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All over for England - penalties again

Last updated : 30 June 2004 By Tony Scholes

Michael Owen - gave England an early lead
England went in front after only two minutes from Michael Owen but the bright start ended only too quickly, not helped by the loss of Wayne Rooney through injury. We struggled after that and conceded midfield all to easily to the Portuguese and it was no surprise when they did eventually equalise through Postiga.

We were counting ourselves very fortunate to be taking the game into extra time when we were robbed of a winner due to a dreadful decision by Swiss referee Meier that ruled out a last minute winner from Sol Campbell.

Extra time followed the same pattern and when Portugal went in front with ten minutes to go we looked a beaten side. But five minutes later we were level with a third tournament goal from Chelsea’s Frank Lampard.

And so to the penalty shoot out which started with David Beckham almost hitting the corner flag. That was out only miss and with Rui Costa missing the target it went to sudden death with Darius Vassell missing our seventh kick before Portugal keeper Ricardo scored.

We head home after failing to equal the achievement of Terry Venables’ team of 1996 which reached the semi-final before they went out on penalties.

Overall it was a disappointing performance from England but we did go further in the competition than the Germans.


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