***Official*** Road to Euro 2012

[grecian]

Haha, WTF was Hart doing there?

[cpr]

Hart confirming why I selected Sack of Cabbages before him for my England XI



Chance for Lampard to hit the post now

[grecian]

Originally Posted by cpr

Hart confirming why I selected Sack of Cabbages before him for my England XI



Chance for Lampard to hit the post now

What a **** pen, went in though.

[cpr]

Frank gets lucky a weak penalty isnt saved there, doesnt really inspire confidence from the spot that boy

[BoyBrumby]

Thank God for that.

Lovely little goal for our second, actually.

[grecian]

Downing, you complete ****.

[Redbacks]

England just don't have the cattle

[Nnanden]

Harsh on Downing. Probably could've hit the target I guess, but that's not where the game was lost.

Capello is a freaking terrible manager for England. I have no idea why you persist with him.

[Uppercut]

Jeez, there are some properly crap players playing for England these days. Glen Johnson definitely wasn't an international footballer last I checked, and Milner/Walcott is a pretty painful step down from Beckham/Cole.

I guess it mirrors the sudden dip in the quality of the domestic league.

[grecian]

Originally Posted by Nnanden

Harsh on Downing. Probably could've hit the target I guess, but that's not where the game was lost.

Capello is a freaking terrible manager for England. I have no idea why you persist with him.

Okay. I'll bite, WTF is Capello meant to do, we've got ****e players, the ones who are less ****e can't be bothered to play for us. Lampard and Ferdinand may well of phoned their performances in today. Johnson, Baines, Downing, these people would barely get in Scotlands side.

We need to totally over-haul our game at the youth level, emphasizing skills and technique, not strength and endeavor, or else we'll carry on falling behind. There has been talk of this happening, but I'm yet to see any results.

We're **** and the more talk about it being down to foreign players and managers is just taking the attention away from the points that matter. Actually pretty allegorical of all British life ATM.

[Uppercut]

Originally Posted by grecian

Lampard and Ferdinand may well of phoned their performances in today

will definitely steal that.

There's a tongue-in-cheek article in issue zero of the blizzard about how this is all Roy of the Rovers' fault for forming the basis of every English gameplan since 1970. Worth a look, it's available on pay-what-you-like.

[Samuel_Vimes]

^ btw, I now understand a little about how you feel about NI's 'success' recently.

Artist's impression of Norway's tactic vs Portugal today.



(Thankfully they lost 0-1)

[Redbacks]

Originally Posted by Uppercut

will definitely steal that.

There's a tongue-in-cheek article in issue zero of the blizzard about how this is all Roy of the Rovers' fault for forming the basis of every English gameplan since 1970. Worth a look, it's available on pay-what-you-like.

Is he the guy who advocated the long ball based on the thoery, time in the box = more chances at goal and thus long direct passes to a forward..? Apparently this theory was popular for a long time. It's amazing given the level of sophisitication in the English cricket anaylsis.

Given Australian football media hail from the continent and love to blame the 'English Mafia' for why Australian football was so poor outside of the influx of Greeks/Italians/Serbs/Croats post WW2, here's a list of what we have been told over the years as to why England struggle to keep up with the continentals in terms of technique. With heart/passion and all that other bollocks being held equal.

a) Initially only teachers could coach the game. Compare this to the high levels of structure in the Italian system and others where exhaustive theoretical debate took place between former players.
b) The working class roots have really affected the theory behind the game. Equalisation of work expected from all players leading to people to question if the inbetween striker/forward type player e.g. like Maradona (forgetting he's an argie f***er) would have struggled to get a game as a youngster, small, slow and not really fitting to the rigid 4-4-2. Some creative players who float in and out of games or don't 'get stuck in' would fail to win crowd approval.
c) cold weather, too much running around at training instead of teaching skills.
d) Pride, invented the game so what can 'they' teach us.
e) Too much emphasis on power, thus in juniors the 6 month younger guys usually struggle vs the more developed players in their age groups, although they might have more technical ability. (Germany made this adjustment to thier junior system after the 98 QF loss to croatia, and believe the class of WC2010 to be showed fruit of this theory, plus they have won a heap of junior tournaments).
f) EPL is great to watch but, outside the top few, it's really a myriad of mistakes if you watch it closely and critically (Jose made this comment in his first press conference as Inter Manager 'Italians are professionals who see football as a job and manage their bodies/outlook accordingly, English players enjoy playing so much I can't get them to take rests (Lampard) and they just want to have fun rather than see the bigger picture).
g) Too concerned about the ends rather than the means. Press feed this circus to a hungry crowd.
h) Not enough small sided games for kids.
i) England are naturally crap and bottle it under pressure (The Aussie ungrounded pub theory , maybe we stole that from them).

[Nnanden]

Originally Posted by grecian

Okay. I'll bite, WTF is Capello meant to do, we've got ****e players, the ones who are less ****e can't be bothered to play for us. Lampard and Ferdinand may well of phoned their performances in today. Johnson, Baines, Downing, these people would barely get in Scotlands side.

We need to totally over-haul our game at the youth level, emphasizing skills and technique, not strength and endeavor, or else we'll carry on falling behind. There has been talk of this happening, but I'm yet to see any results.

We're **** and the more talk about it being down to foreign players and managers is just taking the attention away from the points that matter. Actually pretty allegorical of all British life ATM.

I disagree. While there might be a few things I don't think you have (a system the players are comfortable with, desire to win, a right back haha), one thing I believe you have is the talent. Maybe not to be the best in the world, but around the Top Eight.

I just don't see any cohesion with the England unit, which after thee (?) years of being here, I would have thought Capello would bring.

I see cohesion with Australia frbs, and we don't have anywhere near the talent you do.

[duffer]

Originally Posted by grecian

We need to totally over-haul our game at the youth level, emphasizing skills and technique, not strength and endeavor, or else we'll carry on falling behind. There has been talk of this happening, but I'm yet to see any results.
.

No real big deal though. You guys will qualify, just won't win.