England Has Jinx Against Sweden

“Argentina smiled, and England cried.”

Group F of the 2002 Korea Japan World Cup is called `Deadly Group`, as championship candidates Argentina and England are grouped together along with Northern Europe’s power Sweden and Africa’s pride Nigeria.

F-Group matches were held on the 2nd, while all football fans laid their eyes on them with great interest. Argentina started off lightly by scoring its first win, but England seemed little shaky as it scored a tie.

In the Nigerian match at Kashima Stadium, Ibaraki, on the day, Argentina claimed victory after Gabriel Batistuta scored a heading-goal in the 18th minute of the second half.

Argentina and Nigeria led a close match in the first half, but Argentina succeeded taking leadership in the second half and finalized victory with Batistuta’s single goal.

England scored 1-1 tie with Sweden in the day’s match at Saitama Stadium. Sol Campbell connected David Beckham’s corner kick into a goal, leading the game, but Sweden’s Niclas Alexandersson scored the tie-goal in the 14th minute of the second half.

England has never won a single game against Sweden out of 9 matches in 34 years since its victory in 1968, and this time could not be an exception.

Meanwhile, Group-B match between Spain and Slovenia in Kwangju ended with Spanish victory of 3-1, while Paraguay and South Africa made a tie of 2-2 in Busan.