For England, Spain and Brazil are the Scylla and Charybdis of this World Cup. To believe the sick man of Europe can finally put 1966 in a time capsule you have to believe the improvements wrought by Fabio Capello are sufficient to overcome the game's top two superpowers.
Last week England again reversed Sven-Goran Eriksson's mantra of first half good, second half not so good, to beat the best team in Africa. That just leaves the top sides in Europe and South America, who have inflicted hurt on Capello's men in friendly matches. Spain were 2-0 winners in February last year and Brazil prevailed 1-0 in Doha in November, a game that prompted pundits to say England's back-up boys were not good enough, in contrast to Wednesday's 3-1 victory over Egypt, after which everyone claimed the bench was bursting with match-winning talent.
We are close to the stage in World Cup build-ups where an amnesiac population start hectoring the players and coach to say yes, strike me dead if England don't go there and win it this time. Eriksson started out not wanting to go along with this premature triumphalism but succumbed in the end, lobbing the punters the sardine they wanted: "I think we will win it, of course."
Just as assessments of individual talent are weakened by an unwillingness to consider the quality of the opposition – Tommy Hotshot was a one-man tornado against Stoke but anonymous against Barcelona, strangely – so any appraisal of England's prospects in South Africa must start with an acknowledgment of how hard Spain and Brazil will be to shift.
Nor is it only those two fine teams but the five others currently ranked higher than Capello's: Holland, Italy (the world champions), Germany, Portugal and France. Not forgetting Argentina, who are managed by the self-detonating Diego Maradona but beat Germany in Munich in midweek. Spain and Brazil, though, are the Kauto Star of this summer's tournament. Realistically England jump off in the Gold Cup knowing there's nothing in the form book to say they should beat silky Spain or a Brazil XI who have dumped big-name narcissism in favour of industry and a lethal counterattacking style.
Spain's 2-0 win over France last week was their first on Gallic soil since 1968 and extended an already astounding run to 42 wins in 45 outings. Their only defeat in that time was to America at the Confederations Cup. Here our racing experts toss their trilbys. If the US can beat Spain, and England beat the US, who are in their World Cup qualifying group, then surely the form line says ...
No it doesn't. In Spain's starting line-up in Paris: Iker Casillas, Carles Puyol, Xabi Alonso, David Villa, Cesc Fábregas, Andrés Iniesta, David Silva. Villa scored his 36th international goal in 55 appearances. In nets Casillas collected his 102nd cap, Xavi Hernández, Pepe Reina, Fernando Torres and Marcos Senna warmed the bench before trotting on. Imagine having Casillas and Reina to choose from in goal. Capello, meanwhile, is sweating over whether David James should be replaced by Robert Green.
They say Brazil have "problems". But these seem entirely political, as they often are with the five-times World Cup winners. The dilettante Ronaldinho has woken up under Leonardo's management at Milan, so now Dunga is under pressure to restore the slimmed-down shimmy-star. The coach, though, has his core of humble patriots and his pattern of play, which is to absorb attacks with the help of two screening midfielders (Gilberto Silva and Felipe Melo), then dispatch overlapping full-backs on their merry way while Kaká probes in the No10 position and LuÃs Fabiano scores the goals at centre-forward.
England's strengths and weaknesses are a whole other seminar. They cannot be examined in isolation, though, because the road to the final runs through countries demonstrably better equipped to win this World Cup and because England display specific historical failings that Capello will need to cure if they are to play the same possession game as the nations who have won World Cups since 1966.
The bad news is that this requires a profound cultural shift, even if most of Capello's starting XI are Champions League regulars. Gary Neville, who has played at five international tournaments, and is interviewed on pages 10-11, confirmed this theory while discounting the argument that England could be sunk without a Gilberto or a Melo. Or an Owen Hargreaves.
"I've always found in the World Cup that we can burn ourselves out because we're playing every four days and we're all running round like mad men when we need people to control the ball," Neville said. "Carrick and Gerrard and Lampard and Barry – people who've played at clubs who control the tempo of the game – are a better bet than putting a destroyer in there."
Capello has accentuated England's virtues and concealed their flaws. His management will bestow on a sprinkling of world-class players their best hope since France 98 of putting 1966 in a box with 1066 and all that. But let's see them sail through the Strait of Messina.
