Behringer wants 'maximum points'

Melanie Behringer has declared that Germany have no intention of taking it easy in their final Group B game against Iceland, despite already being guaranteed first place in the section and progress to the UEFA WOMEN'S EURO 2009™ quarter-finals.

Early stand-out
The dynamic FC Bayern München winger was withdrawn midway through her side's 5-1 win against France on Thursday as a precautionary measure, but, by that time, her work was done. A stand-out performer from the first minute, Behringer's piercing runs and blistering set-piece delivery was a constant menace to her opponents' backline.

Ambition
It was a Behringer corner that led to Germany's second goal and the crucial third was also a product of the 23-year-old's right boot, when she drilled the ball through a ruck of bodies from yet another dead-ball situation to beat goalkeeper Sarah Bouhaddi. Ominously for Sunday's opponents, Iceland, she insisted Germany have no intention of slowing up, telling uefa.com: "We want to win against Iceland and go to Lahti with maximum points."

Lingering 'mistakes' 
"We didn't play a particularly good match against France, even though the result suggests otherwise," she added. "The thing is we have still made a lot of mistakes and the game didn't go exactly as we had wanted. We made life difficult for ourslelves. As we expected, France were very good on the ball and, when we gave them space, they made it tough for us. Actually, I think we performed better against Norway. We went two goals up without actually winning a lot of our individual duels and that's something we have to work on, because the goals won't always come so easily."

'Big plus'
"After the second goal, they had a really good spell in the game and they made it difficult for us," Behringer went on, "simply because they were comfortable on the ball. At that time, I certainly never thought we would win by such a huge margin. I'm pleased with my own performance against Norway and I guess I did OK against France." In the end, though, pragmatic Behringer did manage to find one or two aspects of Germany's victory worthy of acclaim. "The fact we had five different scorers against France was certainly a big plus," she said. "It's true we have a very good team at the moment, with strong individuals. Every player in our squad can score a goal and, of course, that's a good attribute."