Tuesday, November 13, 2007

And now the end is near;


And so I face the final curtain......

Actually, as we face the very real possibility that England will fail to qualify for a tournament for the first time for 14 years (and don't forget, there are more teams at the finals now - increased from 8 to 16 for the 1996 finals), all that the Ginger Sven faces is a massive pay cheque for 12 months pay when he gets sacked while us fans have to actually think about a holiday destination that doesn't involve mountains, cuckoo clocks and yodelling.

There are combinations of results that will see England through but lets be honest, Group E was not exactly difficult for us as top seeds. We had everything in our favour and we've blown it big time. When the draw was made for the 2006 World Cup, we were ranked as 2nd seeds for the draw and now were can't even claim to be one of the top 16 teams in Europe. Yet if you believe the FA, the team is progressing !!!!!!

In my opinion, qualification from this position will actually be a bad thing. The politicians at the FA (thats what they are, not football men) will say the important thing is getting there but it will only be papering over the cracks. There are major problems with the national team and these problems must be addressed regardless of whether or not England qualify for the finals.

Football men must run the game in England not idiots like Brian Barwick. People like Bobby Charlton and Trevor Brooking need to be involved. They have played football at the highest level and understand what is needed. You could even take this a step further. Why not involve coaches like Mourinho to give their opinions on coaching techniques. Part of the Euro 2008 failure has been the appalling lack of tactics on the part of the management and possible on the inflexibility of the players.

Sadly for the national team, club football is a priority. Closing the FA school of excellence and letting each Premiership club develop their own talent has been a bad move as the clubs will pick players of any nationality whereas the FA school would concentrate on developing English youngsters.

We also need to develop more English managers. Its a disgrace that the last English manager to win the league title was that dinosaur Howard Wilkinson and the last English manager to win the FA Cup was Joe Royle. Supporters will have more pride in the team if it led by an Englishman but at present, suitable replacements for the Ginger Sven are scarce. The long term aim must be to unearth the next Bobby Robson or Brian Clough but in the short term, England must appoint the best man for the job, regardless of nationality. Failure to do so could see us drop into the footballing wilderness at international level.

So what will happen next Wednesday? A Russian victory in Israel will see the match as a dead rubber in terms of qualification and that will not make for a comfortable time for the management. But it could be worse, if Russia slip up and give us a chance which we subsequently fail to take, the atmosphere will be far more hostile. After this, the FA have to think about the 2010 World Cup qualifying campaign and more importantly, they need full houses at Wembley to help pay the massive £900m bill for the stadium.

But lets wait until next week before discussing all that. As for qualification, there is not doubt in my mind that Russia are a much better team than Israel. Although Tel Aviv is a difficult place for visiting teams, I just can't see Russia not getting the 3 points they need. I hope I'm wrong but if Russia get the points, they will deserve to be in the finals instead of us - the league tables don't lie !!!!


// posted by Big Blue Marble @ 8:22 pm
Comments:
Would you be willing to sell your domain name www.euro2008info.com ?
If so please contact me at this address: gunner05[@]gmail.com


Thank you,
Ben.
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