the draw for the World Cup finals was made in December will have been relieved by events yesterday afternoon.

With Tunisia safely dispatched in Marseille, Glenn Hoddle's spies, Dave Sexton and Peter Taylor, will no doubt be reporting to the boss that England have practically nothing to fear from Colombia, bar falling asleep on the job, and Romania can hardly have struck fear in the camp with a performance high on efficiency but low on imagination.

Romania, however, will get better. Once they had secured the victory through Adrian Ilie's classy scooped shot seconds before halftime, they cantered through the rest of the match.

That they were able to do so says much about Colombia, and it is little wonder that Faustino Asprilla admitted last week that there was less pressure on his team than four years ago because of reduced expectations back home. Asprilla, substituted near the end, and walking straight past his colleagues and manager Hernan Dario Gomez to the tunnel, justified that sentiment on his own. The rest were not far behind.

Gomez, clearly unhappy as he banged the top of the plastic bench long after the final whistle, understandably criticised his players' attitude. Romania's manager Anghel Iordanescu was positive when he defined his side's display as "pragmatic and intelligent", a reasonable assessment.

The build-up to the game was overshadowed, literally, by two things: the first a rain storm of tropical intensity that made the surface slick, though not treacherous; the second a large picture of Andres Escobar draped in front of a section of Colombian fans.

Beside the picture a national flag had "Colombia: Peace" written on it and the Colombians began as if they were trying to live up to that statement - lacklustre makes them sound energetic. It took them more than half an hour to worry the Romania back three even slightly, then the mere presence of Jorge Bermudez was almost enough to cause Gheorghe Popescu to put through his own goal.

Encouragement should have been taken, and yet that incident apart, Colombia produced no further threat until 10 minutes into the second half when Jose Santa, in space in the Romania penalty area, chose to cross rather than shoot.

The problem was a straightforward one when viewed from the stands: Colombia lacked width and pace, and Asprilla had nothing other than the odd surge forward by Carlos Valderrama to call support. Gomez did try to rectify that in the second half, bringing on Adolfo "The Train" Valencia, but too often he began on the wrong platform.

Belatedly, Bogdan Stelea in the Romania goal was forced into the occasional punch and block but that was because those ahead of him had slackened off.

Freddy Rincon offered brief resistance for the Colombians but the ease of the win can be judged by the contribution of Gheorghe Hagi. The great man strolled about, as he does, for 99 per cent of the 77 minutes he was on the field but when the goal came he was inevitably involved.

His flick towards Ilie hit a Colombian leg on the way but it was still Ilie's to collect. Maurizio Serna was then expertly bypassed before the man nicknamed The Cobra flicked an improvised shot over Farid Mondragon into the far corner. Ilie might just be the snake in the grass for England next week.

The Colombian coach Hernan Dario Gomez criticised his team for being "very timid" in their defeat. "There was no spontaneity and a lot of the players were nervous," said Gomez. "In the second half we fought and we had plenty of goal-scoring chances. We didn't get the right result but Romania didn't deserve it either."