Frank Lampard

Frank Lampard - England Midfielder - World Cup 2006
squad no. 8

club: Chelsea
position: Midfield
age: 27
caps: 40
goals: 11

Frank generally gets preference over Steven Gerrard in the attacking role so has a lot to do to justify the managers' faith. He has looked below his best in the last couple of months but his stats for the season still make mighty impressive reading.

Lampard will be up and down and leave nothing in the tank but he may well be judged a success or otherwise on his goal tally alone.

If he can manage four or five from midfield it could see us all the way to the last four, and then who knows what might happen?

Football England Verdict
Rating: 5.40

We probably can't blame Sven for this one as I think we all probably expected Frank to come good and carried on giving him the benefit of the doubt.
In the end his tournament was a complete disaster with no goals, no assists and a miss in the penalty shootout.
Came with a glowing reputation that millions of people around the globe must have been kept awake at night trying to figure out.

Portugal 0-0.
Football England rating: 5
Nobody could fault his effort but Lampard completed a truly miserable World Cup by seeing his weak penalty easily saved in the shoot out.
Maybe he needs a rest but he simply did not look a world class player in any way.

Thurs, June 29
Frank's done an ankle in training and is now a doubt for the Portugal game. Even though he's not hit top form his absence would be a blow. Let's hope his famous durability comes to the rescue once again.

Ecuador 1-0.
Football England rating: 6
Fat Frank is having a poor competition and this was another distanctly average performance.
He still cannot find the net, which is usually his great redeeming feature, and missed particularly badly when presented with a sitter by Rooney.
Hardly likely to be dropped but he needs to hit form as of now if we are to progress further.

Sweden 2-2.
Football England rating: 5
Frank had a lot of shots again last night but nothing has come of them so far. He'll carry on buying those raffle tickets, however, and hopefully win us all the jackpot eventually.

Trinidad 2-0.
Football England rating: 5
Lampard looks a yard off the pace in build up play. Continually has a couple of touches to check back onto his right side before working out what to do.
Is there anything else to his game than goals? Let himself down badly in that department after getting into numerous goalscoring positions. Could easily have had three, or even six, but got none.

Paraguay 1-0.
Football England rating 6
Started brightly but faded badly. Linked well with Gerrard and Joe Cole in the early stages but dropped deeper and deeper after the break and all but disappeared.
Surprised no-one by shooting regularly but in general his radar was off although he did force a couple of reasonably comfortable saves from the keeper.
Another of whom much more is expected.

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