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Fabio Capello today dismissed any talk of revenge over Croatia at Wembley tomorrow night and insisted that he is only interested in the future of the England team.
The Italian said that he had not even watched a video of the match when Steve McClaren's side lost 3-2 and failed to make Euro 2008 on a wet night in the capital two years ago.
"That match is too old, it was too long ago. It is history," said Capello.
"I prefer to look at the next game. I do not speak about a game that they played two years ago. I have to motivate the players for tomorrow, not what happened two years ago.
"They will go into this game thinking about how we won in Croatia."
England triumphed 4-1 in Zagreb 12 months ago and now only need three points against Slaven Bilic's team to qualify for the World Cup finals in South Africa next summer.
John Terry missed the match at Wembley in November 2007 with injury and although he understood his manager's desire not to talk about revenge, he insisted that England's players need to bury the nightmare before they can move on. Terry said the qualifier tomorrow was his biggest game as captain of the national team but claimed that ignoring the past was difficult for those players involved in the defeat.
He said: "It is still in the back of each player's mind a bit. But it is a new era now and a new start for everyone.
"It is important the manager draws attention away from it but it is difficult for players to collectively rule it out of our minds. It is a chance to correct things from that bad campaign.
"It would be nice for our fans and ourselves to finish the job at Wembley where we threw it way before.
"It would wipe it all away. We all know we should have done better but the manager said it is a new start and we have been doing very well."
Reader views (1)
I think Capello has the correct approach & attitude towards England games. One game at the time, don't dwell on the past & if your playing like a donkey, don't bother turning up. He does not hype up Englands chances. Just look at his record on competetive England games. 100% win rate. Where all other recent managers have tried & failed, Capello has managed to get an England team playing fairly well, and winning against teams we should beat, that in the past we probably would have struggled to get more than a draw against. I still do not think we have the flair to win the world cup, but with Capello I do believe he will restore some faith in how England perform in competitions. A semi-final place would be fair. It would be nice to win, but I'm just being realistic. Guaranteed the media will hype the England team up in the world cup build up. I wish they wouldn't, as it is such a big fall when we fail.
- Dom, London
