*Official* English Football Season 2007-08

[nikhil1772]

****ing should be. I couldn't watch last night's game thanks to the fact that I'm stuck in a tiny French town with no English bars, but if a group of players that talented can fail to qualify from a group like that then there's got to be a lot going wrong both on their part and on the part of the manager. I watched France v Ukraine, which was a dead rubber, and the France players looked like they were pretty committed to that. Sometimes I wonder whether our players even enjoy playing football.

I hate this whole debacle - I'm going to be stewing in my impotent rage over here for days, unable to rant to anyone about how ridiculous this situation is because either they're all French and just want to laugh at me, or because they're English but just don't get the whole football thing.

I'm almost glad I'm not in England to witness the media crucifixion of McClaren, it'll be brutal - obviously he's been under a lot of pressure and all that jazz that gets spouted by people who know no better, but if you can't take the pressure, don't take the ****ing job. You are clearly not good enough, Steve, so get back to managing a League One side where you belong, and the nation can attempt to move on without you.

Je déteste le foot.

Which league one side would want him now anyway? I cant believe he went with 4 5 1 or Carson as GK or didn't play beck at the start or didn't seem to change anything when 2-0 down.

Complacent. Thats all I can think of, of the state of mind of players and manager,maybe they thought fate was on their side anyway,courtesy saturday results. Its just that, Fate wanted to deliver a sucker punch.

 

[GIMH]

****ing should be. I couldn't watch last night's game thanks to the fact that I'm stuck in a tiny French town with no English bars, but if a group of players that talented can fail to qualify from a group like that then there's got to be a lot going wrong both on their part and on the part of the manager. I watched France v Ukraine, which was a dead rubber, and the France players looked like they were pretty committed to that. Sometimes I wonder whether our players even enjoy playing football.

I hate this whole debacle - I'm going to be stewing in my impotent rage over here for days, unable to rant to anyone about how ridiculous this situation is because either they're all French and just want to laugh at me, or because they're English but just don't get the whole football thing.

I'm almost glad I'm not in England to witness the media crucifixion of McClaren, it'll be brutal - obviously he's been under a lot of pressure and all that jazz that gets spouted by people who know no better, but if you can't take the pressure, don't take the ****ing job. You are clearly not good enough, Steve, so get back to managing a League One side where you belong, and the nation can attempt to move on without you.

Je déteste le foot.

Nothing wrong with League One

 

[GIMH]

Mclaren gone

 

[Craig]

Mclaren gone

Not surprisingly. One person once told me in 2003 that England would be better off picking players from the Championship and League One because they would at least care about playing for England. What does it matter to Gerrard or Ferdinand? They can go back to their 100k + a week jobs. TBH I sort of wanted England to win so I could have an excuse to change my avatar, well I was right after all but I could in all honesty see it happening.

 

[Craig]

What a disaster by England. Losing at home to Croatia is poor, remembering this is the side Australia drew against in the World Cup.

Bring back Paul Robinson!! lol

Socceroos > England then?

 

[GIMH]

Not surprisingly. One person once told me in 2003 that England would be better off picking players from the Championship and League One because they would at least care about playing for England. What does it matter to Gerrard or Ferdinand? They can go back to their 100k + a week jobs. TBH I sort of wanted England to win so I could have an excuse to change my avatar, well I was right after all but I could in all honesty see it happening.

Yeah, get Shuker and Greenacre in there I say

 

[Magrat Garlick]

Not surprisingly. One person once told me in 2003 that England would be better off picking players from the Championship and League One because they would at least care about playing for England. What does it matter to Gerrard or Ferdinand? They can go back to their 100k + a week jobs. TBH I sort of wanted England to win so I could have an excuse to change my avatar, well I was right after all but I could in all honesty see it happening.

Yeah, but with Championship & League One players they'll be stuck to Reading-esque tactics.

It might earn you points at home but it'll be even uglier than now.

Oh, and Greece and Russia FTW.

 

[Olwe]

we were abismal, as i was there, i thought the half time changes were not right i deffently would have left wright-phillips on even though he was stugglerling with his size, and barry was playing well. in the first half lampard did not really touch the ball and i would have taken him of with cole who played dreadfull, put barry on the left, beckham in the center and brought a stricker on either defoe or bent on to partner crouch. also from the start you cant play a keeper for his debut on a vital game, why not play James who is playing very well for pompy and is playing well with campbell, who played ok compared to the rest of the defence!

 

[Loony BoB]

Disagree with the whole "Get rid of all the well paid players" thing because if there's anyone who is well paid, it's Beckham, and if there is anyone who shows on the pitch and elsewhere that they have more heart than anyone else for England, it's Beckham. So there goes that theory. You can get rid of well paid players but only do it if they aren't suitable and actually don't have the heart. Don't just assume that well paid = no heart.

Surprised Ferdinand was mentioned by whoever it was saying that, too. I find Ferdinand to be one of the better defenders for England and it certainly showed against Croatia when the replacements were abysmal.

 

[GIMH]

Carragher's retirement hurt us last night one feels

 

[Barney Rubble]

Carragher's retirement hurt us last night one feels

So did ****ing Bobby Charlton's, by the sound of things.

 

[GIMH]

 

[Tom Halsey]

McClaren should go back to doing what he's good at - being a top assistant manager.

Shearer at 16/1 is ridiculous.

 

[aussie]

Well its taken me almost a day to recover but damn yo it really sucks to think that England won't be at Euro next year. This talented generation of players has really been wasted by poor management. But i have ranted enough of late so i guess the road to 2010 should begin now. Firstly the FA needs to appoint a manager with the tactical ability to get the best out of these players & get them playing like how they play for their clubs & not be afraid to drop star players i.e what Sven did in Euro 2004 by picking Stevie G, Lamps & Scholes at once.

Talk of Mourinho getting it well i don't know especially with Scolari probably leaving Portugal at the end of Euro 2008 he may want to coach his national team, i personally don't buy any of the English managers tbh due to inexperience mainly. So it two options for me Shearer as they say a former player immediately commanding respect amongst the lads thus getting the best out of them ala Klinsmann for Germany or either one of the Italians would be good for me especially Capello, when Becks was a real i watched real allot of course & his no nonsense style could just be the wake-up call these clowns need i reckon. Word is that his defensive style is a bit of turn-off but i don't see how that could be the case because when he came to real the ``galactico`` era was fading & they didn't know what their best team was & gradually after a stuttery start he made a defensive looking 4-2-3-1 formation play some brilliant attacking football. So Shearer or Capello for me.

Secondly the structure of the premiership needs to be looked at, the injury woes England suffered throughout this campaign was easily the most by any side. Not to say that I’m blaming injuries on our defeat yesterday or failure in the campaign but any team losing quality players in such an important clash would hurt them, it would have been like Italy losing Cannavaro, Toni & Pirlo for their game in Scotland & with the way the Scots played you never know what could have happened. Thus talk of introducing a winter break like other major leagues is a must since it will keep the players a bit fresher & minimize these injuries. The amount of foreigners in our leagues is a problem as well i remember reading an article a while ago & i was shocked to see how much foreigners really make up the starting line-ups of most of the premiership sides i knew it but just seeing the figures was amazing i thought & without a doubt it really was preventing younger players from coming up into the major sides baring a few i.e Rooney, Richards, Noble, Walcott, Agbonlahor, Young to name a few, something needs to be done their like what the ECB has done in reducing the amount of foreign players a club can have even if it kills the premierships credentials of being the best league in Europe we can't afford to have too many more Arsenals around.

Last night game probably ends Beckham's England career he won't be around in 2010 but he should be allowed to win his 100 cap but a sad end for him given that they way he recovered after being dropped by England & Real Madrid in a matter of 6 months to still have to fire in him to want to play for England after clearly having a celebrity lifestyle to fall back on really shows what a top dog he has been. He should be knighted...

 

[GIMH]

Hopefully they won't take too long to appoint the new boss, thus giving him plenty of time to decide his first choice XI by the first WC qualifier, which I assume will be next September. I don't think McClaren ever new his best XI, this evidenced by the fact that, when he brought Beckham and Defoe on he wound up with Sven's midfield that failed so abysmally in the last WC. He chopped, changed and ended up back at square zero.

What the new manager needs to do is:

use a few games to decidee a first choice keeper, then stick with him
Get Carragher to come back
Build a solid midfield that doesn't involve Frank Lampard
Have established back-ups who actually play for their team. Surely losing our first choice strikers needn't be the disaster it was; we ended up with Tottenham players who can't make the ****ing side. In defence, admittedly, we have been unlucky, but I don't think Wayne Bridge should ever be let near an England match again after last night.

 

[Tom Halsey]

There's no way anyone with a brain (so that excludes Barwick tbf) would appoint Shearer, he's never managed before.

Hope it will be Mourinho. Think he would do a good job, though I don't think he will be the Revelation everyone else seems to think he would be - it wasn't as if he got every tactical decision at Chelsea right.

 

[aussie]

There's no way anyone with a brain (so that excludes Barwick tbf) would appoint Shearer, he's never managed before.

Nor did Klinsmann before he coached Germany & he did very well. The thing with him though he had a plan to revamp the way Germany played football after failure in Euro 2004 and in the 2006 WC his hard work payed off brilliantly. If Shearer where to become manager would he have that same kind of thinking? who knows but even though its risky i don't think it would be a horrific selection. My choice though is Capello since i don't believe for reasons already mentioned that popular choice Mourinho would be up for the job.

 

[Pratters]

Mourinho would suit England perfectly. He knows how to handle stars, build a team. Loves the attention and challenges too.

 

[Majin]

The thing that disappointed me most was that I told a friend a few days ago that England would lose 3-1, and but for one goal.

Still, not too disappointed. I had already believed they were going to go out so it didn't really come as much of a shock, and that they only finished third in that group shows they didn't even really deserve to go through anyway.

 

[aussie]

Build a solid midfield that doesn't involve Frank Lampard.

Why not?. I know everyone now would be all down on Lampard now after being poor for England most of the time since the WC when in reality he has done more than his mid-field compatriot Gerrard who never gets any criticism. But really we see him every weekend playing brilliantly for Chelsea being the most prolific goal-scoring mid-fielder in europe over the past 3 seasons i don't think any coach could leave him out really. Its obvious though his game is one-dimensional & is helped by the fact that at Chelsea he has had Makelele & Essein doing the dirty work while he shoots & not having that support with England has exposed him. But i'll say & Mourinho realised it with such goal-scoring pedigree from mid-field such a player has to play really. So between now & the 2010 WC Lamps still has a big role to play for England once that goal-scoring form is still good.

Surely losing our first choice strikers needn't be the disaster it was; we ended up with Tottenham players who can't make the ****ing side.

In a way it probably was given that Heskey & Ashton were also out two players that would have worked better than Crouch in the 4-3-3 or 4-5-1 that was played. But then again poor tactics from McClaren Agbonlahor should have been called up.

In defence, admittedly, we have been unlucky, but I don't think Wayne Bridge should ever be let near an England match again after last night.

He was awful no doubt, probably lack of enough matches under his belt showed up or the wet surface. But i'll back him to recover since he is a quality left-back.