June 1, 2006

For the last seven days, Brazil have been holding open training sessions in Weggis, a lakeside resort in the foothills of the Swiss Alps. Fans have been able to see the likes of Ronaldo, Ronaldinho and Adriano playing in practice games that mimic the way they will line up in Germany.

Coach Carlos Alberto Parreira is more than happy to discuss the novel 4-2-4 formation he has used throughout the World Cup qualifying campaign and laughs at anyone suggesting he may need to change it to counter some of the leading sides that block his side's route to the trophy.

The inference is clear. Brazil believe they are the best team in the competition and do not care who else knows about it. There will be no concessions and no wavering from the supreme self-confidence that swept the South Americans to glory four years ago. If anyone feels willing to challenge them, they will have to do so on Brazilian terms.

Now contrast that approach to England's. While Brazil's players train in public, the England squad are hidden from view while Sven-Goran Eriksson scatters first-team bibs around like confetti.

Ask the Swede about his starting line-up for next weekend's game against Paraguay and you will be met with a host of riddles and half-truths.

Friendly games, normally used to fine-tune plans that have been set in stone for months, have become platforms for a string of desperate attempts to stumble across the formula that may yet spell success in Germany.

Instead of belief, there is bafflement. Instead of clarity, there is confusion.

"Why should I tell the nation, and therefore our opposition, what formation we are going to play in our first group game or which players are going to play where?" asked Eriksson in the wake of Tuesday night's 3-1 win over Hungary.

"Maybe I will play Peter Crouch up front, maybe I will play Steven Gerrard. You will just have to wait and see.

"I'm very happy if all of this is confusing everybody. If other people are confused, it means the opposition are confused, and that's good.

"There is no confusion for me, there is no confusion for my coaches and there is no confusion on the training pitch.

"If I'm convinced about something, I cannot be confused. Although it's good when all of you are confused."

Confused? I know I certainly am. One thing is clear though, you would never catch Brazil trying to play the elaborate mind games that Eriksson is indulging in at the moment.

A key part of being the best is having complete confidence in your ability.

Tiger Woods does not beat his opponent by turning up late on the first tee and muttering under his breath during the course of his round. He grinds down inferior golfers with the sheer quality of his play.

Similarly, Rafael Nadal has not become the best clay-courter in the world by stopping everyone else seeing how he hits his backhand with top spin.

Watch him during the warm-up to his games and his attitude becomes clear. "I'm the better player here and here are the shots I'm going to hit during this match - now you work out some way of stopping them."

Brazil's approach is exactly the same - England's, on the other hand, smacks of inferiority.

In some ways, perhaps Eriksson is not the one to blame. Had Wayne Rooney been fit for the first two weeks of the tournament, the Swede would no doubt have been much more bullish and open.

As it is, he has to plug a seemingly unfillable gap. He had to try out Peter Crouch in last week's 'B' game against Belarus, just as he had to experiment with Gerrard in a more attacking role during Tuesday's game with Hungary.

Now, though, it is time he made his decision and stuck with it. It might not be the right one, and it might not even last for the rest of the tournament, but England's players will be far more likely to make a success of it if they truly believe it has their manager's unequivocal support.

Instead of continuing to play with smoke and mirrors in the build-up to Saturday's friendly with Jamaica he should name his starting XI and promise that, fitness permitting, it will also be the side that lines up in Frankfurt in nine days time.

True, the Paraguayans might be able to tailor their own game-plan to suit England's. But that is surely preferable to Eriksson desperately tinkering with his own formation to counter a side who are unlikely to even progress beyond the group stage.

If the Swede genuinely believes his side are world champions in waiting - and, in public at least, that is exactly what he is continuing to claim - it is time that he started acting like it.

Otherwise, the only confusion apparent in three weeks' time will relate to how the Football Association came to put so much faith in such a dithering and indecisive manager.