On This Day – 12th February
Australia have beaten the English at cricket and rugby over the years with some fantastic teams. They’ve also had some fantastic golfers and tennis players who have beaten us too!
One thing that we have always been able to brag about to the Aussies has been football. After all, we’ve won the World Cup and appeared in the competition fifteen times and they’ve only played in five tournaments.
Our bragging rights came to an end on 12th February 2003 as England were swept aside by Australia in a 3-1 defeat at Upton Park, home of West Ham United.
The match was a friendly and our record going into the game was great. We had beaten them three times and drawn twice in the five games between the two countries.
Confidence was high going into the game and England fans were guessing how many we would win by, not giving the Aussies a chance. This probably suited them down to the ground as they would have nothing to lose and there would be no pressure to succeed.
The Australian squad had several players who had played in the English game so they were far from an unknown force. Goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer played for Middlesbrough and Harry Kewell and Mark Viduka had played for Leeds United.
England were managed by Sven-Goran Eriksson and he made it clear that he would be making several changes in the game.
He did just that in the game, famously substituting the whole team at half-time and bringing on a whole new side for the second half!
34,590 fans attended the game and most of them left angry and embarrassed at the result. It was more of a frustrating result than the 2-2 draw in the previous game against Macedonia in a Euro 2004 qualifier.
The first-half England side huffed and puffed and made hard work of the game and Australia deservedly lead 0-2 at the break.
In the second-half, the 17 year old Wayne Rooney came on in Kieron Dyer’s place to make his full England debut. He would eventually become England’s all-time top goalscorer but he wasn’t able to score on his debut.
Francis Jeffers who was playing alongside Rooney as a fellow striker was -making his full England debut as well. He made a much bigger impact on the game by scoring from close range on 69 minutes. After scoring 12 goals in 12 games for the Under 21’s, this was the perfect start for him as he made the step up to the Senior level.
Try as they might, England just couldn’t find the elusive equaliser and Brett Emerton added a third for the Socceroos on 83 minutes.
The 3-1 defeat remains one of England’s most humiliating defeats and was probably the most embarrassing of Eriksson’s time in charge of the England national team.
I have to mention here that later on in the year, the England rugby team beat Australia in the final of the 2003 Rugby World Cup in Australia. Everyone would rather that we had won that instead of this friendly anyway!
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