Media less lukewarm about Young

Luke Young has been portrayed as a make weight stop gap from an unfashionable club who will have no long-term role in the England side. It took a while for Charlton fans to appreciate what a good buy he was by Curbs and now the media are at last starting to acknowledge what he has to offer. The Sunday Times this morning gave him 7 saying that accusations of him not being international class are unfounded, noting that he played well after Beckham was sent off.

This is their detailed appraisal of the Addicks right back:

'With Gary Neville and Ashley Cole injured, the full-back positions went to Charlton’s Luke Young and Liverpool’s Jamie Carragher. Carragher is essentially a resilient centre-back and a right-footed player, but he was seldom under any kind of pressure on the left and predictably coped well enough. Young, by contrast, was pleasingly willing and able to surge into attacking positions.

He may have been given confidence by the fact that at the start of the game, Austria’s experienced captain, Andreas Ivanschitz, wandering frequently from the centre to the flanks in midfield, tried to beat him down the left but Young matched him for pace and put the ball into touch.

His most spectacular moment, however, came 18 minutes into the first half when, receiving a pass from Peter Crouch, he made an ambitious run worthy of any striker and was only just beaten to the ball by Austria’s resilient goalkeeper Jurgen Macho.

When briefly caught out of position late in the first half, Young was quick to race back, intercept the ball and play it to a defender behind him.

In the second half, he continued looking for opportunities to attack and was present and effective when needed in defence. Early in that half, he did well to head away a potentially dangerous cross from the right by Rene Aufhauser.

Subsequently, receiving from Frank Lampard when overlapping vigorously, he put in a good cross that the Austrian defence cleared. In the 83rd minute, he was overlapping yet again after once more receiving an inviting, angled ball from Crouch. This time his low cross was also cleared but he had done well.'

The Independent on Sunday made Luke the 'star performer' with the highest rating, along with Owen, of 7.

They said, 'The Charlton right-back had a positive impact on the right side of defence in Gary Neville's berth and broke forward at every opportunity. Defensively his best moment was a brave diving header to clear a dangerous cross. Occasionally caught upfield, but Andreas Ivanschitz failed to capitalise'

Both the News of the World and the Mail on Sunday were less complimentary about Luke, rating him at 6/10 and 4/10 respectively. Some of the Addickted have also used words like 'competent' and 'workmanlike' to describe his performance. I think that he displayed a new confidence as an international player, a sense that he was where he rightfully belonged. Let's have a real chant of 'England's No.2' against Fulham.

Crouch versus Bent

'What is this man for?' is a question that might reasonably be asked of the man mountain. The Addickted were disappointed that Darren Bent did not get a chance to show what he could do. However, with the club having a lost a rumoured £650,000 through all:sports going into receivership, Sven saved the club £500,000 that would have had to go to the Tractors if he had made an England appearance. Now if he comes on for five minutes against Poland, that will work out at £100,000 a minute ...