England squad discussion

[James]

I'm surprised given the rate that you guys go through midfielders that Mark Noble has never got a cap or talked about as a possibility of making the squad.

He's always a rock for the Hammers and puts in good performance after good performance. Wouldn't be a bad backup for Gerrard?

 

[grecian]

I'm a fan of Noble, and have been for years. Think he's a neat progressive footballer, who can keep possession without just going backwards or sideways. He's pretty similar to that other West Ham graduate Carrick. Think he's the type of player who if he was in a bigger side would get a lot more plaudits. He really should be ahead of the likes of Milner and Cleverly for selection IMHO.

but all of a sudden we have a bunch of younger midfielders coming through, who you feel have a bit more talent and scope to improve than Mark.

I wouldn't be displeased if he got a look-in, but I don't see it, and perhaps for the future of the side it's better if he doesn't.

 

[Uppercut]

Yeah he would always have been a bit left-field but I don't remember anyone even suggesting it, which is really surprising. Playing for a Fat Sam team really counts against him.

 

[Nate]

                  Hart

Flanagan   Jagielka   Cahill   Baines


           Gerrard    Henderson


  Sterling     Rooney      Rodriguez
 
                Sturridge

Stupidly LFC-centric, but there you go. Gibbs, Shaw, Carrick, Wilshere, The Ox, Barkley and Lallana would all have to be close.

 

[Nate]

Johnson and Lambert too. Maybe Zaha now that he'll be getting regular playing time.

 

[Furball]

                  Hart

Flanagan   Jagielka   Cahill   Baines


           Gerrard    Henderson


  Sterling     Rooney      Rodriguez
 
                Sturridge

Stupidly LFC-centric, but there you go. Gibbs, Shaw, Carrick, Wilshere, The Ox, Barkley and Lallana would all have to be close.

Swap Lallana for Rodriguez.

I'd have Wilshere over Henderson but it's a bit of a toss up.

 

[Pothas]

Yeah that is what I would do, maybe Ox starting over Sterling as well.

 

[Uppercut]

I like the idea of using as much of one club as possible, the familiarity provides such a huge advantage. I'd take Henderson over Wilshere for that reason alone, although he is also having a much better season. Same story with Sterling over Ox for mine.

Flanagan is too big a call though. Walker is **** but he'll play anyway as the devil we know.

 

[GIMH]

Imagine if anyone had said a year ago you should pick Henderson over Wilshere

You'd have replied "shut up Ikki" () and yet now it's perfectly reasonable

 

[Nate]

Imagine if anyone had said a year ago you should pick Henderson over Wilshere

You'd have replied "shut up Ikki" () and yet now it's perfectly reasonable

I just willingly put Jon Flanagan in a team. *shakes head*

 

[GIMH]

I like the idea of using as much of one club as possible, the familiarity provides such a huge advantage. I'd take Henderson over Wilshere for that reason alone, although he is also having a much better season. Same story with Sterling over Ox for mine.

Flanagan is too big a call though. Walker is **** but he'll play anyway as the devil we know.

I agree, but the downside is that as impressive as Liverpool have been at times this season they probably aren't the best team in England. When the team had a core of United players, United were the best side and then some.Obviously the Prem is multinational but to me it kind of shows you where we're at. I'd be over the ****ing moon with last 8 this summer and I never hope for anything less than a 5-0 win in the final usually.

 

[Jarquis]

AOC absolutely has to play if he's fit.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Interesting squad Woy has picked for the Danes.

Three specialist left-backs and only three centre-halves, one of whom is Chris Smalling.

Still can't quite shake off the suspicion Captain Racist will be back.

 

[Uppercut]

I agree, but the downside is that as impressive as Liverpool have been at times this season they probably aren't the best team in England. When the team had a core of United players, United were the best side and then some.Obviously the Prem is multinational but to me it kind of shows you where we're at. I'd be over the ****ing moon with last 8 this summer and I never hope for anything less than a 5-0 win in the final usually.

True, but Liverpool's English players are mostly their better ones. If you get Liverpool's attack with Rooney in place of Suarez and a better defence, I'd say that'd make you one of the better teams in Brazil.

I don't think England ever really used United's core of English players. There was the whole "Scholes on left wing" debacle for starters. But in 2012 United lost out on goal difference with Scholes, Carrick, Young, Welbeck and Rooney all first-choice. Taking advantage of that would have meant dropping some much better players, but in practice United's attack that season was miles better than the team Hodgson ended up putting out.

I just think the benefits of familiarity aren't appreciated enough in this country. Too much focus on how a team looks on paper. It's not like Fifa where you calculate a team's goodness-number by adding up the goodness-numbers of all 11 players. You need a functional system in place and since there's so little time to create one with an international side, it's generally a good option to transplant it in from one of the clubs. It'll piss off fans of other clubs that say "Player X needs to play because he's better than player Y" but they can go **** themselves.

EDIT: Just saw Marcuss's comment above. Last line isn't aimed at him haha.

 

[GIMH]

Yeah all good points but I do think the Scholes on the left thing gets overplayed. Only really happened in 04 when United were weaker than usual anyway (not that it makes a difference either way how strong they were, more in reference to my overall point). That season you could argue Gerrard certainly and maybe Lampard had been better, so then you look at class V form.

The rest of the time Scholes was well used by England. I do wonder if Sven decided he was going to be the one shifted because he'd announced his retirement.

 

[Jarquis]

We should pik Jenkinson, Gibbs, Wilshere and the Ox obvs. Get Theo fit and we'd walk it.

Apart from Jenkinson being a bit ****e ATM and Wilshere making about an average of one iota of progress for each of the last 2-3 years

 

[Pothas]

Nah lets pick Southampton, would be more fun and fans of big clubs won't be able to complain about their rivals getting favoured.

I know it would never happen but it would be kind of interesting to see a club like Southampton play all England players and actually be able to hold of the good ones.

 

[Furball]

I just think the benefits of familiarity aren't appreciated enough in this country.

It's absolutely no coincidence that all of the truly great European national sides (Hungary of the 50s, Netherlands of the 70s and Spain of the 00/10s) have had a solid core all based around one side (Honved, Ajax and Barcelona.) It's why I'm more convinced that Germany would do some damage (given that Neuer, Boateng, Lahm, Kroos, Schweinsteiger, Müller and Götze all share a club dressing room) at this World Cup if their coach wasn't ****ing hopeless.

 

[grecian]

So did last nights match tell you anything?

I didn't watch it, the cricket much better. Yet do we know more than before, anyone pushing for a place. Sturridge has got to start if fit though, I know this because I saw he scored.

 

[GIMH]

Lallana was probably the big beneficiary of the Denmark game. A breath of fresh air.

Would Gerrard, Henderson & Lallana work as a three? With Wilshere out & crap anyway I'm thinking this would be decent. But I'm under certain influences as we speak

PS Jason McAteer is a B****n wanker