Lamps wary of Kazakh threat
04 Jun 2009 - 12:47:22
Midfielder Frank Lampard says he and his England colleagues will not take the challenge posed by Kazakhstan lightly this weekend.
Lampard and co are in search of a sixth straight victory in World Cup qualifiers for the 2010 finals in South Africa, having beaten the Kazkhs 5-1 at Wembley last October.
However, Fabio Capello's side came under fire for their performance that day, having taken 52 minutes to finally breach the minnows' defence.
Lampard said: "We know when we played them at Wembley that we were not at our best and they put us under some pressure and had a high work-rate.
"We were not at our best in that game and we will have to be even more concentrated on Saturday. We have watched a re-run of the Wembley game to refresh our minds about how we performed in that game.
"No doubt we will look at it again and we have to make sure we perform as well as we are capable of - and hopefully that will be good enough.
"If we can get six points from these two games, we know we will take a huge step towards ensuring qualification for next summer's finals.
"Everyone is fit and fresh and, whether they have lost or won cup finals with their club teams, they are very focused.
"We have come here early to acclimatise and over the next few days we will get used to conditions.
"The manager has sat us down already and explained the importance of the game. We know that as a squad anyway."