World Cup/England v Sweden: Tom Humphries writes from Cologne, where England aim to clinch their group and end their Swedish hoodoo

So to Cologne and once more into the breach with Sven and his pals. It's a funny old world and not getting any straighter as Sven prepares to put two unfit strikers onto the field while taking one of his two non-compatible central midfielders out of the way of yellow cards.

Whatever they have in the spring water down in Baden-Baden seems to be good for the promotion of self-delusion. England still believe they can win this thing. They are, after all, the most gifted English squad ever sent to a World Cup.

Meanwhile virtually nobody in the English media saw that jolly old stick Peter Crouch cheat Trinidad and Tobago out of a goal last week and English players continue to say if they don't win here in Germany there will be no excuses. Very rum.

To cast away the crutch of excuse is brave of them but wrong-headed and probably premature. This English side are no better than the others which have trundled down the line in previous tournaments to meet their inevitable and sad end against any team who are stronger and more solid than them. England are as weak as their vacillating, approval-hungry manager. Which is a pity but a little amusing too.

England's tepid departure from the last World Cup at the hands of Brazil has left a memory of the Sven era which is almost defining. It was astonishing to watch England politely lining up at the swing-doors waiting to be thrown out of the Last Chance Bar in Palookaville Central.

With Rooney still unfit, perhaps there is only one sector of the field where England can say today that they are stronger than they were four years ago. Goalkeeper. The position provided one of the more blackly comic cuts of Shizuoka in 2002. David Seaman, a serial choker who had been lobbed from distance before, was beaten from long range by Ronaldinho, a serial genius who had scored two similar goals for Paris St Germain that season.

England chose to view the goal as a fluke although goalkeeping had cost them precisely as it had done way back in 1970 when Peter Bonetti stood in for the ill Gordon Banks against West Germany.

At least with Paul Robinson in goal England have denied themselves the excuse of unreliable goalkeeping and returned to a tradition of solid goalkeeping which seemed unbreakable through the era of Banks, Clemence, Shilton, etc.

Robinson, pulled by Spurs from the rummage sale which ended Leeds United's great adventure under Dave O'Leary, is just 26, young by international net-tending standards, and already his tenure is so secure it is possible to speculate that had it been his foot instead of Rooney's which got mangled in late April then England would really have been in deep trouble.

Robinson has come a long way in a short space of time and in doing so the gap between himself and all other contenders for the English number one jersey has become embarrassing. He has just turned in another consistent season for Spurs and, despite his age, it seems strange to think that while Sven was taking a major punt on Wayne Rooney at Euro 2004, Robinson was still an understudy to David James.

James was patchy if not calamitous in Portugal, which could mean only one thing. Calamity was just around the corner. England headed into World Cup qualifying and James fragmented. He made a couple of howlers against Poland to throw away a 2-0 half-time lead and then, offered rehabilitation in a friendly with Denmark, he conceded four. It was Robinson time.

Robinson is a big Yorkshireman (as was Seaman - it doesn't make him a bad goalie) with a modern attitude to his profession. If Ireland's failure to reach these finals posed interesting questions regarding the difference between manager and players (Brian Kerr blamed Thierry Henry. The players said Kerr was too meticulous and blamed theory ennui), when it came to the nature of preparation Robinson knows which camp he would be in.

For once an England team has been practising penalty-taking at its World Cup training sessions while their goalie has not just been practising saving them but has compiled a dossier on the penalty styles of all the major players here. The England team receive tailored DVDs of their opposition in the days before each match. Robinson is an enthusiastic student. Nothing will be left to chance.

Similarly with the controversial Adidas Team Geist matchballs; Robinson has seemingly had a lot to say about them.

It would be wrong, however, to assume his volubility masks a fear. Privately he got his hands on half a dozen of the balls as soon as they were available and mixed them in with his practice balls at Spurs, preparing himself for the erratic swerve and bounce of a ball he considers "goalkeeper unfriendly". He's had his say. He's not going to get hung up about the thing.

"I don't know if it's an unfair advantage for forwards or whether it's just a difficult ball for goalkeepers," he said. "If they don't strike the ball totally cleanly, it can fly anywhere. I've prepared well with it though and given myself the best opportunity."

Robinson's move to Spurs in May 2004 following Leeds United's relegation from the Premiership undoubtedly gave his career some impetus but by then he was already an English international, having debuted in a 3-1 defeat to Australia the previous year.

Robinson had been at Leeds since the age of 14 and had been part of a golden generation of players who were due to integrate with the extravagant buys of the Ridsdale/O'Leary era to become one of Europe's leading sides. Robinson almost survived the crash and the wreckage, but relegation made his move inevitable.

"In retrospect it was good. You get comfortable very quickly when you make the first team at a club and I needed to go somewhere again where I had to prove myself. It came at the right time," he says of his move to White Hart Lane.

That need to prove himself is a thin line away, he concedes, from the need to avoid the sort of castigation and public humiliation he has seen visited upon James and Seaman for their errors in an England jersey.

"It's something you can't think about but goalkeeping is a lonely position and the higher you go the more lonely it gets. You can only stay positive and keep working."

Tonight as England go seeking their first win over Sweden since the 1960s they don't bring a lot of certainties onto the field with them. Unfit strikers, tactically incoherent coaching and a dangerously persistent belief in their right to be considered among the footballing aristocracy on display here.

Lucky they packed a decent goalkeeper.