Phew!
It's been a while since I've written about football, but I guess England qualifying for the World Cup is a suitable occasion to pass comment.
Beckham was rather unfortunate, I thought, to be sent off, but he seemed to take it rather well, probably because he got someone else sent off in similar circumstances last week.
Good to see, too, that the best replacement we have for Wayne Rooney is Peter Crouch. As the pundits never tire of telling us, he has a good touch for a big man. Sadly, he's pretty awful in the air for a big man too.
He may even be more Heskey-ish than Heskey. I didn't think he was too bad against Austria. But there are better players to replace Rooney. Poor Jermain Defoe must be thinking he'll never play for England again under Sven. Was he injured or something?
Lots of people are still saying we can win the World Cup. This is nonsense. We have no chance. I'll be right behind the team, of course, when the tournament starts and would be delighted to eat my words if we won. I can't see it myself, though. Not under Sven. We're simply too negative. Too cagy. Too nervy.
Not that there's anyone out there who is good enough and willing enough to replace Sven. Jose Mourhino would do a grand job, but he's already got one.
It is bizarre, though, that Sven picks players like Crouch, Richardson, Hargreaves (in the Ireland game) to start or to come on and leaves players like Defoe and Alan Smith out. Love him or hate him for his aggression, surely Smith is a far better player than any of those in any of their positions? But Smith didn't even make it to the bench.
I was thinking, when Lampard stepped up to take the penalty, can you imagine what would happen if we had a penalty shoot out? Beckham, Owen, Gerrard - all failed penalty takers and all bottled out at club or international level. We'd be left with Rooney (if he's not suspended by the latter stages), Lampard (he seems to have the guts) and Joe Cole if he plays. Where does that leave us? Two penalties left. You'll know we're on our way out when you see Sol Campbell, the most inaccurate passer of a football I think I've ever seen, step up to take a pen.
Not exactly optimistic, but very relieved we're there.
Beckham was rather unfortunate, I thought, to be sent off, but he seemed to take it rather well, probably because he got someone else sent off in similar circumstances last week.
Good to see, too, that the best replacement we have for Wayne Rooney is Peter Crouch. As the pundits never tire of telling us, he has a good touch for a big man. Sadly, he's pretty awful in the air for a big man too.
He may even be more Heskey-ish than Heskey. I didn't think he was too bad against Austria. But there are better players to replace Rooney. Poor Jermain Defoe must be thinking he'll never play for England again under Sven. Was he injured or something?
Lots of people are still saying we can win the World Cup. This is nonsense. We have no chance. I'll be right behind the team, of course, when the tournament starts and would be delighted to eat my words if we won. I can't see it myself, though. Not under Sven. We're simply too negative. Too cagy. Too nervy.
Not that there's anyone out there who is good enough and willing enough to replace Sven. Jose Mourhino would do a grand job, but he's already got one.
It is bizarre, though, that Sven picks players like Crouch, Richardson, Hargreaves (in the Ireland game) to start or to come on and leaves players like Defoe and Alan Smith out. Love him or hate him for his aggression, surely Smith is a far better player than any of those in any of their positions? But Smith didn't even make it to the bench.
I was thinking, when Lampard stepped up to take the penalty, can you imagine what would happen if we had a penalty shoot out? Beckham, Owen, Gerrard - all failed penalty takers and all bottled out at club or international level. We'd be left with Rooney (if he's not suspended by the latter stages), Lampard (he seems to have the guts) and Joe Cole if he plays. Where does that leave us? Two penalties left. You'll know we're on our way out when you see Sol Campbell, the most inaccurate passer of a football I think I've ever seen, step up to take a pen.
Not exactly optimistic, but very relieved we're there.
posted by Me @ 6:18 pm
6 Comments:
At 2:36 am,
swisslet said…
nevermind what Jermaine Defoe thinks - at least he was in the squad. Alan Smith was picked as a midfielder and players like Scott Parker were left out. Imagine how he feels about being left out, effectively, because Sven fancies picking Smith in a position has played in for about a month. To be fair to Smith, he has shown some promise there, but it's not as though we don't have a surplus of reasonable midfielders already (Carrick, Parker, Jenas, SW-P etc.).
Quite how Owen Hargreaves keeps picking up caps I'll never really know, and is Kieran Richardson really the answer? If he is, what the hell is the question.
You've hit the nail on the head: Sven is conservative and for some reason doesn't seem to be able to get the best out of what looks on paper to be a great squad. It totally misses the point to say that our squad is second only to Brazil in terms of quality. We've just had 3 terrible performances in a row. Nobody from the 2004 Greek side would have made the England team, and yet they won the damn thing. England are patently only less than the sum of their consituent parts, and anyone who thinks we deserve to be amongst the favourites this summer clearly needs their head examining.
ST
ST
At 9:31 am,
Anonymous said…
Smith would have done a better job upfront than Crouch, or Defoe, or Owen for that matter. I really couldn't believe it when i got back from the offy one minute into the game that Crouch was on the pitch - I never thought I'd see someone skinnier and lankier than me playing for England.
Thank the Lord for Holland. I really can't see us beating Poland on Wednesday after recent performances. Surely once we're actually in Germany we will raise our game and prove that we really are better than anyone, apart from Brazil...
As for the final two penalty takers...Hargreaves and Richardson, obviously.
At 3:50 am,
LB said…
we'll scrape through the group, draw someone really good, play like genius and be knocked out by a dodgy refereeing decision and a penalty shootout.
as ever.
At 6:42 pm,
thomkat said…
Whoosh!
[the sound of it all flying straight over Thomkat's head]
At 8:23 pm,
Anonymous said…
I think everything could be solved by giving the players longer shorts, like the good old days!
guess who I am
At 11:38 pm,
Anonymous said…
I have changed my name from anonymous to save confusion! Roll on the next blog!
Post a Comment
<< Home