England's problem

[supercrystal7]

Very disappointing. Was too angry to comment yesterday, but we have so many problems, but the biggest one is that we don't play football like England. We need to stop copying other countries, ignore what they do and play football the English way.

I have seen post moaning about the facilities in this country, because kids have to get changed in a car par. Who cares? Do you think Brazil have won 5 world cups, because they have a changing room? We have better facilities than every other country in the world. We cannot go 2 miles, without finding good green pitches. We have perfect weather to play football all year around and here.

We have big problems with our coaching. Most youngsters are coached poorly and the scouting system is not particularly good either. Too many talented players slip through without ever being seen. Other problems include the drink culture that we have. Most talented players turn to drink around 15/16 and are more focused on going out on the Friday night rather than training.

This England's team just lacked ability. We are just going through a poor generation. We have been spoiled by the golden generation and this team just does not compare. The defence is a shadow of what it was before.

Great we can pass the ball, but that's worthless without anything. Stop using Spain as an example of physically limited players winning things. For some reason Spain had the fittest team in the world. Physical abilities are important as well as technique. We need to merge both.

Hopefully the next Euros will be better, but with our defence we probably won't be a threat to win it.

Spain's fitness seemed to be due to Fuentes and his injections.

Almost certainly, but people don't seem to question why small physically challenged guys like Xavi have endless stamina and can outrun players picked for their physical ability in other countries, but hardly matters now.

The golden generation was the one just past, which we completely fluked and did nothing to get much like Belgium have now. Part of the reason we did not really look at changing things is, because we produced so many world class players in that period. It's not fair to compare as to Germany, because in the 2000 they had Ballack and Diesler. We had Neville, Beckham, Cole, Gerrard, Owen, Scholes, Lampard, Ferdinand, Terry etc all coming through and we assumed we were fine and did not look to improve.

This will be the worst world cup in 20 years if Costa Rica or Uruguay get a point. It's a disaster much worse than 2010.

 

[abu13]

The reality is that we are not out of it yet, if Italy beat Costa Rica an Uruguay and wd beat Costa Rica then we have a chance.
Unfortunately, us beating Costa Rica looks like the least likely result.

we have now got to a point where we aspire to be at Costa Ricas level. We haven't got one single world class player.

the best player in an England shirt last night was Gary Cahill.

 

[Ruhr]

Hodgson yesterday reminded me of the german team 2000 under the clueless coach Erich Ribeck.
At that point the need of a youth academy system in germany was seen (the world cup 2006 ahead was clearly helpful). But that system needed 10 years to produce a new generation of players and even it has a good quality it is not able to bring up strikers, left or right backs.
But all in all it was a common effort of the german FA and the Bundesliga Association. I admit, i don´t know, how close the english FA and the Premier League work together on such things

 

[lancs blue]

Hodgson yesterday reminded me of the german team 2000 under the clueless coach Erich Ribeck.
At that point the need of a youth academy system in germany was seen (the world cup 2006 ahead was clearly helpful). But that system needed 10 years to produce a new generation of players and even it has a good quality it is not able to bring up strikers, left or right backs.
But all in all it was a common effort of the german FA and the Bundesliga Association. I admit, i don´t know, how close the english FA and the Premier League work together on such things

As an earlier poster mentioned the English FA are money obsessed, mainly to pay for a ludicrously expensive national stadium. Unfortunately diverting so much money to pay for Wembley meant less money to upgrade facilities at lower levels, which had already been scandalously ignored for many years previously. End result, a decline in not just the quality of young English players but also the quantity with the ability to be just solid Prem players, hence the mad rush to import a lot of foreign players, not just the superstars. Throw in a lack of basic technique coaching and an over-emphasis on athleticism and it's all too obvious what the problems are.

The Prem clubs are focused on what's best for their clubs which I feel is fair enough, personally I wouldn't want the national team to take precedence over club football. Who got the blame in 1974, 1978 and 1994 when England failed to qualify for the World Cup, couldn't point the finger at foreign players then.

 

[Ruhr]

The Prem clubs are focused on what's best for their clubs which I feel is fair enough, personally I wouldn't want the national team to take precedence over club football. Who got the blame in 1974, 1978 and 1994 when England failed to qualify for the World Cup, couldn't point the finger at foreign players then.

Miroslav Klose was around 18 and his talent wasn´t seen just because he lived somewhere in the forests. That should never happen again, so these days the german FA has 366 football camps for kids all over the country with about 1.300 coaches, where talented kids have once or twice a week an FA training in addition to their local clubs.

But if you talk about the Prem clubs. The 36 Bundesliga clubs were forced to invest in the standards of their youth academies. And if you invest so much money in something you want a return on your investment. At that point the Bundesliga clubs stopped buying mediocre but cheap players mainly from eastern europe and let their own talents play. I think, that was a change in attitude. These days many clubs are proud, if they have as many homegrown talents as possible in their first team.

 

[Citizen of Legoland]

England's problem can be seen before the game starts - 2 players belting out the national anthem and 9 miming the words to a nursery rhyme. Until we get someone who can instil some passion into our national game, we're forever doomed.

 

[Citizen of Legoland]

The Prem clubs are focused on what's best for their clubs which I feel is fair enough, personally I wouldn't want the national team to take precedence over club football. Who got the blame in 1974, 1978 and 1994 when England failed to qualify for the World Cup, couldn't point the finger at foreign players then.

Miroslav Klose was around 18 and his talent wasn´t seen just because he lived somewhere in the forests. That should never happen again, so these days the german FA has 366 football camps for kids all over the country with about 1.300 coaches, where talented kids have once or twice a week an FA training in addition to their local clubs.

But if you talk about the Prem clubs. The 36 Bundesliga clubs were forced to invest in the standards of their youth academies. And if you invest so much money in something you want a return on your investment. At that point the Bundesliga clubs stopped buying mediocre but cheap players mainly from eastern europe and let their own talents play. I think, that was a change in attitude. These days many clubs are proud, if they have as many homegrown talents as possible in their first team.

This is all well and good, but how do you explain how teams like Chile, Uruguay (with their small population), USA, Australia and most of the others play better football than us.

 

[CityFan94]

I put this World Cup down to the manager - Hodgson has to go after this.

First of all, not bringing Terry and Cole to the World Cup. They are England's best centre back and left back, yet they're watching it on tv. Jagielka and Baines have replaced them - both around 30 without a trophy between them. England would have been much more solid with those 2 in defence, especially alongside Cahill (who they're familiar with).

Playing Gerrard and Henderson in a flat midfield two. That was a horrible, horrible tactic from Hodgson and was obvious it would never work. I thought Italy's midfield completed dominated ours due to this. Last night against Uruguay they were poor aswell. Gerrard hasn't got the legs to play in a midfield two and Henderson was playing in a holding midfield role, something he never plays for Liverpool.

The whole Rooney obsession, allowing your whole World Cup to depend on the form of Rooney was strange. Putting him wide left where he was clearly not comfortable. Then changing the system in the second game just to accomodate Rooney in his "best" position. Rooney as a number 10 doesn't work at International level, simple as that. Number 10s should have quick, one touch passing and creating chances for the striker and attacking midfielders. I thought Hodgson had to choose EITHER Rooney or Sturridge.

I've read people saying "at least Hodgson played some of the kids". They're not kids, but they are inexperienced. I'm talking about the likes of Jagielka (31), Baines (29), Lallana (26) and Lambert (32). Why start giving tournament debuts to players over 30? Where's the future in that?

The actual kids Jones, Shaw, Wilshere, Barkley and Sterling didn't get too much gametime, with only Sterling starting either game.

Shocking World Cup from England and Hodgson IMO.

 

[whp.blue]

England's problem isn't players. They have a team that, with the right manager, could reach the semi-finals. Look at Holland, or Chile, do they have better players than England? I wouldn't say so. Minus Van Persie and Robben that Dutch side has nothing special. But why does it work so well? Organisation, intelligence, composure and unity. Look at Mexico, Colombia, Switzerland and Croatia - none of those sides are anything special but they're all well-drilled, organised, intelligent, composed and unified.

Where your argument falls down a little is the Rapist and Robbin are genuine world class game changers however Shrek is Englands and he is not up to the mark you can argue if he is the best England have but at this level he isn't good enough look at Suarez last night he made a real difference and almost single hand-idly took the game away from us Shrek could never do that

 

[BoundedCascade]

The Prem clubs are focused on what's best for their clubs which I feel is fair enough, personally I wouldn't want the national team to take precedence over club football. Who got the blame in 1974, 1978 and 1994 when England failed to qualify for the World Cup, couldn't point the finger at foreign players then.

Miroslav Klose was around 18 and his talent wasn´t seen just because he lived somewhere in the forests. That should never happen again, so these days the german FA has 366 football camps for kids all over the country with about 1.300 coaches, where talented kids have once or twice a week an FA training in addition to their local clubs.

But if you talk about the Prem clubs. The 36 Bundesliga clubs were forced to invest in the standards of their youth academies. And if you invest so much money in something you want a return on your investment. At that point the Bundesliga clubs stopped buying mediocre but cheap players mainly from eastern europe and let their own talents play. I think, that was a change in attitude. These days many clubs are proud, if they have as many homegrown talents as possible in their first team.

This is all well and good, but how do you explain how teams like Chile, Uruguay (with their small population), USA, Australia and most of the others play better football than us.

I don't know about the others but the USA has invested heavily into grass roots football over the past few years and is actually becoming more popular than baseball there among kids under 12 as a sport to play. It is astonishing the strides that they have taken recently. There are "Soccer Academies" all over the place down there.