England 0, Wales 3 Comments Off
The first group match of my next attempt saw me lose 0-1 to Switzerland. They got a breakaway goal in the middle of the second half. It was the only goal of the game. I had 65% of the possession. I had 15 shots on goal, 11 of them on target. Switzerland had 1 shot and 1 goal. That’s the way the PES cookie crumbles sometimes.
The second group game was against Wales. You can never underestimate any team on Top Player difficulty, but I was guilty of underestimating Wales. (I’m not the first Englishman, in a PES context or otherwise, to make that mistake.)
I believed a victory was a certainty, and so my concentration was nowhere to be seen. I was listening to the radio and planning a trip into town. Only my hands were playing the game – and my hands on their own are not good enough. I squandered chance after chance. I moved Gerrard to DMF and pushed his position up past the halfway line in the formation screen. It’s been a while since I scored a genuine long-range screamer of a goal. Sure enough, Gerrard had about half a dozen chances from knockdowns and clearances. One hit the bar. One was well-saved by the Welsh keeper. The others flew over. Wales scored from a cheap header at a corner, the kind I can usually defend against in my sleep. 0-1. Sloppy.
Not to worry. It was only half an hour in. Just as I thought that, Wales scored with another header from another corner. This is when I sat up and began to pay serious attention. 0-2 down on Top Player difficulty at halftime in a 10-minute game that you really need to win spells serious trouble, whoever the opposition is.
I came out after the break all guns blazing… But it was one of those games where the paranoid PES player thinks that he is simply not allowed to score. While I was peppering the Welsh goal with shot after shot and getting no reward, time was ebbing away. Then Wales went off on their one attack of the half and put the ball in the back of my net again. 0-3, and the final whistle went soon after. I examined the group table. Played 2, lost 2. Goals for: 0. Goals against: 4. Even if I won my final group game by a hatful of goals, progression was impossible.
I quit the tournament and, as ever, created a whole new one. My first opponent in this all-new International Cup? Germany…