Baros short of Czech mates

IT’S easy to be misled by scorelines.

Russia were excellent against the Czech Republic last week and fully deserved their victory, but the 4-1 margin perhaps suggested the Czechs were worse than they actually had been. For long spells, particularly either side of half-time, they controlled the ball in midfield, probing and teasing, and the last two goals they conceded were the result of individual error rather than structural deficiency.

True, the disappearance of the left side of the defence as Alan Dzagoev charged through – as he had with the score at 1-0 when he had sliced wide – suggested a tactical error, but still, he only scored because his shot bent back Petr Cech’s wrist. There had been a question-mark about the Chelsea’s keeper’s speed off his line for the second goal as Roman Shirokov got to Andrey Arshavin’s ball before him but it was just about possible to give him the benefit of the doubt there as Aleksandr Kerzhakov initially stretched for the pass. But the fourth was calamitous for a number of players – first Roman Pavlyuchenko was allowed a preposterous amount of time to set himself for a shot without being closed down and then Cech again showed a weak hand in not being able to keep the ball out having got a hand to it.