BUHLERTAL, Germany, June 13 - England captain David Beckham believes striker Michael Owen will come good in the World Cup despite his early substitution against Paraguay.

England captain David Beckham talks to the media at their World Cup soccer training camp at the Mittelbergstadion near Baden-Baden in Germany June 13, 2006. [Reuters]

Owen, who looked well short of his usual sharpness in Saturday's 1-0 victory in sweltering conditions, lasted only 10 minutes of the second half in England's Group B opener.

The striker has played only once for Newcastle United this year since breaking a bone in his foot on December 31 and has been fighting to reach peak match fitness.

Defending his England team mate at a news conference on Tuesday, Beckham said: "I wouldn't say he's not at his best.

"But when he's not played for a while, getting his fitness back up to a certain level is important.

"With Michael coming back, he got 55 minutes the other day and (those) 55 minutes were good, especially in the first half. He's got his fitness levels back up.

"Michael will come good -- he always does in big competitions."

Owen and the rest of the England players were all toiling in the hot conditions at the Waldstadion in Frankfurt, where temperatures soared to reach 29 Celsius (84 Fahrenheit).

Beckham believed the conditions were no excuse, though, for a performance which fell markedly during the second half after a bright start.

"We've already spoken about the heat in the game and I'm not going to speak about it any more because we can't just blame our performance on the heat," said the skipper.

"We've played in it before, we're better players than that and we know we can put in a better performance than that."

England and Owen get a chance to improve on Saturday's showing when their group campaign continues against Trinidad & Tobago on Thursday in Nuremberg.

"We always though it would be a tough group with tough games," Beckham said. "And we've got that already."