England vs Malta

2011 Women's World Cup
Qualification Group Five
5.30pm (GMT), Sunday 25 October 2009
Bloomfield Road, Blackpool FC

Tickets are priced £5 for adults and £2.50 for concessions
Ticket hotline - (+44 ) (0)871 622 1953 (option 1) or http://ticketable.com/blackpool/

Silver medalist's with their heads held high after coming through what has to be the story of EURO 2009, England have a new found status among the best teams in the world. They can now look forward to the qualifying season for the 2011 World Cup in Germany with the knowledge that they have the players to take them there.

Along with the recent U20 EURO win looking to the future never seemed better for female football in England. This squad has also been named the same week the national football association of England switched back on the green light to a super league, starting March 2010.

Included in this squad for the game against Malta is Dunia Susi from Chelsea and Rachel Williams from the brilliantly historical Doncaster Rovers. They will replace injured Kelly Smith and Karen Carney.

For England the possibility of having two more players in the newly formed American league is a sure sign of their presence on the international stage, if not as a team then certainly individually. The drafting of Fara Williams shows that their is an absence of a controlling midfielder within most WPS (Womens Professional Soccer) teams.

The big prize though is the selection of Lianne Sanderson.

At 21 yeears young Lianne has been a jewel in English football.

2seasons ago she outscored Real Madrid's Cristiano Ronaldo and any other player in Europe (male or female) with 52 goals! She then followed this with 42 in 41 games. For someone with limited international appearances Lianne has showed enough technical ability and pitch awareness to have a number of top clubs fighting for her signiture.

It is her off the field marketing value which the Philadelphia Independence will value as she is set to become the next global star of female football.

 

Coach Hope Powell is looking forward to seeing how her team reacts to their new status and mentality.

“We are really looking forward to the new campaign, the main objective is to qualify for another tournament and try to reach another Final. We have qualified for three tournaments in a row now and made progress in each one. We must make sure we qualify from our group, we have to finish top to reach the play offs for the World Cup, so every game is important starting with Malta.”

“The players did fantastically well to reach the final in the Euro’s, we came up against the best team in the world in Germany, who proved why they are so good, and we have to learn from that experience. I think we would admit that we didn’t always play our best football upon reflection at times over in Finland, but what we did show was how much character we have in our squad and we overcame many obstacles to reach the final, which was very pleasing. The experience of playing 6 games in a tournament will be vital for our players who will be able draw on that in the future.”

“The objective now is to really kick on, we cannot afford to rest on our laurels or become complacent, the Euro’s are now behind us and we have to focus on our group games ahead. Spain will obviously be the main challengers in our group, but we cannot afford to look past Malta, Turkey or Austria.

I think teams such as these will step up now and treat games against us like their Cup Final, the more success you have, the more teams will look to upset the form book. We have never played Malta before, so I’m looking forward to a new challenge. We have started doing our homework on them already and we will be ready for them in Blackpool.”

“We always get great crowds up north and the players and I are looking forward to coming to Blackpool FC, it’s a great stadium and hopefully we will get a big crowd along to support the players, we had such great support from our fans in Finland and fingers crossed we get more of the same at Bloomfield Road.”

England Squad:

Goalkeepers
Rachel Brown (Everton), Siobhan Chamberlain (Chelsea), Karen Bardsley (Sky Blue FC),

Defenders
Anita Asante (Sky Blue FC), Faye White (Arsenal), Casey Stoney (Chelsea), Rachel Unitt (Everton), Laura Bassett (Arsenal), Lindsey Johnson (Everton), Alex Scott (Boston Breakers), Dunia Susi (Chelsea),

Midfielders
Dan Buet (Chelsea), Fara Williams (Everton), Katie Chapman (Arsenal), Jill Scott (Everton), Rachel Williams (Doncaster Rovers Belles), Emily Westwood (Everton), Jess Clarke (Leeds Carnegie), Sue Smith (Leeds Carnegie), Jody Handley (Everton)

Forwards
Eniola Aluko (St.Louis Athletica), Liannne Sanderson (Chelsea)