Macedonia: After match verdicts from Sven and the Ambassador - A packed Press Conference, saw Sven Goran Eriksson complementing the Macedonian side, as a good team but England, playing with a "cool head" overcame them to win. "We were ok in the first half, said Sven, and came back well to win. The Macedonian side played very well."

Half time, saw a need for more weight up front with Heskey replacing Rooney. "At 1-2 it was a case of reverting to 4 4 2 rather than continue playing with 11 attackers to avoid being caught out by one of those goals so frequently conceded in the closing minutes."

When asked how he’d have felt had we not won, Sven replied "all games you lose, you wish you could play tomorrow."

In reply, the Macedonian Coach, Dragi Kanatlarovski said "we could be proud of our boys who gave it their best for the whole 90 minutes. Unfortunately 2 mistakes created 2 goals, but my compliments go the England team and I wish them good luck for the future.

It was towards the end of the conference we noticed who should be standing behind us was none other than George Edgar, the British Ambassador to Macedonia. What did you think of that he asked etc, etc, 3 points in the bag and all that stuff we replied.

The conversation continued covering Sol Campbell giving away the goal and the racial abuse suffered by a number of our players, but what was interesting was his view that he considered England fans "had behaved well and had not caused problems by coming to Macedonia" that "the burning of our flag was not good and would upset a number of Macedonians", the skirmishes in the ground "were really of little concern" but it was "unfortunate" that the small pen of English fans "had been placed in the West stand next to the Macedonian hooligans" rather than in the half empty East stand at the opposite end of the ground. "I just hope the next few hours with packed Bars would pass off peacefully" he said.

A lot of sense was spoken by Mr Edgar in that 5 minutes, fancy a job at the FA ?

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