SOCCER/Croatia - 2 England - 4: Trivia bores, of which the media is full, never tire of telling hapless strangers that the Stadium of Light here in Lisbon is so called not because of its illuminations, but because of it's situation in the suburb of Light, or Luz as those who live here call it.
Till Thursday night that is. Then the two great caravans of Euro 2004 come at each other. Portugal and England, head-to-head at the OK coral.
England sold us a dummy last night. We had listened to them pondering about how nice it would be to have Greece in the quarter-finals and we had decided that there might be too much hubris in the air to be healthy. The Croats, pleading ordinariness but unity, seemed to believe themselves so touchingly overmatched that we credited them with plotting slyly.
It almost came true. After just five minutes further sustenance for the anglo-sceptics and for those of us who believe that Beckham's burnished entry in the who's ballyhoo of football is a severe case of the emperor's new sari.
Facing a twisting, surging Milan Rapaic coming at him with evil intentions Beckham responded in kind and committed the foul. Duly the free came swinging across to the far post. Boris Zivkovic knocked it back and Nico Kovac was there to fire home. 1-0.
Perhaps in hindsight the Croats will feel that such a gift horse should have had it's mouth checked. Now, instead of drawing the English out little by little, they had to face the full wrath of a wounded team. During the period which followed, England played their best football of the tournament so far and may have convinced themselves that they are indeed growing into the competition.
There are still too many flaws apparent for them to be considered true contenders but the history of the European Championships is punctuated with instances of players just grabbing the tournament by the scruff of the neck and winning the thing by dint of personal passion.
Platini, Van Basten, Zidane, Kopenka. No gum-chewing eighteen-year-old among them but, in Wayne Rooney, England may have found a star from which a nation can swing. He was involved in all the good stuff for his team last night and added a further two goals to his account, making him the name of the tournament so far.
During that period when England struggled with deficit it was Rooney who produced the gasps and moans from the crowd as his sheer confidence threatened to reward constant English pressure. He shot, he passed, he tackled. He fell down, he got up again. He won frees. Inevitably when England scored he had a hand in it.
Steven Gerrard, quietly effective all evening, found Frank Lampard, about whom the same could be said, and from the right the move gained momentum with a pass towards Michael Owen whose effort was saved by Tomislav Butina and looped up in the air. Rooney, with wisdom beyond his years, opted not to try to score but headed laterally across goal. Scholes was there to finish the move from two yards. Level. Which was all England needed.
More surprises to come though. On the cusp of half-time the Croatians might have expected a little respite. England, having just done the job of pulling back the goal, might have allowed a truce till the kettle boiled. Rooney was having none of it however.
Owen played a little pass to Scholes who repaid Rooney's earlier generosity by teeing him up for a shot. From 20 yards the kid pulled the trigger and found the net and as he ran towards the corner flag to celebrate he appeared to grow to the dimensions which the awerstruck English Sunday papers had chosen for him.
With that intervention the complexion of the game changed. The Croats who had come to defend and to counterpunch had to come off the ropes swinging. They brought on the heft of Ivaca Mornar to add some attacking thoughts to their midfield and initially the sub seemed to have found England's achilles heel.
With Scholes being asked to play wide left but being magnetically drawn infield Ashley Cole was exposed in the left back slot and Mornar set about harrassing and terrorising him. All very promising and few decent saves were required of David James before Rooney dropped back to populate the centre of midfield and Scholes and Gerrard began taking it in shifts to play bumper cars with the big Croat.
Were that all Rooney contributed to the game he would be worth his weight in headlines and hype but in a supporting role to owen he played a couple of ingenious passes, one in particular which set the Liverpool player up for a delicious attempt to chip Butina.
That instinctive understanding of the possibilities available at any given moment effectively shut the game down in the sixty eight minute. Again taking possession in apparently neutral territory Rooney launched a little one-two with Owen, now very much second violin. Taking the return Rooney calmy slotted it past Butina. 3-1.
If they thought it was all over, well it was. Everything else was dressing. England took Rooney off and having serially patted him on his golden head wrapped him in cotton wool till the weekend.
Five minutes later another free kick did some damage to England. It was all slightly surreal though. Igor Tudor rose unmarked to head Croatia's second goal and recognising the ersatz nature of the situation (mock Tudor almost) walked away without raising an arm to the sky in celebration.
His suspicions were confirmed minutes later when Frank Lampard was allowed waltz in most ungainly fashion through the centre of the Croatian defence and plant the ball in the Croatian net again. "You're Not Singing Anymore" bayed the English end. The Croatians replied with something surly and no doubt politically incorrect.
England march on. They came to this tournament sporting fetching new red jerseys which seem to have the Danish flag sown onto the shoulders and a single yellow star Stitched onto the left breast. Fitting , Wayne Rooney came to Luz and left bathed in light. One star eclipsing captain moonbeam and the boys.
