The classic England-Germany encounter in the new, revamped Wembley Stadium will certainly be one to watch on Wednesday. The last time such a game was played at the old stadium, Oliver Bierhoff said before the match: "It would be nice to score a hat-trick there."

The German golden-goal pioneer was hoping some of the Euro 1996 glory would return. And Germany did win as Dietmar Hamann launched one of his missiles into David Seaman's net, Kevin Keegan resigned - and Wembley was rebuilt.

This time the English will be missing Steven Gerrard, Owen Hargreaves and others due to injury, but they still have Frank Lampard and David Beckham in their midfield. Germany are missing Michael Ballack and Thorsten Frings, the heart of their midfield. When one of these two gets injured or needs to be replaced, the normal substitute would be Tim Borowski, but he, too, is injured. And Bastian Schweinsteiger withdrew from the national squad after picking up an injury during Bayern's weekend Bundesliga match.

In attack, Miroslav Klose, Lucas Podolski and Mario Gomez (Germany's Player of the Year) are all out with injuries, leaving Kevin Kuranyi as the main attacker. In midfield, Thomas Hitzelperger could cause some problems with his left foot.

Both teams are going to field experimental sides and the youngsters have an opportunity to make an impression. It will be up to the players' ambition and belief (interestingly, Arsenal keeper Jens Lehmann has said that he believes the English lack a winning mentality).