England Team Thread

[Kongster]

2-0 to England. Joe Cole with a brace.

[ezee ryder]

He has been the spark England have needed, they have saved face this time. I fear for them against Croatia though.

[abigsmurf]

What would England do without Joe Cole? Missed both of the goals due to atmospheric interference. First half was typically mediocre.

Think Capello's approach of cycling the captaincy was focusing in the wrong area. He needed to make far bigger experiments in the friendlies, we need a fundamentally different approach

[prinnysquad]

England =
Gash!

Nevermind, I'm watching paint dry tomorrow.

[gizmo1990]

I don't think Capello can be blamed much for Englands performance. The subs he made shows he knows his stuff.

The simple fact is that the players Capello has to pick from are not good enough to break (even poor ones!) teams down. Technically they are poor and creatively they are non existant.

Utterly overpaid with inflated opinions of themselves brought about by the media and our own stupid notion of us being any good. Oh for the days of Italia '90..

Thought's on Wednesdays game? I'm going with 2-0 to Croatia.

[abigsmurf]

Personally, I'm getting pissed off with the "overpayed players who don't care" talk. The players are struggling, there's no doubt about that and it doesn't seem to be one issue.

Yes playing for England is high profile but look at it from the player's point of view. They're in the middle of their domestic season which, for 3/4 of the players, means they're in the middle of a title race (or at least a champions league spot). That's a fair bit of pressure in itself.

Now they've been called up for England. That's some more pressure on them. The press have been laying into England on past performances, you've got the knowledge that if anything goes wrong, you could be the guy on the back pages for the wrong reasons (Beckham, Rooney and Lampard have all had especially venomous headlines). You've got players worrying more about the headlines than anything else.

Support from the fans? Forget it, if things get difficult, first they get a bit quiet, then the boos start. Domestically, fans would push on them try to raise them so they get the drive and confidence to attack. They may boo as you leave the pitch but I can't remember the last time I've seen a premier league game with fans booing their own side whilst the game is going on.

How are players supposed to deal with attacks from all fronts? I don't care how much they get paid, if I read nothing but critisism of me for a week, had people booing me and hurling abuse, I'd be a wreck.

England do need a reform, they need a fresh start and a new approach. However England's 'support' and the media are a disgrace. Until people actually try to raise England's spirits rather than crush them, we're going to keep seeing performances like these from players who frankly, don't want to be there but have no choice; the only thing worse than playing badly for England would be refusing to play for England (could you imagine what would happen if a young-ish, fit player said 'no, I dont want to play for England?')

[ezee ryder]

All big international teams (although I wouldn't class England as a big international team anymore) have to deal with this pressure from the media and fans not just England players so that is not an excuse. It seem the England players just don't know how to deal with it and that is quite poor for big time professional footballers. The pressure is part and parcel of being a professional footballer these days so I do not feel sorry for them at all. You can only support what is infront of you, if the players are not giving it there all the fans and media (although the media can overblow it sometimes) will let them know.

[abigsmurf]

I've never seen any team have to deal with the kind of pressure and venom that England players currently deal with from their own fans. This is above and beyond 'playing for your country'. Yes teams get stick if they under perform but usually it's not before or during games, it's once they've arrived back on the plane.

Players should dread coming back as failures. They shouldn't ever dread being on the pitch.

There should be a sense of pride playing for your country, how can you have any pride if you feel like the only people not out to get you are the rest of your squad members?

[davidcotton]

Yes playing for England is high profile but look at it from the player's point of view. They're in the middle of their domestic season which, for 3/4 of the players, means they're in the middle of a title race (or at least a champions league spot). That's a fair bit of pressure in itself.

the only thing worse than playing badly for England would be refusing to play for England (could you imagine what would happen if a young-ish, fit player said 'no, I dont want to play for England?')

Two points there. 1) The premier league has just started and they've played what 3/4 matches? Hardly the middle of a long hard season. 2)Wasn't it David Bentley (someone correct me if I'm wrong)who said that he didn't want to turn up for the england under 21's due to exhaustion? Look at all the comments that were thrown his way for that.

[FreelancePolice]

I heard an interesting viewpoint on talk sport, they were talking about how the majority of international teams like andorra, macedonia etc. are often worse quality than the majority of championship teams. The difference comes in that they play as a unit while we seem to have 11 individuals on the pitch.

The main problem in my eyes is that although he says no one is undroppable, he still refuses to drop certain players and it's hampering our progress. Even though beckham didn't start he still came on later. It's ridiculous to even include him in the squad

[Matt]

Beckham came on last night and done a good job - sit in the middle, play simple balls, don't go for the long pass unless it's on. While his age is showing and he can't get up the wing like he used to, he's still a quality player. I'd prefer him to sit in the middle of the park next game, with Lampard attacking.

But what other real right wing options are there? Theo was very good last night at what he does, but there's no end ball from him. That's a big problem all round. Downing couldn't clear the front man half the time on his corners, so Lampard took over.

People have to be honest and admit England do lack real world class cutting edge players.

As seems to be the usual situation, the only person who turned up and performed well for England was J. Cole.

[toythatkills]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/internationals/7604687.stm

Winger Joe Cole says England will adopt a defensive approach against Croatia in Wednesday's crunch World Cup qualifier.

We might as well just give them the three points now. This is how they lost to Croatia at Wembley, FFS, let alone every other game they ever try to sit back in.

[gizmo1990]

People have to be honest and admit England do lack real world class cutting edge players.

This.

Why can't people in this country get that fact into their heads?

[toythatkills]

Because it's not true. For goodness sake.

[ezee ryder]

Gotta agree with Chain and gizmo, it is true. Our truly world class players are in the defenseive areas (Ferdinand? Terry?), the rest of the players are good but not world class. As much as it pains me to admit it, Rooney is not world class. He is good (maybe very good) but not up their with the elite. A few years ago him and Ronaldo were at the same level as they both had the potential to be world class. Ronaldo realised his potential whereas Rooney has been left behind. Don't even get me started on Lampard and Gerrard......