Is Roy Hodgson taking the pi""

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/worldcup2014/article-2664736/Please-dont-quit-skipper-Roy-Hodgson-wants-Steven-Gerrard-play-England-Euro-2016.html

We've just witnessed 2 completely inept performances by our captain, that lacked energy, guile, leadership on the field...and Hodgson wants Gerrard to stay on until 2016?

Pathetic.....and we think we'll change our approach for the future? Bollocks

I can see you're hopping mad bluey and I have to agree with you. Gerrard should never play for England again, he's the past. Let's try and blood someone we think will be around for a good few years. If Gerrard was as effective as Pirlo, I'd say keep him. But he isn't. Get rid of the DJ thumping toerag.

It's nothing short of shit Dawg.....and for that comment alone, Roy needs sacking, immediately. What a cock.

Rooney will be 32 at the next World Cup....wouldn't it be nice to have a National manager that says "you know England, fuck your sponsorships, I'm employed to make our team better for the next WC, therefore, for the next 2 years I'm going to select young players I can mould and give them an identity, one that makes them proud to wear the shirt. Gone are the prima donnas of the PL, gone are the overpaid, sponsor-laden so-called superstars...I'm picking hungry youth to work with, give them an opportunity and make them National heroes".

The likes of Lampard, Rooney and Gerrard have had great PL careers...but none of them, absolutely none of them, can be called world class, now or ever....they always have let us down in tournament football.

The likes of Shaw, Barkley, Stones, Flanagan, Lallana, Sterling, Sturridge, Shawcross...will all be given a chance to stake their claim for the Euro's..

Will it happen? Will it fuck. Pathetic.

blueboy wrote:The likes of Shaw, Barkley, Stones, Flanagan, Lallana, Sterling, Sturridge, Shawcross...will all be given a chance to stake their claim for the Euro's...

Damn right! And if they prove to be as incapable as the last lot, so be it, but they should at least be given a shot. In fact, they should be given a shot right now, while the pressure's off. Let them go out there and show us, and the world, what they can do. Let them live or die by their own hand, rather than being dismissed in favour of the so-called "Golden Generation" who weren't even that gold when they reached successive quarter finals.

The only change I'd make to your list would be to include Jay Rodriguez, assuming he recovers fully from that awful injury he picked up at ours. That made me sad, he'd worked so hard to get shortlisted as well, he deserved it purely because he wanted it so much. Same with all those you mentioned, they've fought for the right to play and so they should.

Fuck protocol! Fuck sponsorship! Fuck all this focus on one single player! Let's get a national side who are proud to pull on that shirt and hungry to play, to do or die! Is someone playing rousing music, or is it just me?

blueboy wrote:The likes of Shaw, Barkley, Stones, Flanagan, Lallana, Sterling, Sturridge, Shawcross...will all be given a chance to stake their claim for the Euro's..

Will it happen? Will it fuck. Pathetic.

And guess who's captain tomorrow...that's right, it's Lampard. Another step forward!

So much for giving the youth a try, then   

Still pandering to sentiment. Is Frank one of the best 15 let alone best 11 these days? I don't think so. The only reason he's playing is because it will be his last ever game for England. It's all bollocks. We know it's all bollocks. We have hope that one day it won't be bollocks. But we know that it will always be bollocks.

Topdawg wrote:Still pandering to sentiment. Is Frank one of the best 15 let alone best 11 these days? I don't think so. The only reason he's playing is because it will be his last ever game for England. It's all bollocks. We know it's all bollocks. We have hope that one day it won't be bollocks. But we know that it will always be bollocks.

Stop talking bollocks Dawg..  

They were winding down in Urca on Sunday. The £80,000 media centre, the largest of its kind at the World Cup, bigger even than that of hosts Brazil, was being prepared to be dismantled.
The giant, dramatic photographs of England manager Roy Hodgson and his squad will be carted away and consigned to the dustbin, much like this blighted campaign.
There was one final training session, one last round of media commitments for the manager and his captain, Steven Gerrard, one last look at the pretty bay that was the backdrop to these daily routines, all blue ocean and white triangles afloat. That stuff seems to matter to the Football Association.

It wasn’t the most convenient training ground, maybe not the best equipped, but it was the most photogenic. The FA got the image just right. The football, not so much. Maybe one day they will again realise what the ‘F’ in their name stands for. In the meantime, a new campaign begins in September and there are seats to fill and kits to sell. There always are.
England could have trained at the home of Flamengo of Rio de Janeiro, where Holland reside. The city of Belo Horizonte, journey’s end tomorrow, was desperate to have them, too. Cruzeiro, the current Brazilian champions, are instead playing host to Chile at their base, Toca da Raposa II. And Chile seem to be doing all right.
There may be a reason for this. Chile blew into Rio last week, before blowing Spain away at the Maracana Stadium. It is fair to say they do things differently there.

Back home, we used to take the kids to parties at a place called the Wacky Warehouse. At the Radisson hotel in Barra da Tijuca, to Rio de Janeiro’s west, it was recreated. Chile transformed their pre-match base, briefly, into a giant play pen. It was carnage. Chile con carnage, if you will.
The noise hit you at the lifts. It was as if they had filled the place with laughing gas. The Dom Rosso Grill Bar was in uproar. Kids were riding each other like horses between tables, or running around in dizzying, furious circles, beautiful young women were swaying to the buffet holding caipirinhas, there were fans seeking autographs and photographs, and friends and families, all talking excitedly, hooting, hollering, posing, eating, drinking, greeting, hugging and ignoring the mayhem apart from indulging the odd insistent toddler’s demonstration of a forward roll or how many times one could spin before falling over.
And in the middle of it all were the Chilean team. Coaches, staff, players, the soon-to-be conquerors of the world champions. Their coach, Jorge Sampaoli, sat with his feet resting on a table in the lobby with some mates, the squad took over the restaurant, talking casually to their partners and pals in large groups. It was an amazing sight.

The following day they would sweep tiki-taka aside as if it was as relevant to the modern game as the W formation, but it was already plain to all witnesses in the hotel that Spain had no chance. Here was a team entirely at home at the World Cup, natural and unaffected.
Later as a liftload of players went down to an insanely late team meeting, Alexis Sanchez could be seen still shovelling forkfuls of dessert into his mouth as they descended.
And one thought occurred: that will never be us. No matter how hard England try to engage, assimilate, charm and chill out around a major tournament they will never be secure like Chile. They are too hyped up, in a commercial sense, too oversold.

The FA does not see the basic disconnection between dumbing down — they call it managing — expectations and a marketing arm that makes Goldman Sachs appear modest in its financial aims.
The team becomes the collateral damage of this. They played Uruguay last week like frightened men and no amount of favela visits, good deeds, seafront walks, psychiatrists or on-message press briefings is going to change that.
See England trying to relax in Brazil. God, it is painful. They walk along the beach at a designated time, desperate to appear casual, but sticking out like a bloke in an overcoat on Copacabana. They might as well be in full kit. There are photographers and cameramen because this down time invariably doubles as a media photo-opportunity, and the expedition ends with Gary Neville telling some busy Brazilian snapper to eff off.
Later, players arrive before the press with instructions on what can, and cannot, be said. When Daniel Sturridge talked three days before the Uruguay game, an FA policy wonk made notes and showed them to him, as he went, like he was an imbecile in need of constant coaching.
Even Justin Bieber is allowed freedom of expression. Raheem Sterling spoke on the condition he had a chaperone in Frank Lampard. ‘The management are more comfortable with this,’ it was explained. And then the big match comes and we wonder why our players are nervous, intimidated and unable to make the independent-minded decisions that win games.
After the defeat by Italy, Leighton Baines walked through the area in which post-match interviews are conducted and appeared willing to take questions. Then a thought occurred. ‘I’m not on the list, am I?’ he asked his FA minder, suddenly shorn of confidence. No, he was told. He apologised and moved on, effectively gagged.

And this is not a moan about press relations. Players can speak, or not, as they wish. But it has to be their choice. Have no doubt, this malaise bleeds into performance. Baines is a bright bloke. Bright enough to know that he had just had a poor game for England but honest enough to front it up. If self-determination is not allowed, though, his whole persona is undermined.
Alan Hansen told the BBC a major problem against Italy was that Baines did not demand sufficient protection from Wayne Rooney. Ashley Cole, he said, with his 107 caps would have had no qualms about insisting Rooney got three yards nearer the touchline and stopped the runs that killed England.
Hansen felt Baines did not have the confidence to insist on this. Yet when will he develop it, if he is not even trusted to discuss his own performance after a game, like a man?
Don’t mention Andrea Pirlo, don’t mention Luis Suarez, don’t mention the Falklands War, yet once again, England’s exit seems as much to do with the mind as the body. Yes, the defence made mistakes and Gerrard misjudged his header, but a late Uruguayan goal might have been an irrelevance had England’s performance in the 85 minutes leading up to it been bolder and braver.
How is that achieved, though, when the children of the Chilean players are allowed greater freedom than England’s footballers? How do we mature to the point where we feel comfortable at a tournament?

Chile were not under orders to appear relaxed. It was just the way they were. As Spain discovered, they are deadly serious when it comes to the football. Yet it was the casual details, the small stuff, that equally impressed. They looked at ease and were trusted. Trusted to be their own men. Trusted to remain professional, even when cut a great deal of slack.
They were treated like grown-ups, so they played like grown-ups. If an England player is not left alone to make even the simplest decision in front of nothing more dangerous than a microphone, how will he develop the wit to think smartly as a player?
It used to be that England stayed in extreme remote locations shut off from the outside world. Glenn Hoddle’s team were clinging to France’s west coast in La Baule in 1998, while Sven Goran Eriksson chose a hotel surrounded by a moat in Japan and then one halfway up a mountain in Germany.
The way it was going, it would not have surprised had the next headquarters been subterranean, or inside a volcano, the England manager petting a white Turkish Angora like Ian Fleming’s Blofeld.
Instead, the chiefs of Club England — another ludicrous branding exercise, all style and no substance — decided the team should now be in the business of winning hearts and minds. City centre bases, charity exercises.

There is an episode of Armando Iannucci’s superb political satire Veep in which the vice-president, Selina Meyer, is left with an unexpected gap in her schedule. ‘Come on,’ she tells her head of communications, Mike, ‘let’s go somewhere, let’s meet the public.’
‘You want to normalise it?’ he asks.
‘Yes, exactly,’ she says. ‘I want to meet some regular normals! Where are we going to find them?’
Mike is delighted. ‘A photo op with the normals and the normalistas!’ he exclaims. And you think they don’t have conversations like that at the FA?

After a World Cup exit, there is always the temptation to reverse every decision that was made. The WAGs circus in Baden-Baden was widely believed to have had a negative effect on England in 2006, so in 2010 Fabio Capello took the team to an upcountry outpost in South Africa that sounded about as much fun as that hotel in The Shining.
Since then, at the 2012 European Championship and here, the FA has decided England should be more immersed in the tournament in Krakow and Rio de Janeiro. Always engaging at the appropriate time, of course, in the right circumstances, and under controlled conditions.
Sturridge let the cat out of the bag when he discussed the team’s favela visit. ‘It would have been nice to go inside the favela,’ he said wistfully. The players had stopped short at a community centre outside Rocinha, Rio’s largest slum.
They were permitted to say they were moved by the experience. And then, as usual, they all went home.

The FA charter plane, top heavy with England’s bloated World Cup party of around 80 underperforming personnel, will touch down first in Manchester and then Luton on Wednesday afternoon on their hasty retreat from Brazil.
The pampered underachievers — both players and officials — will scuttle towards a convoy of chauffeured cars and then home to their families.
There will be no welcoming party of England fans thankful for having been entertained by their heroes on the greatest football stage in the world. Just a miserable retreat for a pathetic Team England.

What an unedifying — but fitting — end to this World Cup debacle. This was the team of athletes, coaches, and a myriad of experts that flew from England in the belief that they would be the ‘best prepared team at the World Cup’.
What they weren’t prepared for, and neither were the fans who paid thousands of pounds to follow a dream to Brazil, was that England would be out eight days after the tournament had begun.
Even now, the humiliation may not be over. England play Costa Rica on Tuesday night in Belo Horizonte. If they lose, this will be their most miserable World Cup since 1950 when England were defeated by the USA in the same city. At least in those days England managed one victory, a 2-0 win over Chile in Rio.
That tweed-and-brogue clad party numbered only 17 players, four referees, two trainers, eight sports writers and the manager. It was long before an England team needed an army of sports scientists.
So how did it come to this? And how did we get to the stage that the FA’s reaction is to keep calm and carry on?
The FA’s blundering chairman Greg Dyke’s timing on Friday was bizarre in the face of such an abject display. A time for review or consideration? Best to review the operations of the whole England set-up? No, Dyke blurted out his and the FA’s full support for Roy Hodgson just minutes before Costa Rica scored the goal against Italy that sealed England’s fate.

Dyke, who likes a report as his ill-conceived England Commission shows, should have, at the very least, played a straight bat when asked about Hodgson’s future. Then he should have set about a root-and-branch review of England’s approach to this World Cup. The starting point? What exactly did everyone in that ridiculously excessive FA party — only Germany had a bigger delegation — do to justify their place in Brazil?
Not a lot in many cases. Trevor Brooking, England’s retiring director of football development who somehow thinks England can win the World Cup in 2018, made a short address in a ceremony in a Miami cathedral to mark the 60th anniversary of the D-Day landings. Apart from that his only noticeable contribution seems to have been endlessly walking around the training ground keeping fit.

Dyke might also ask why England need a load of blazers hanging around the hotel with nothing to do but wait for the next free drink or dinner.
The defunct dinosaur international committee, who haven’t had a meeting for three years since being marginalised by the Club England set-up, still had Robert Coar and Dave Barnard in Miami. Then another four — Ivan Gazidis, Keith Lamb, Peter Barnes and Barry Taylor — took their places on the FA gravy train for the Brazil leg.
And as if this isn’t enough freeloading largesse, Tottenham’s Darren Eales has arrived for the meaningless match against Costa Rica because Gazidis went home after the Uruguay humiliation.
Team England flew out with all manner of specialists: fitness and conditioning coaches, doctors, sports scientists, video analysts, security officers, four Club England and FA executives and numerous commercial figures.
The whole team will fly back as what Jose Mourinho might call ‘specialists in failure’.

Perhaps the most heralded member of the team was the acclaimed sports psychiatrist Steve Peters. But he has cut a timid, detached figure, who did nothing either to empower Steven Gerrard and his team-mates.
One leading European coach asked: ‘When is the last time that group of players lined up in the tunnel with a look about them that said to the opposition: “You’re gonna have to play well to beat us today, lads”.’
The answer is probably against Portugal, in the quarter-final of the World Cup in Gelsenkirchen. It was there that England played for an hour with 10 men and were beaten, inevitably, in a penalty shootout.
Dyke, who attended a couple of training sessions at the Urca military base, should also demand specific data on the impact of so many sports scientists.
England had the best of everything — except the football. At their base in Urca, the FA lavished over £100,000 on ensuring the training pitch was up to standard yet used it on just seven occasions; likewise the media centre, which cost £80,000, partly paid by sponsors Vauxhall, to install.

This extravagance was also in evidence during the squad’s three weeks of training before they arrived in Rio. The FA spent more than £100million building a national training centre at St George’s Park outside Burton, yet had less than three full days there during that time. Instead they preferred to go to the Algarve — colder than Burton for part of the week — and then on to Miami at the start of the hurricane season with the first day’s training washed out by rain.
And only the FA in their wisdom could complete their World Cup from hell by having a closed training session on Sunday when already out of competition. How much better it would have been to let in fans, who have been totally let down by England, to watch them practise.
It was ‘business as usual on a match day minus two,’ said an FA spokesman. Try telling that to the short-changed England supporter.
The FA have a habit of putting a positive spin on everything. Why even this World Cup has been a success: due to FIFA appearance money for World Cup finalists they will make a net profit from their brief stay in Brazil.
Nowhere was the FA’s financial obsession better illustrated than when the team was used as clothes horses for kit suppliers Nike’s vast wardrobe of gear. The smiles of the FA officials and staff at England’s military training base on Sunday said it all. School’s out. Soon enough they will pack up their boxes of Nike T-shirts, shorts and socks and travel home with the rest of the team.

This has been an appalling World Cup campaign and yet the public are supposed to accept the same, dreadful excuses from the FA.
To the outsider, no one is really taking this shameful experience seriously enough within that organisation. When Germany, Holland and France have found themselves in similar positions, they have opted for a cathartic overhaul.
Not England. At their training camp, you are met by armed, Brazilian military personnel on the way in. Once inside, there is a cossetted, almost arrogant, atmosphere. We are England, it says. We know best.
Hodgson is a lovely, charming man. But he has proved beyond reasonable doubt he cannot lead England to success at tournament football. The facts speak for themselves.
‘The players gave me everything I could have asked for and more,’ Hodgson claimed and that proves the point. If they really have given him everything and more, and still lost their opening two group games, there is something profoundly wrong.
Every time England come up against elite competition, they get well beaten. Every. Single. Time.
That the jobs of Hodgson and his assistants are safe after such a fiasco – even before the last dead rubber of is played — is beyond belief.
However, it is worth casting the mind back to England’s Ashes surrender in Australia last winter. England Cricket Board chairman Giles Clarke was adamant that Andy Flower would remain in charge. And Flower, like Hodgson insisted, couldn’t see any reason why he shouldn’t.
A month later Flower, once out of the England bubble of a major sporting event, realised the depth of national feeling and resigned. He admitted that those who had questioned him had been right all along.
Hodgson should do the same, but he won’t.

The way the players are expected to behave is more like an FA marketing exercise than an international competition.  It's essentially an extension of how they're expected to be during the league season.  You can hear all the trite phrases being trotted out all the time.  It's like nobody can actually speak the truth any more for fear of upsetting the sponsors.

Is it just me, though?  Instead of "The lads performed well", is it too much to ask for the manager to instead say, "Well, we had a lot of possession, but we struggled to get past the defence and when we did, we had nobody with a killer instinct."  I mean, surely that's what we were all thinking?

No, we can't be seen to be telling the truth, no matter how obvious it is.  We can't upset the sponsors by admitting to the failings as they're the ones pouring the money in.  Perhaps if the FA weren't so hell bent on spending a fortune trying to make us look good then it wouldn't be an issue.  Perhaps they should try doing something more constructive with the funds.  Off the top of my head, perhaps use it to ensure we produce players who will actually BE good. If we did that, we wouldn't need the hype machine, we'd just let them do what they do best.

I think we'd all like a little honesty....but as the articles state, it's a media machine, run by people who have no idea about football.

As said the other day, the sooner we sack the majority of those involved in Club England and that includes Roy Hodgson, the better. Let's face it, the board selected Roy, he picked the squad, he set up training, he is the man who makes team selections...and it's been nothing short of an absolute failure. Why do they deserve to keep their jobs?

I'm glad 2 of the most respected Journalists wrote those articles, Samuel and Neil Ashton...I just hope others follow suit and demand a complete change...and that includes Greg 'the cock' Dyke.

To be honest though blue, i personally don't think we've been well beaten at all though....if anything, i don't think we actually deserved to lose either game. That said, we did and we have to look into the reasons why we did.
Whether it's the players, coaches or overall set up needs looking at (or indeed all 3) is up for discussion and i guess there's valid reasons as to why we failed in all 3 areas.

Personally speaking, we have to revert to pumping money into grass roots football and limiting the number of foreign players to PL clubs. Until this happens we're never gonna give enough youngster coming through a chance in the PL.

Oh and the "Chile con carnage" line is pure gold blue    

I'll accept that we were unlucky to lose both games, but we did lose them. But we also aided our own downfall by not sorting out the left against Italy.

Govin should have been sent off for Uruguay and we'd have been in the driving seat then. We may not have won, but we'd have had a better chance. We also led to our own downfall in that match with piss poor defending.

Letting Lampard play because it's his last game is just outrageous beyond belief. Why is Gerrard gonna be a sub?

It's jobs for the boys t the FA and look after your mates because they'll look after you. Not much different to FIFA really.

I honestly dont mind Lampard gettin a final game
He's been a great servant and let's be honest he cant be any worse than Gerrard was
The match is a dead rubber, the Ox is out injured so he can do as good a job as anyone
Im not worried about the MF We have some good youngsters coming through who will all get their chance.
Its the defence & attack Im worried about. At CF we have Sturridge that's it. No one coming through. Rooney has proved he cant do it, Lambert is too old, Carroll is shit
Defensively Baines, Jagielka Cahill & Johnson were just about the best we had. Maybe Flanagan & Shaw could have done better maybe not but we are not exactly spoilt for choice in any of the back 4 positions, Cant see us fairing any better at the Euros in 2 years time or the next WC

Massive changes need to be made IMO or we  will be further left behind in world football

Limiting the amount of foreigners in the PL & Championship is a must & needs to happen quickly
Getting the top B Team's more and better competition is also vital so I know Den & others dont like it but Dykes idea of playing the B teams in the 3rd div is a good idea unless Den u can think of a better way

The international team should come before club football so whatever is required to prevent this summers debacle happening again should be tried in my view

I disagree, club football before international football for me.

That's fine as long as ur expectations for England remain the same as they were for this tournament

shakencity wrote:Personally speaking, we have to revert to pumping money into grass roots football and limiting the number of foreign players to PL clubs. Until this happens we're never gonna give enough youngster coming through a chance in the PL.

Precisely! It's at youth level where we need to make the biggest difference. Most lads want to play football and I can't help but wonder how many talented boys are sitting at their Playstations instead of being outside playing football and looking at a promising future playing the game. I personally know of four or five lads, who I've managed in the past, who have no chance because they can't afford to pursue it. And making it possible for them to actually get into the upper echelons will be a great help.

The FA makes enough money. If they want the national team to succeed, they should get the youngsters playing the sport for real and not via computer games.

TMG wrote:Getting the top B Team's more and better competition is also vital so I know Den & others dont like it but Dykes idea of playing the B teams in the 3rd div is a good idea unless Den u can think of a better way

I disagree with this B team proposal. There's a reserves league in place that's been there for many years and this already gives the lads some decent competition to play against. We don't need another tier consisting of B teams and Conference sides, this isn't enough competition. The only possible advantage is the teams might be able to get through to the latter stages of the FA or League Cup, but then what happens when, say, our B team gets drawn against our first team?

Reducing the number of foreign players, as you suggested yourself, will open the doors to better competition automatically as there'd be more places available for them to slot in to.

ManCityMan wrote:I disagree, club football before international football for me.

Says the man from Scotland   

Which has what to do with preferring club football to international exactly ? :-)

Hang on, we've got the likes of the following playing at the WC:

Brian Ruiz
Jo
Gary Medel
Corluka
Jelavic
Tim Cahill
Massimo Luongo (Swindon)
Jean Beausejour (Wigan)
Gary Medel (Cardiff)
Gonzalo Jara (Notts Forest)
Ron Vlaar
Leroy Fer
Pablo Armero (West Ham)
Maya Yoshida
Diego Lugano (WBA)
Gaston Ramirez
Maynor Fugueroa
Juan Carlos Garcia (Wigan)
Wilson Palacios
Roger Espinoza (Wigan)
Reza Ghoochannejhad (Charlton)
Ashkan Dejaga (Fulham)
Joseph Yobo
Efe Ambrose (Celtic)
Peter Odemwingie
Victor Moses
Kenneth Omeruo (Boro)
Shola Ameobi
Albert Adomah (Boro)
Jozy Altidore
Geoff Cameron (Stoke)
Essaid Belkalem (Watford)
Nabil Bentaleb
Riyad Mahrez (Leicester)
Park Chu-young (Watford)
Kim Bo-kyung (Cardiff)
Yun suk-young (qpr)
ki sung yeung (Sunderland)
Lee Chung-yong (Bolton)

who are/were bobbins playing in the PL yet they are internationals for their respective countries and will probably look better than their England counterparts.
There are many more such players who are playing in far inferior leagues to ours that will look better than the English players.

Most of these players will see the WC as a chance to shine whereas the England boys see it as another chance to fail.

MCM I wasnt talking about preferring
Yes I prefer to watch City than England but football is our national sport and our national team is embarrassingly bad so if we want to be proud of our country and for our country to be one of the top few football teams in the world instead of on current form behind the likes of Mexico, Ghana, Chile, USA, Columbia, Nigeria and some would say Australia Iran & a few others then we need to drastically change 
As far as I can see the rest of the world is improving and we are going backwards

If the PL clubs continue to bring in foreigners - City Chelsea & Arsenal have already fielded a whole team of foreigners and the other top clubs arent far off - what chance have we of ever producing a decent National side

If it was the foreigners that makes our National team poor what was the excuse from 1966 to present day including not qualifying for the world cups of 1974,78 & 94. We have hardly been an international success over the years. If a player is good enough they will shine ala barkley. The problem for me is grass roots coaching. Kids should be encouraged to enhance the skills they have, not have it coached out of them by inexperienced coaches & parents screaming hoof it at 10 year olds. Until those sort of attitudes change & the realization that Football is more than kick & rush English Football will remain what it is.

HOLD ON....for one minute. Before we all start going on about youth football being the problem, let's get one thing straight:

The European Champions of 2010 at U17 level - were England.

The European Champions of 2014 at U17 level - were England.

How come then, if other countries have the 'right' formula, and we don't...did we win both?

What is so right about our U17 set up, but it falls apart when it comes to them progressing into the Senior team?

I agree to a point that we need to nurture better these young talents, especially at club level.....but if we look at the U17 team of 4 years ago:

1. Sam Johnstone - Manchester United
2. Bruno Pilatos - Darlington
3. Luke Garbutt - Everton
4. Conor Coady - Liverpool
5. Nathaniel Chalobah- Chelsea
6. Andre Wisdom - Liverpool
7. Will Keane - Manchester United
8. George Thorne - West Brom
9. Benik Afobe - Arsenal
10. Saido Berahino - West Brom
11. Robert Hall - Bolton Wanderers
12. Ben Gibson - Middlesbrough
13. Jack Butland - Stoke City
14. Tom Thorpe - Manchester United
15. Josh McEachran - Chelsea
16. Ross Barkley - Everton
17. Connor Wickham - Sunderland
18. Luke Williams - Middlesbrough

This group of kids beat Spain in the final!

Where are most of these kids now?

Maybe you are right, maybe they will never get a chance at 1st team football because of the foreigners.....but we are producing them, it all seems to fall apart somewhere.

skyblueoz wrote:If it was the foreigners that makes our National team poor what was the excuse from 1966 to present day including not qualifying for the world cups of 1974,78 & 94. We have hardly been an international success over the years. If a player is good enough they will shine ala barkley. The problem for me is grass roots coaching. Kids should be encouraged to enhance the skills they have, not have it coached out of them by inexperienced coaches & parents screaming hoof it at 10 year olds. Until those sort of attitudes change & the realization that Football is more than kick & rush English Football will remain what it is.

Well I can promise you, I've attended FA coaching courses as I run junior football teams, and they never tell you to coach "hump it up the field"...

Furthermore, my lads, from U8-U17/18's....in training, they train to play out out from the back, and during a 40 minute practice match, they go from unlimited touches, to 2 touches, to 3 and back to unlimited. It improves their touch, their movement, their awareness of their surroundings and other players...always trying to keep an eye where their team mates are and thinking ahead.

I really don't see what the simple solution is...however, what would make a massive difference IMO, is if the FA created 5 a side pitches in every village, town and city across the UK. Get kids playing football, rather than kicking it about on the streets, or being chased of school pitches by caretakers.

Maybe our kids are peaking too early whereas others start to come through around 21. Maybe our kids think they are good enough at 17 because they won whereas other kids keep on developing.

Although we have failed in many tournaments
we haven't been as bad as this for a long time
It's not just the quality of our play which maybe
hasnt changed much but it is the lack
of international standard players we have available

Up front there is Sturridge and Sterling
That's it !
Defensively very little options
Only the MF do we have some promise

In the past we have been unlucky going out
on penalty shoot outs on several occasions
The hand of God The Ronaldinho fluke the Lampard
Goal etc etc but this time we were not good enough
And won't be for the foreseeable future
unless something is done
How on earth do we expect to get a decent England
Team together when virtually all our team and
many of the other top teams are made up of
almost entirely foreign players

blueboy wrote:Where are most of these kids now?

It's a reasonable question. I had a quick look and most of them are in the under 21 squad, but there's no earthly reason why they'd not be called up if they were any good. So I checked out how many appearances they've had with their parent club and it makes for some interesting reading...

1. Sam Johnstone - Manchester United (0)
2. Bruno Pilatos - Darlington
3. Luke Garbutt - Everton (1)
4. Conor Coady - Liverpool (1)
5. Nathaniel Chalobah- Chelsea (0)
6. Andre Wisdom - Liverpool (14)
7. Will Keane - Manchester United (1)
8. George Thorne - West Brom (10)
9. Benik Afobe - Arsenal (0)
10. Saido Berahino - West Brom (32)
11. Robert Hall - Bolton Wanderers (22)
12. Ben Gibson - Middlesbrough (33)
13. Jack Butland - Stoke City (3)
14. Tom Thorpe - Manchester United (0)
15. Josh McEachran - Chelsea (11)
16. Ross Barkley - Everton (47)
17. Connor Wickham - Sunderland (40)
18. Luke Williams - Middlesbrough (23)

Ross Barkley is the most notable exception as a regular player for Everton and this has helped him get onto the first team. However, it's interesting that Connor Wickham doesn't get the nod despite his efforts for Sunderland. Eight players have featured for their parent club less than five times, spending their time on loan to lower league clubs.

I can't find much info on Pilatos, other than he had the idea he was better than he was.

So...either they aren't good enough, or for some reason, they don't seen to progress at their parent club.

I guess we are as guilty as any other club. When we have seen promising players like Lopes, Suarez, Rekik, Guidetti...all not given a decent amount of game time...then it's no wonder it's the same story at other clubs.

Maybe it is the foreign players...however, it'd be interesting to see how many of the Spanish U17 of 2010 have played in La Liga first teams over the same period. I'm betting it'll be similar.

We had a couple of promising full backs a few years ago. I wonder where they are now?

That maybe all well & good blue to accredited coaches, but I assure you there are far more coaches out there who have never attended courses, who set up teams to play local football. A lot of kids get their game time from these teams. It was certainly the way when I was a kid. Kicking around in the back streets was another way of being able to play football also. Times may change but a lot of attitudes don't.  I actually meant a lot of parents on the sidelines give the hoof it call not necessarily the coaches. But by then the damage is done.

We had a similar discussion a little while back about coaching and pitches. Where we live, we have two astroturf pitches of good quality. The kids play their matches sideways, so you can have 4 matches at one time and they play something like 7 or 8 a side. My town has only 8,000 inhabitants and is maybe a bit lucky with its facilities. But when I go to play at other towns, they have a similar set up so most kids play on a decent surface and on a small size pitch. The few matches I've seen have been about passing, not hoofing.

I also see the older lads/young men playing in the sports centre and some of the technique blows me away.

It's not too expensive to play especially as most towns subsidise clubs.

Money should be spent providing good fscilities and properly run clubs.

TMG wrote:Getting the top B Team's more and better competition is also vital so I know Den & others dont like it but Dykes idea of playing the B teams in the 3rd div is a good idea unless Den u can think of a better way

Sorry Tony, it ain't a good idea, that's why the FL decided against it. The PL clubs are "for it" because it benefits them on all fronts, but they won't subsidize any lost revenue that the FL clubs will undoubtedly suffer from bringing this crazy format in. Why the fuck would i want to buy a seasonticket to go and watch Bury play against City/Liverpool/Stoke/Leicester "B" teams every other week? Simply put i wouldn't and the vast majority of FL fans feel exactly the same way....oh and yes, i've already explained my alternative on what needs to be done.

Stop the amount of foreign players playing in the PL and it'll force PL managers to pick from the clubs Youth, EDS/Reserves. I know the global brand that is the PL will suffer, but tough titty.

Maybe EVERY PL club should be forced to play a certain number of English players in every league and cup game they play?

Den, that may well be good in the long run, but I'm sure employment laws etc. wouldn't allow it.

Basically, if our players are good enough they should be able to make it.

Another option is for City to buy a Spanish club in their 3rd or 2nd tier and send them 5 of our best youngsters (if that is allowed) for a season to get them more battle hardened. That way you can avoid the ridiculous situation of John Guidetti going to Stoke and hardly playing at all.

I don't really know about employment laws Dawg, so i can't really comment.

But hypothetically speaking, if clubs are only allowed to employ let's say for round figures a maximum of 15 foreign players (and i include all countries except England in this) in a season, and are only allowed to start with 7-8 of those in a game, PL clubs would HAVE to bring the English players through.

This doesn't have to be brought in immediately, just sooner rather than later.

I think Dawg is right.....it may take an almighty shift in EU working laws to get this through.

I can see where you are coming from Den and I agree, long-term, it will benefit the team.

1) We have seen great performances from the 'lesser' teams, ie Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica etc....how many of their players play in their own countries leagues? I'm betting very few. Therefore, they play abroad....and I don't see many of them playing in the 'best' league in the world...the PL, yet when they come together from clubs all over the world, they seem to play well.

Therefore, can it be argued that we do have the players, we just don't have the right set-up at International level?

2) IF, we were to player cap foreigners in the PL....it may take a generation for it to benefit our National team. Therefore, would you much rather our National team benefits from this every two years for 1 month or 2, or our club sides benefit every season for having players like Aguero, Silva, Yaya, Vinny?
For me, and I'm being honest....I'd much rather be supporting Man City winning the PL or CL...than England getting to a WC final or Euro final. I never go to watch England and I don't always watch them when they're on the tv.

UEFA squad system is a bit of a joke. It looks good on paper having to have 8 HG players including 4 trained 'in-house' but when you go into the detail, they can all be foreign. In fact, you just cannot have a rule whereby only English youngsters can get a spot (even though we have all female short lists for parliamentary elections etc.).

The HG rules was a way to get around the law, but it has it's shortcomings allowing those HG to be foreign.

How do you guarantee that English youngsters will get a look in? I don't think you can. But, City's academy may well be a step in the right direction up to a point. We are going to hopefully get the cream of the local youngsters and those around the country. We'll also get top youngsters from overseas. I'm not sure what the youngest aged child can be, but let's say it's 12-14. Even those 'foreign' kids will grow up as Mancs.They will spend most of their teenage years in Manchester and will be eligible to play for England (like Januzai).

maybe that's another way to get a few more top youngsters eligible to play for England. But the huge problem is stepping up from EDS to 1st team squad and getting games.

Look at Pogba for instance. He could hardly get a look in at Utd so he went to Juventus, got some game time and has shown how good he really is.

Sitting on the bench of a big club, drawing £20k per week during your late teens and early 20s is the problem. You can't have a wage cap so how to stem the problem?

Welcome to England's future. On Tuesday, in Belo Horizonte, a game of football will be played. If England lose, it means nothing. If England win, it means nothing. If England draw - well, you get the idea.
And not just because the World Cup is over for Roy Hodgson and his men. The FA decided on Friday, in the aftermath of an eight-day exit from meaningful tournament football in Brazil, that victory and defeat were very over-rated qualities when assessing the success of a sports team.

There were other factors, intangibles, concerning preparation and work across several years that had to be considered, too.
'If it doesn't matter who wins and who loses, then why do they keep score?' asked the great Green Bay Packers coach Vince Lombardi, a man with more quotable one-liners than Bill Shankly, yet England are moving beyond these earthbound measures of advancement.
It is just as well, for the Costa Rica experience is destined to be repeated two years from here. The qualification campaign for the 2016 European Championship, with the finals expanded and downgraded to 24 teams, means it will get no easier to ascertain English progress in the coming months.

England must play Switzerland, Slovenia, Estonia, Lithuania and San Marino to qualify, knowing a top-two finish guarantees entry and third place affords a puncher's chance via the play-offs. The only high quality opposition England will face between now and June 2016, then, is in friendly games, and those results are notoriously deceptive.
England have defeated Italy and Spain in their most recent non-competitive meetings and won against Germany in a friendly in 2008. There will be no way of knowing England's true standing until their next competitive game in finals football in 2016. Everything that happens until that date lacks substance.
Coming here, the message was that England had battled through a difficult qualifying group, which allowed for false security. It was suspected that Gary Cahill and Phil Jagielka were far from an exceptional pairing at centre-half, when compared to their predecessors: John Terry and Rio Ferdinand, Tony Adams and Sol Campbell, with Ledley King in the role of fifth Beatle.

Yet, England had only conceded four goals in qualifying, it was pointed out. Fewer than any country in Europe, bar Spain. Cahill and Jagielka were not perfect, but they could do a job.
This wasn't true. England's centre-halves, the whole defence in fact, were below the standard required. That is why the World Cup, not the route to it, is the health check. Hodgson thinks it would be harsh to judge his work on two matches, but that is football's bottom line.
Did Carlo Ancelotti become a better coach because he won a single match, and with it Real Madrid's 10th European Cup final? In a word: yes.
The fear when Hodgson succeeded Fabio Capello was that he would turn England, not into Inter Milan, nor even his overachieving Fulham and Switzerland teams, but into West Bromwich Albion.
Hodgson did a very good job at West Brom, but it was a job with limitations. West Brom do not tolerate relegation, but they have no realistic ambitions of major success, either. If they finish safe and give it a go against the biggest clubs, it will be regarded as a good season. This is where England are now.

For Premier League safety, read tournament qualification. Alex Horne, the general secretary, summed up the dismal reprogramming that has taken place at the FA when he announced before the tournament began that he believed Hodgson had done enough to justify seeing out his contract until 2016 just by getting to Brazil. The widespread acceptance of courageous defeat by Italy in Manaus is another sign that England now regard themselves as small and provincial, unable to challenge the elite.
Hodgson's final season at West Bromwich Albion began with a home game against the champions, Manchester United. Wayne Rooney put United ahead, but David de Gea was inexperienced and vulnerable, and West Brom equalised through Shane Long.
Limited success: Roy Hodgson made sure West Brom were safe from relegation
+8
Limited success: Roy Hodgson made sure West Brom were safe from relegation
They gave United a real game from there but, with nine minutes to go, an Ashley Young cross that deflected once before going in off Steven Reid handed United victory. It was agreed that West Brom could have put more pressure on De Gea after half-time, but had done pretty well in the circumstances and were perhaps unlucky not to earn a point against a classier team. There was definitely cause for optimism.
In essence, that was the reaction to England's defeat by Italy. Even the same scoreline against Uruguay has produced no grand inquest. What began as realism is now the meek acceptance of defeat.
The impossible job, we are now told. It isn't. That is more expectation management. If it is impossible then the incumbent should step aside to make room for another candidate, who might entertain possibility.
Others see the green shoots of recovery in the next generation. Yet this presumes on several fronts. Any team that includes Phil Jones or Chris Smalling presumes they will train on and make the team regularly at Manchester United under Louis van Gaal, in a way they have not over the last three years. Any team that includes John Stones on the back of 26 appearances for Everton, presumes he will grow up to be John Terry not James Tomkins, who made 37 appearances for England at all levels from Under 16 onwards, without quite fulfilling the outstanding promise of his youth.
In the previous three World Cups, the players with five caps or fewer are Michael Dawson, Stephen Warnock, Joe Hart, Aaron Lennon, Stewart Downing, Scott Carson, Theo Walcott, Wayne Bridge, Darius Vassell and Trevor Sinclair. Not everybody delivers on that early promise. Any team that includes Jack Wilshere presumes he avoids injury, and any wholly youthful starting XI presumes depth below, as at all tournaments the law of averages dictates there will always be at least one significant injury, possibly more.

Yet here we are. Reimagining what constitutes success. The England of the future gets its kicks from logistical efficiency. 'The best prepared team at the World Cup,' we were told and that boast persists through back-to-back defeats.
We wish to be judged on intangibles, when in sport there is a very finite measure of attainment. It's called the score. It is immune to spin, management, foresight, hindsight, revisionism, criticism or any form of external pressure. By removing it from the equation, nothing is. Win, so what? Lose, so what? Glen Johnson came out of the lift at England's team hotel in Sao Conrado, in the aftermath of the defeat by Uruguay. A fellow countryman asked how he was feeling. Johnson shrugged philosophically.
'What can you do?' he asked. Actually, that shouldn't be a rhetorical question. There are books written on what you can do. Indexed, cross-referenced, alphabetised. There are videos and coaching sessions, debates and discussions, and plans A, B, C, probably through to Z.
There is always something you can do. Yet England's right-back is a man of our times. What can you do, eh? He should have an FA blazer. He'd fit right in.

blueboy wrote:For me, and I'm being honest....I'd much rather be supporting Man City winning the PL or CL...than England getting to a WC final or Euro final. I never go to watch England and I don't always watch them when they're on the tv.

Yeah, i get what you're saying blue and in a way i and many people will agree with you, but i still think we need to find a way of improving our National squad in the long-term. I guess you could argue that with the current crop of youngsters currently playing for the National team, in 2 years we could do well.....but we need to do something to make sure the "new crop" keeps coming through after that.

Of course I would like England to do well...but if it meant England or City..it'd be City every time.

If we look at the current crop of youngsters and one's for the next 2 years....are they all good enough or have the potential to be?

Hart - yes, will be the keeper

Baines? no

Shaw - maybe

Stones - maybe

Jones - maybe

Smalling - no

Flanagan - we don't know, but I'm guessing yes.

Wilshere - no

Barkley - yes

Sterling - maybe

Sturridge - yes

Lallana - maybe

Ox - yes

Walcott - yes

Lot's of maybe's. Regardless, I'd much rather we start from scratch with these young players...but Roy has already come out and said he wants Gerrard there in 2016....that says it all about his thinking.

I don't get this "we need experience"....if these young players stick together and the philosophy stays the same to allow youth to develop (and that may mean introducing players from the FL or players not getting regular first team football at their clubs), then we don't need the likes of Gerrard, Lampard etc in the team...these lads will have 2 years to prepare themselves, get to know each other, play together and get the experience they need.

But this will take some forward thinking, and go against the grain....I just don't see the FA execs or Roy having the balls to do it.

If we are going for youth - why do we have a manager who's nearly 70 looking after them? Where's the connection with them?

These players will look at him as some grandad figure.....that's why we need someone new, youthful looking after the team.

I'd love the likes of Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher looking after our England kids for the future.....they will all learn together and have 2 years to do it.

still no idea why we are playing Lampard as captain tonight.
this is a world cup, not a testimonial.

Anyone over 28 should not even be in the matchday squad tonight, everybody should have a chance of being at the euro's under 30.. granted, rotate a litte if needed.

blueboy wrote:I don't get this "we need experience"....if these young players stick together and the philosophy stays the same to allow youth to develop (and that may mean introducing players from the FL or players not getting regular first team football at their clubs), then we don't need the likes of Gerrard, Lampard etc in the team...these lads will have 2 years to prepare themselves, get to know each other, play together and get the experience they need.

I get the need for experience. But it doesn't have to be kitted up and on the field of play... Look at the past U17 England teams: Not a shred of experience on the pitch, but the expertise on the bench sorts it out. Look at our own youth setup, all kids, but with the cool, calm experience of Vieira to see them through, to guide them to victory.

By all means have Gerrard there in 2016, but have him in a coaching role and not on the pitch. He'd do the same job from the bench. In fact, a better job, because he won't need to split his focus with his own game.

That's what I meant Leo. We don't need 'experience' on the pitch if they play together for the next 2 years. I'm more concerned having Roy Hodgson in charge than I am who the players are.

Example - i've just heard his press conference talking about tonight's team "These lads are ready and I want them to prove to me how good they are"

Well why the fuck didn't you play Jones, Barkley, Shaw, Lallana etc against Uruguay??? Have they suddenly become 'ready' over the past 2 days???

It's all pathetic rhetoric....and it'll never change in the next decade unless we make a massive change in our approach - and now, not when we fail to do anything at the Euro's!!

blueboy wrote:Example - i've just heard his press conference talking about tonight's team "These lads are ready and I want them to prove to me how good they are"

Well why the fuck didn't you play Jones, Barkley, Shaw, Lallana etc against Uruguay??? Have they suddenly become 'ready' over the past 2 days???

Well, quite.  We needed something more when we played Italy and we should've tried to change it up against Uruguay instead of thinking, "Oh, well Uruguay are clearly crap because they got thrashed by Costa Rica" and keeping the same team.

I think you said it before, we should've gone there with the view that this was a team for the future and have no expectations placed upon them.  All this persevering with Gerrard and Lampard because they somehow deserve to taste some International success after all their efforts is bollocks.  They've had their time and they failed, so tough luck and move on.  It's a young man's game, there's no room for sentiment.

Read an article this morning on Gerrard and how he's been magnificent for Liverpool, a real game changer. They listed the amount of games he has pretty much won on his own, cup finals, CL finals etc...they reckoned they could name at least 50+ games over his career.

They then did the same for England...1 game.

Andorra - away. Not much really.

Very astute overview by Henry Winter. Sort of sums up everything we are talking about on here:


When England were blown away by the fast, intelligent, ruthless movement of Germany in Bloemfontein at the last World Cup four years ago, this newspaper carried a “10-point plan to save the face of English football following shame in South Africa”. Only three of the points have been achieved, leaving little surprise that England continue to lag behind more sophisticated footballing nations.
It is a time-honoured ritual that an England tournament exit is followed by a focus as much on personalities, particularly on whether the manager is good enough or whether the players care, as on policies. This is Punch and Judy fare, when a more analytical approach is required for England’s benefit.
Point One proposed in 2010 was to “Build Burton”, and St George’s Park now educates the coaches and managers of the future, ensuring a deeper pool of contenders to be England manager. Currently, the long-term battle to succeed Roy Hodgson is between Gareth Southgate and Gary Neville, potentially good candidates, but more are required. Burton helps that.
It also assists Point Two: “Invest in more youth-team coaches to work with five-to-11-year-olds.”
Point Three, “Introduce a winter break”, remains as distant as ever. The Football Association, fretting over England, needs to surrender its FA Cup replays, the starting point for the Premier League to consider a brief hibernation in January.
Players need a breather. The average England international does not fully know how to pace himself in a season, or in a game, and expends energy inefficiently. Hodgson also made a significant error with Steven Gerrard during the November international break by not sending him away to the sunshine. He was required for important FA 150th birthday celebrations, and look what happened. Gerrard’s fuel gauge was showing empty by May.
Point Four, “Trust in flair”, is slowly being addressed. Ross Barkley starts against Costa Rica in Belo Horizonte today. Luke Shaw’s enterprise down the left will also be seen. Hodgson has undeniably made England more expansive. Raheem Sterling has been given his chance. John Stones should be embedded in central defence, replacing Phil Jagielka, next season.
Four years ago, under-10s were still labouring in 11 v 11 matches, but thanks to the good work of people at the FA such as Nick Levett, Roger Davies and Southgate, counties and leagues were persuaded to play small-sided games, enhancing technique. It is a start.
Point Five, “Appoint more football people to the FA”, has hardly been realised.
Hodgson’s future, and the choice of his eventual successor, are decisions made by suits. Sir Trevor Brooking leaves the organisation. Conversations with Rio Ferdinand and Jason Roberts out here brought a reminder of why their ideas and energy should be harnessed by the FA board. Gary Neville is another whose dressing-room experience, can-do attitude and stirring could be useful in the FA boardroom.
Point Six, “Cash on delivery”, was an ambitious plea for players to have more performance-related pay, creating an incentive culture. Some of the younger English players need a wake-up call, being given deals which quicken ambition, not soften it, motivating them more to start, score, assist, and defend better.
English players have to accept more responsibility. A career should be a constant exercise in self-improvement, whether with extra technical work after training, examining clips of opponents or analysing their own performances. Frank Lampard remarked last season that England’s young midfielders did not do sufficient shooting practice.
Last week, Lampard was talking about Sterling, saying the teenager would find it hard to answer questions about his movement because it was down to “instinct”. Yet Sterling can still accentuate his natural talent and, indeed, is becoming even more effective since listening to Brendan Rodgers.
Some footballers need to appreciate that football is a cerebral activity as much as a physical one. They need to train the brain more. Andres Iniesta, a world and European champion, took on extra university studies to sharpen his mental faculties.
England’s usual routine after tournament defeat is for manager and players to return home chastened, some of them chased by photographers, enduring a few days’ discomfort before they disappear on holiday, are pictured smiling on sunloungers, the intense domestic season bounds into view and the World Cup disaster is largely forgotten. Life goes on. Yet they need to reflect on their failings here. This applies to the manager. It is a pity that Hodgson is not returning to Brazil to scout the teams. Even such an experienced manager can still learn, particularly with tactics changing.
Back in 2010, when Hodgson was wandering around World Cup media centres, Point Seven hoped that “government must invest more in PE at school”.
More is being done but there is so much historic damage to repair, particularly with the selling-off of playing fields. Government still hasn’t listened intently enough to the timebomb of childhood obesity ticking away under the NHS. Giving sport a real cabinet presence, not lumped in with abstract art and string quartets, would be a start. So would a campaign installing 3G pitches all over the land. Give the kids somewhere to play.
The issue of quotas, suggested in Point Eight of “Six plus five adds up”, focused on the influx of foreigners into the Premier League and the blocking of the pathway for younger English players, an issue at the heart of Greg Dyke’s FA commission. Youngsters do require managers to believe in them but they also need to make themselves so good that they demand selection.
Hodgson wants to see more players take responsibility for their career development. He pointed to Jack Rodwell as a promising player who headed into a cul-de-sac, compromising his international prospects. “We’ve lost players who we thought had great England potential but they moved to so-called bigger clubs – Rodwell,” said Hodgson. The midfielder was maturing well at Everton when he succumbed to Manchester City’s lucrative overtures in 2012 and has scarcely been seen since. Stay, play games, develop, then move.
Point Nine, “Sell Wembley to a concert organiser”, was always a pipe-dream but it remains a drain on resources which would be better served investing in grass-roots.
Point 10, “Get in touch with the real world”, was a request for England to embrace tournaments more, not deliberately isolate themselves as in Rustenburg at 2010. They did this time, finding a base in Rio. For 15 days.

The 1st sentence of this story:
"When England were blown away by the fast, intelligent, ruthless movement of Germany in Bloemfontein at the last World Cup four years ago"

Is that the game at 2-1 down Lampard had a goal disallowed that was 2ft over the line?
It was widely acknowledged that at the time we were well on top and if the goal stood were the most likely team to go on and win......but the goal didn't stand and we conceded 2 more late on to lose 4-1. Fine margins once again, but i hardly think we got blown away   .

yeah, but after we didn't get the decision, we got battered.

Ok