You may recall from entry 1, that I am writing a lighthearted weekly blog on my progress towards attending the World Cup in July. Budget required £2,500 : current saving nil. Tickets to hand, none. In addition will be profiling characters involved; the host nation and previous England World Cup adventures.

Call me stupid if you like, but am gearing myself up for attending both semi finals and final, where I fully expect England to be featuring on July 11, in Jo'burg. A massive gamble some might say, but having examined the profile of our manager, feel that Fabio will be the man to see us through.

Capello will be 64 come the final; born June 18, 1946 in San Canzian (top right hand side of Italy). He has been married to Laura for over 40 years and has a son Pierfilippo, who acts as his agent. His pastimes include collecting fine art and listening to Opera / classical music. The FA brought Capello to England due to his no nonsense approach to football, winning mentality and a solid stability to his personal back ground. (Unlike one or two previous managers).

His playing career spanned the 1960's through to 1980 picking up 33 caps along the way playing as a midfielder. He was the mainstay of the famous 70's Juventus side. By his own admission his favourite moment was scoring for Italy at Wembley in a one nil win ,Nov 1973.

His managing career has spanned since 1983 through to now. England is his first national post but he has had success at massive clubs AC Milan and Real Madrid. Real Madrid won La Liga in May 2007 under Capello (after many baron years). Unfortunately, Real fans didn't care for Capello's defensive, ball retaining tactics (after being brought up on attacking flair) and he was sacked a month later.

During his early matches with England you could clearly detect that our boys were trying to retain possession a lot more. It looked uncomfortable for some. More recently players have become used to his methods and results have improved dramatically.

He says that " winning is everything and much more important than playing beautifully".

A disciplinarian who may just squeeze that extra 5%, which will bring us success.

Back to my progress; have laid two unsuccessful bets this week. £20 scorecast on Painton to score first and Swindon 1 Fulham nil at 50/1 (FA cup match that I attended ) and £20 scorecast Snodgrass to score first and Leeds 1 Man Utd 0 at 55/1 . That's £40 spent so far. Never mind, will continue to lay out.

The third phase of the official World Cup 2010 ticket sales is currently underway. It is a lottery to be drawn mid to late Jan 2010. I have requested 2 tickets for each semi and the final at CAT 3, potential cost £1,100 in total. Chances of success are very slim. Watch out for the next blog later in the month. It will feature some memories from 1970.