The DA

Japanese born Marcus Tanaka has caused a major upset by snatching the last spot in Fabio Capello’s 23 man World Cup squad. In the final friendly before England jet off to South Africa, Tanaka proved he could yet be a vital option for Capello’s side after tucking away a neat finish from a corner before leaping like a salmon to beat his hapless marker Emile Heskey and equalising for England.

The Italian said ‘it was tough to beat that centre half Heskey, he’s going places for Japan that’s for sure. Every ball into the box he was pelting into the stands or heading away to safety, I almost wish he was English, he’d be fantastic cover for John Terry. But Marcus proved he had what it takes to beat him today, and he’ll be an asset for sure.’

Capello is now set on his final 23 man squad and is likely to phone the seven players missing out tomorrow evening. ‘I plan to play with their emotions’ he added. ‘I’ll call and say something really casual like, hey how’s it going? What you up to big guy? Fancy booking a holiday to Malaga? and then I’ll laugh relentlessly down the phone before Franco Baldini does his ‘is your fridge running gag. He’s so good at that!’

South Africa was last night whistling loudly and politely not letting you past where they were standing after denying a power failure had completely crippled the opening match at Soccer City. ‘What’s that?’ said an inconspicuous security guard, ‘no that’s not the stadium, that’s just a big piece of metal farmers put down to scare away seagulls. Excuse me for two seconds, I think I can hear someone calling me.’

South Africa reportedly won the game 2-1 and seeing as no one could actually witness the match, why the hell not? South Africa captain Aaron Mokoena said ‘it was a great result for the lads really, considering we’d walked off the pitch assuming we’d lost 6-1. When we heard the score our officials had handed to journalists we were delighted. I scored the winner by the way…And it was a f***ing belter!’

The build up to the World Cup has been hit by a series of problems prompting fears of a chaotic summer but a South African tournament spokesmen said ‘no it hasn’t, prove it. Everything is going really, really well. Just don’t look left…or right…Holy s*** that’s a big f***ing gun. If I were you I’d swallow your wallet now, just do it! And f**ing duck!! You heard me, Get on the f**ing ground!!!!…Now, where was I?’

Gareth Barry is facing a race against time to prove to England head coach Fabio Capello that he has what it takes to stand up straight and pretend his ankle doesn’t hurt anymore, newspaper reports suggest. The Manchester City midfielder is currently making love to an oxygen tent, playing the boardgame ‘Operation’ everyday and taking daily dips in the fountain of youth in an attempt to show the England boss his leg is only half dangling off.

‘It’s feeling better all the time. Yesterday I almost didn’t pass out from the pain of standing up. I can’t really remember because obviously I blanked out but the physios said I was standing up for so long they nearly had time to dress me in an England kit. The metal strapping and genetically enhanced bull testicles tied to my waste really seem to be doing the trick. Please pick me Fabio, please. It’s either bull testicle Barry or Michael Carrick…’

Head of England supporters club Phil Inconfident believes it makes no difference whether Barry pretends to recover in time or not. ‘It’s not like when David Beckham was unfit, he actually does stuff. Barry’s role is to stand in the exact same spot, just outside the penalty area there, and a bit like a traffic cone, just force things to go wide. Technically, we could nip down to Homebase and buy a reasonably priced garden fence to do roughly the same job.’

Iranian comedian Omid Djalili has been heavily criticised for making his Mexico debut at Wembley last night, all in aid of a new Moneysupermarket.com promotional push targeting wealthy football players.

Djalili started the game unnoticed but after 20 minutes ran 50 yards out of his penalty box doing that annoying scream thing he does to inform Peter Crouch that he wasn’t getting the best deal on his home insurance. The Mexican stopper advised switching to a lower premium by comparing the best offers on the market immediately.

Mexico went on to lose the game 3-1 but despite the scoreline, Djalili believed he’d put in a good shift for his first game. ‘I’ve dabbled at right back but never been in goal before. It was the best place to discuss critical illness cover with the players really because every time there was a corner everyone came and hung around in my penalty box. I managed to take Wayne Rooney through some travel policy options too so the night wasn’t a complete disaster.

Stuart Pearce has revealed why Fabio Capello is paid half of Britain’s gross domestic income after shedding light on the Italians ingenious World Cup penalty plan. Capello has scrapped witch doctors, horse blinkers, tranquiliser darts, David Batty DVDs and Dale Winton replacing them with…get this…practise. Yes, the England squad will now practise taking penalties in preparation for a knock out showdown.

Pearce said ‘Fabio has really mastered this whole training thing. What he does is, watches a game of football, and then, sparing absolutely no detail, gets the players to practice specific areas of skill he has seen in the game, like defending or shooting for example. With penalties he’s got the boys lined up each holding a ball, walking to the penalty spot whilst we shout rude words in German accents and then making them kick the ball towards the goal. I’ve never seen anything like it before.’

Liverpool skipper Steven Gerrarrd has heaped praise on the new training regime. ‘Had we not had this invaluable lesson, I’d have walked up to the spot and wondered what the f*** I was supposed to be doing. It was always pretty confusing when a witch doctor was standing inside the 6 yard D saying she would turn me into a Merlin, frog whore if I didn’t put in the bottom left corner. And Dale Winton just used to shout ‘Bring on the Wall!!’ non stop, which was even worse.’