How will England self-destruct this time?

Slamming, body-rocking heat greeted the traveller in Manaus yesterday. When even the local taxi driver wipes his forehead and declares it’s "mucho calde" you know this isn’t a climate for the faint-hearted.

Before the draw for the finals, Roy Hodgson had, unwisely, voiced the view that this city plonked in the middle of the Amazonian rain forest was the place to avoid. Almost inevitably then, that’s precisely where the gods ordained the Three Lions would have to make their opening stand. And, despite being commonly referred to as the king of the jungle, the lion, as we know, tends to be more at home in wide, open grasslands. Like, um, Wembley.

So, yes, there’ll be energy-sapping heat and humidity in the Arena Amazonia tonight, not to mention a dubious pitch, but England’s initial challenge, you feel, will be to overcome possible stage fright, especially if Hodgson opts to give a few of his bright but scarcely battle-hardened young ’uns their World Cup baptism.