posted Jun 13, 2008

Yeah spot on, due to all of the hype of the english press gerrard is supposed to be 1 of the best midfielders in the world, personally I dont think he can hold a candle to essien, fabregas and ribery for example

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posted Jun 13, 2008

True -we are so insular when it comes to who is a great player. The press will watch the likes of Ribery once or twice a year if he plays against england or in the Champs league v an english team and make their whole opinion on that match. Of course we get told how great our players are and yet every world cup up pops another great player from overseas who the English know very little about or that is dismissed because he only plays in Germany/Brazil/Spain etc DOH

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posted Jun 13, 2008

Perhaps our players mostly lack technique and technical quality. I can only think of 3 or 4 at most who are comfortable on the ball:

Ferdinand
Beckham
Hargreaves
Probably Rooney.

Common thread is that Beckham and Hargreaves havd played abroard. Rooney is a very special talent and Ferdinand is a bloody good defender.

Maybe more of our players should go abroard, learn to play in a more technical possession wise manner and that it is not all about 100 mph football, exciting though it is.

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posted Jun 13, 2008

Maybe more of our players should go abroard, learn to play in a more technical possession wise manner and that it is not all about 100 mph football, exciting though it is.

Agreed but they have little incentive to do so as they are constantly told how wonderful the english league is and they are coached as kids with that style in mind. I honestly think that the likes of Rooney andf gerrard would really struggle in Spain or italy Rooney particularly as his touch is very erratic.

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posted Jun 13, 2008

actually i'd agrue that neither beckham nor hargreaves are confortable on the ball, while beckham was a superb long range passer and crosser he never had any real technical abilty like zidance and he always had a pretty bad touch, and hargreaves is neat and tidy player, but i wouldnt say he was brilliant with the ball at his feet (he's better without it)

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posted Jun 13, 2008

Yes I agree Beckham is almost like one of the old subbuteo corner kickers. Even when he was younger he couldn't take a man on and really had that one ball that he curls behind the last man.

He shouldnt even be mentioned in the same breath as Zidane really.

His touch whilst not bad for an English player restricted him at the top level which is the reason for the long balls or not holding onto it for very long. It's a real weakness I can't see it changing until a proper youth coaching centre is built in england and even then the coaching emphasis must be totally rethought! Depressing really

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posted Jun 13, 2008

I have been following this debate about why the english squad constantly fails.

To say the prem and foreign players hurt the team is hypocritical for the following
1. The premiership is now more competitive and this means english players get the chance to compete with others at a higher level and thus get more exposure and experience.

2. The foreign players bring to the prem a different dimension of play that the other english players can adapt to. This is the reason why man for man england probably equals many squads.

The major problem with the team lies in
1. No Players playing in other leagues. Whilst the english are busy whining about foreign players other nations are exporting their talents to other leagues, this ensures that the team has a variety of knowledge and tachnical abilities whereas the english know how to play only english football the english way.
2. The MEDIA. The media plays a major role in overating english players who are either average or below as a result those who actually deserve to be picked are not picked but those liked by the media we all know what happens to those.The media is also responsible for playing the blame game instead of looking at the actual causes of failure.

I have to say Scudmo and his fellows should actaully be thanked for ensuring that England still has world class players competing at world class levels.

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posted Jun 13, 2008

After more consideration it appears that the english players are reluctant to go abroad because they are paid obscene salaries in england for what I can say is obscene talent.

Now how do you blame Scudmo and crew for the influx in foreigners when english players demand large salaries for ridiculous or no talent.

Now don't blame the Players for the lack of technical abilities, it's difficult when at the age of 6 you have wannabe coaches teaching you how to kick the ball and run all over the pitch without teaching the kids how to control, dribble and pass the ball.

When it's all said and done the senior team coach knows what resources he is working with and should combine these to produce the results e.g Hiddink - South Korea, Bilic - Croatia, and Sweden too. Mclaren was never going to be able to do that. Not only the english players overated, its the managers too.

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posted Jun 14, 2008

Since 2000 there hasn't been a national side we should really fear and be considered underdogs with the players we have got, this is the difference!

Between 1966-2000 there has been all the great Brazil German Argentinian, Italian and dutch sides that admittedly were better than us as a team, man for man etc!

But now, these sides are good but they don't have better players than us man for man apart from the odd exceptions.

Seriously do they have better defenders midfielders, forwards other than rooney probably but thats the difference.

We should be punching our weight but we don't!
-------------------------

Of course we do, we are just lightweights. Lets not fool anyone, how many other countries have not won a trophy for the last 42 years..hmmmlet me see

Ah Holland-oh they won European championship with Van Basten and Gullit
Germany-oh they won Euro 96
France-damn, they won world cup in 2002
Greece-dame they won last euro
Denmark-damn, they have won a euro-92
what about Brazil-oh they have won 2 world cups since we last checked
Argentina-They have won a world cup too

What weight excatly is it that we think we should be punching at-with these big boys-you are having a laugh...

now spain-yes -they like us are perennial chokers-last won in 1964. Its not about foriegners-its about how football is managed by the country.

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posted Jun 17, 2008

Well said up until now there has always been 5 or 6 better teams than England in any given tournanment. Looking at the current Euro I can safely say that Spain,Portugal,Holland,Germany,Croatia,France,Italy,Romania are better than England and there are one or two others that could beat them on an offday like Turkey or Czech Republic or Sweden

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