Spain are the danger in World Cup, says Fabio Capello

Posted Tuesday, March 30, 2010 by theguardian.com

Spain are the danger in World Cup, says Fabio Capello
Fabio Capello fears the threat of the European champions this summer.

Fabio Capello has pinpointed Spain's strengths ahead of the World Cup, believing their confidence makes them hard to beat.

The European champions are the bookmakers' favourites to win this summer's competition in South Africa and Capello can understand why they are highly fancied.

He explained in an exclusive interview with the nation's Gol Television: "Spain have a confidence, a system of play that makes it difficult to beat them – and they don't rely on one player to score the goals."

Asked who else has the potential to win the World Cup, Capello said: "Brazil, I think, are a team who are very difficult to beat and Argentina have improved a lot since they qualified. Us and, as always, the Germans and Italians. Another team who are very good are Holland, they are young, have good players and could be a danger. But I have a lot of confidence in my team."

Capello has been impressed by the form of James Milner and Wayne Rooney during the current campaign.

The Italian explained: "This season the player who has improved most has been Milner. He's played three or four games for us and forms part of the national team.Rooney has scored a lot of goals this season. He's also scored a lot of goals with us but this season he's been impressive. I hope he maintains the same form until South Africa. He is like a bull, he's strong, he started playing at 16 with Everton and now he's matured and ready for all the games."

On England's preparations Capello said: "We are preparing very well. We have managed to find a very good site in South Africa and beforehand we are going to Austria to a place I know very well and have been to with Real Madrid and Roma – and for this I think it will be a good build-up. But the most important thing is that our good players are physically well because they are the players who make the difference."