Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Barwick finally makes a good decision

Its been a long time but once again, I feel positive about the English national teams prospects. The appointment of Fabio Capello means that maybe at long last, we have a manager who can get the best from our players. There is no doubting Capello's CV. He played international football for his country and won 4 league titles. As a manager, he has won a further 9 league titles in Italy and Spain as well as the Champions League when his AC Milan side demolished Barcelona 4-0 in the final.

However, the main discussion has been about his nationality and whether England should be appointing another foreign coach. As with most football debates everyone is having their say and there is a huge range of opinion. My personal opinion is that ideally, an Englishman should be managing the national side and there is always an amount of concern that a foreign manager may not have the same passion as an Englishman. That said, the players are all English and their lack of passion over the last few years has also be brought into question.

The big problem is that there is not a single English candidate who is vaguely good enough so if we go 'English' we certainly won't be getting anything like the best. The last English manager to win the Premier League is Howard Wilkinson and the last English manager to win the FA Cup is Joe Royle. 18 months ago, Sam Allardyce and Alan Curbishley were amount the leading English candidates for the vacancy. This time round we are talking about Harry Redknapp and Alan Shearer. Have Allardyce and Curbishley suddenly lost the ability to manage at that level or have Redknapp and Shearer suddenly learned something that makes them suitable candidates? Of course nothing has really changed, we are just scrapping the barrel for English candidates - class is permanent.

So if we did appoint an Englishman, would they do any better or worse than the Ginger Sven? We'll never know but the FA have a tricky situation. They have a nice new stadium which needs to be paid for. Rubbish football will mean drop in attendences and not qualifying for tournaments severely reduces the income for the FA. It also has a knock-on effect as our world ranking will suffer meaning have already lost our position as a top seed when it comes to qualifying tournaments. Thankfully, we got lucky and avoided the big guns for the 2010 World Cup.

So if we don't go English, we go foreign and if we do that, we have to have the best available. Some people touted Martin O'Neill but when you compare his acheivements to Capello's - there is only one winner. The FA didn't need to appoint someone so quickly but managers like Capello aren't available every day so they have quite rightly taken the plunge and appointed him. A big factor is that from day 1, Capello has expressed an interest in the job which is also handy.

Now we have one of the worlds best coaches, we have to get the best out of him. That doesn't just mean results for the senior side. The FA have to spend the next 2 or 4 years wringing every last bit of knowledge and experience out of Capello. Although there are a lack of good English candidates, I do believe there are a lot of excellent younger managers and in 5-10 years time, we could well be spoiled for choice - Boothroyd, Jewell, Curbishley, Ince, Pearce to name 5. The FA need to find a way to get Capello's knowledge into these (and other) managers heads so when Capello leaves, we will have a number of good English candidates to chose from.

The foreign appointment should be viewed as a means to an end and not a regular thing. In addition, its good to see the FA haven't swept the "Root and Branch investigation of football" under the carpet. It is also vitally important the Centre of Excellence at Burton. Its beyond comprehension that England does not have an overall headquarters for the development of the game we gave the world.

As with everything, there is far too much discussion. The site at Burton has been there for years but everyone is too scared to make a decision. In an ideal world, perhaps it would be better if our Centre of Excellence was nearer London, Wembley and FA headquarters but the cost of this much land in the south would be outrageous. Far better the centre is in Burton and is used than messing around and never having it. The centre originally got the green light back in 2001 and nothing has happen.

So what for 2008. Well, primarily, Burton must get the go-ahead as a matter of urgency. I also expect to see a far more positive and focused England team under Capello. His first game is against Switzerland on 6th Feb and I'm actually looking forward to an England game.

Merry Christmas and all the best for 2008.

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// posted by Big Blue Marble @ 7:56 am
Comments:
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