Cool Capello had faith in England

Fabio Capello insisted he kept his cool at half-time in the Amsterdam Arena last night even though his England side appeared to be in the process of handing victory to The Netherlands.

Two goals down to the highly-rated Dutch, both of them gifts provided by Rio Ferdinand and Gareth Barry, Capello sensed the only way out of the hole England had dug for themselves was to provide the calm certainty that he believed they could do it.

The tactic worked a treat as Jermain Defoe pulled a goal back within five minutes of his introduction as a replacement for Emile Heskey, then pulled England level 13 minutes from time by tapping home a James Milner cross.

“I was really calm at half-time, really calm,” said Capello.

“You have to understand what you have to do.

“It is not always the same. It is very important psychologically for the players to understand if the manager has confidence that they can recover the result.”