England Vs. Ghana: 1-1 Draw At Wembley After Late Goal From Asamoah Gyan

Ghana have a stoppage time equaliser and nobody can say that they haven’t deserved something from the match. The visitors have been the dominant force since half time and were desperately unlucky not to be on level terms. The closest they had come to scoring prior to injury time was an a shot which Gareth Barry somehow contrived to deflect onto the roof of the net, but they had most of the possession in the second half and were pushing England back step by step.

In the end, though, it took some solo magic from Sunderland forward Asamoah Gyan to get the goal Ghana’s play had warranted. With nothing on at the edge of the box and confronted by three defenders, Gyan backed off and faked a pass out wide, which forced Gary Cahill and Phil Jagielka to drop back. The striker, finding himself isolated against Joleon Lescott, then charged forward, wove his way around the Manchester City centre back, and thumped a shot into the bottom corner of Joe Hart’s goal. 20,000 Ghana fans went into raptures as the net rippled - that was a splendid effort from the Sunderland man and a great way for Ghana to score their first ever goal against England.

‘Permanent’ is just a state of mind as far as the England captaincy is concerned. A week after announcing that John Terry was going to be reinstated permanent captain, Fabio Capello has sent the Chelsea man home to rest (along with vice-captain Frank Lampard and Chelsea teammate Ashley Cole), meaning that the defender will certainly not be wearing the armband when England face off against Ghana on Tuesday. Instead, the man to lead his country into battle against Africa’s finest will be... Manchester City’s Gareth Barry!

Ok, that’s not really an inspirational choice, but considering the squad list there’s not really anyone else who could hope to receive the honour. Barry is the senior figure on the England team with 45 caps, and he has several years experience as a captain at the Premier League level with Aston Villa. Virtually nobody else in Fabio Capello’s expected starting eleven has served as a captain in the top level, leaving Barry the obvious choice. The midfielder responded to being awarded the armband by being horrendously dull:

After a comfortable 2-0 win over Wales, Capello seems content enough with his veteran players, and is using the friendly as a chance to test out some of his less-capped players in his new 4-3-3 formation. With five players in the starting lineup from the match in Cardiff gone, the manager has named the bulk of his team to face Ghana already:

At full strength, England would probably find Ghana a handful, and I’d be surprised if the hosts didn’t look like the away side at Wembley on Wedensday. Ghana are simply too good for Capello to drop most of his best players for the match against them, and they’ll probably make him pay. Fortunately, this is just a friendly match - a way to test some fringe players out against an extremely tough opponent. It’ll be fascinating to see how the likes of Leighton Baines and Matt Jarvis do against an underrated and highly motivated Ghana.