"We started flat; you could call it a wake-up call ahead of next week, but whenever we've come off the back of a high intensity game we have been just a little bit too flat".
And then you play six high-level, high-intensity games.
"We've been playing so many high-intensity games," Di Matteo said.
If he cannot put himself forward to face San Marino and Montenegro, can Hodgson really consider Ferdinand fit for purpose for the demands of an international tournament, with the prospect of high-intensity games coming on top of one another in South American conditions in Brazil in summer 2014?
"A very, very high-intensity game".
Keith Van Horn, who simmered down from his high-intensity game Thursday, said of Kidd: "It always bothers me when people say he can't score.
Although his chance came in unfortunate circumstances, as Danny Welbeck damaged his knee midway through the first half, Wilshere seized the moment to enjoy a high-intensity game.
Now, as in 2013-14, a lack of midweek distractions can work in Liverpool's favour and may prove a greater advantage given the high-energy, high-intensity game that Klopp demands and his devotion to detail on the training ground.
They will have to do it the hard way now, facing a Brazil side that will have noted how the Dutch dulled Chile's high-intensity game, and will need to hope that the influential Arturo Vidal – barely fit before the tournament but heroic against the Spaniards – can set their tempo once more.
My concern is that he's going to be knackered, along with many of this England side, after a very long and gruelling season for Saracens; he's been playing as a key ball carrier for two sides who like to play a hard-hitting, high-intensity game since September.
