PaddockLad

So why is it never us?.... why is it never us that gets the erm "luck"?....

Quarters being about where we should be is fine after the dogs dinner Capello left, but we should be aiming for better than that. I don't think we have a divine right to anything, but progress needs to happen quickly if the rest of the footballing world are to be prevented form leaving us behind completely. A limited Italinan side with one very special player made us look mediocre at best. And its been going on decades, with very rare exceptions, without anyone doing anything about it and therefore allowing the press the oppurtunity to ask why the fuck cant we compete at the very top level. It gone on so long, the press criticising the national team in 2012 for things they criticised us for in 1992. Its beyond senseless.

Fuck me I hope not...imagine signing some of that lot and the sort of "visitors" they could attract on a Saturday afternoon should they be at "a loose end" for a season or two..no further than Aberdeen on the train for them too...

Is it Stormont you work at then Ant? Not hanging around for the "historic handshake"?....

The article made me think of something Parky said yesterday about the powers that be accepting that we'll never win another international trophy again, which may well happen anyway because of the strength of the Premier League. I think theres a will at the FA to change things, but as long as we're playing 38 games a season in the manner in which we do + champions league then we'll continue to be shattered in the second half of games like we were on Sunday, and at most of the other tournaments I can think of. Think of Brazil in 2002, Romania in 2000, where we lost from winning posistions after the first 45, and other tired second halves where teams were there for the beating and some of our lot were dead on their feet, unable to physically change things because we couldnt keep the ball, which is obviously our other great failing. The two are linked for me, tired minds and bodies will just "hit the big man" with long balls....defenders at this level lap that shit up. I actually thought we played ok in the first half on Sunday, but it was the same old story in the second. Italy have got fuck all up front to speak of, especially in comparison with us, but Rooney's had 6 weeks rest and still looked knackered. Yet again at a summer tournament, players based in the Premier League have failed to shine. France in 02 were World and European champions and didnt win a group game because half their team had played a full season in England. With Zidane playing on one leg as well they were royally fucked. Something needs changing, the FA want to do it, but, taken with the comparitively small percentage of English qualified players who earn their living in it, the league they set up 20 years ago has basically grown into such an enormously powerful monster that its basically eaten whole any chance of our own national side succeeding on the big stage. But change will be a lot more difficult here beacuse of the sheer power of the PL than it was in Germany as Parky was pointing out yesterday.Good luck to Tevor Brooking & co. they'll fuckin need it.

England have just gone out of a tournament after a match in which they averaged 36% of the possession and were left trying to make sense of the tragicomedy that accompanies the team's most prolific passer actually being the goalkeeper, Joe Hart. No European country has won a World Cup in South America. To believe England can break that sequence when they are still so desperately short in the fundamentals of taking care of the ball is to believe there are fairies at the bottom of the garden humming the words to World in Motion. http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2012/jun/25/euro-2012-england-ambitions

Michael Carrick is the closest thing to Pirlo weve got but he wanted to be starting...silly fuckin twat....

Holland dont produce the players they did in the past and neither do we....nowadays both nations produce some good ones but not as many great ones as they used to...

Playing on concrete with a tennis ball produces better players.....loads of old time players will tell you that, I remember reading an interview with Gerry Muhren of Ajax & Holland, he regretted the passing of what he called "street football"...parents dont let their kids out to do it now, too dangerous, so they have a "coach" down the local rec to show them how to play instead of learning for themselves that falling on concrete is fuckin sore so you learn to stay on your feet. Playing with a tiny ball improves your touch immersurably when someone finally appeared with a full sized leather ball. I'm sure I dont need to tell the older ones on here about that, its how we all learned how to play the game in the days when mothers would kick you out the house at 9-30am "go out and play!!!" Murhen also refused to go a 100 miles to Germany to play in the WC in 74 because his son was ill. He once played for Ajax in the Bernebau v Real in a European tie and played keepy-uppy in the centre circle because he was from the generation who could play off the cuff with real confidence. Some of those playing for England last night were hiding from the ball, a fuckin joke.

Man City dont make money, theyre bankrolled. And its now a combination of things, not just setting up an academy in Prague then? Fair enough. So what we need is Sky to go completly tits up and leave the clubs riddled with debt so they have to pick local lads for the youth squads?... That doesnt really explain why Germany have consistantly appeared in the latter stages of international competitions with monotonous regularity throughout their entire post-war history and England haven't, but thats a whole other argument......or is it?...

"Mesut Ozil, whose family has lived in Gelsenkirchen in the Ruhr area for three generations now, is a case in point. We know that many young players of Turkish descent preserve strong ties to the country of their fathers, so that when the time came for Mesut to decide which country to play for we deliberately refrained from exerting even the slightest pressure. Hoisted by your own petard there old son...and he had a choice of countries to represent too..

Has that contributed to the make up of the current squad though?....or the French side that won the WC in 98, which was largely made up of immigrants' kids?...you're making out all this is new but its frankly bollocks. Fair enough, Germany are doing all that in Eastern Europe as we speak, but its not had an effect as yet. Its down to the kids of Immigrants who came to the country for work atm.See also John Barnes,Paul Parker,David Rocastle,Paul Davis, Oxlade-Chamberlain's old man got a few England caps and wasnt here because the FA spotted him and bribed his parents to come. All that was 30 years ago ffs.

Tebbit lives! joking aside, its a fair point.

It was part of the Empire and we still missed out on Desailly because his folks moved to Paris.

So the parents of all the Polish and Turkish lads playing for the Bosch this summer were enticed by the German FA?....is that what you're basically saying or have I missed the point and economic migration had nothing to do with it?...

We're 10 years off having a lad with a Polish surname playing for Engalnd, one will be starting high school somewhere in September.You can virtually guarantee that and the FA wont have anything to do wiith it. They had nothing to do with Viv Anderson and Laurie Cunningham becoming internationals either.

Our society is destroying the communities that produced wiorld class footballers from council estates here in the UK....thats the biggest issue, rather than the "too many foreigners" thing, which doesnt help admittedly. Look at the players Scotland produced from 1960-1990, and look how many have come through since then. England is going the same way.

Who out of Gerrard,Terry,Cole and Parker will be good enough, should England qualify for Brazil?....none of them iyam, with the possible exception of Cole. Its farewell to the "Golden Generation" then...Roy will have to come up with something extra special to do anything with whats left if he thinks Milner and Young are worth a starting place.

Joe Hart saved all eight shots Italy got on target, but England only retained possession on 15 of his 29 kicks (52%). That said, only Wayne Rooney and Ashley Young completed more passes which finished in the attacking third. From 442 stats zone Sam Wallace from the Independant is claiming that Hart had the most completed passes (45)...fuck me, thats depressing if true...

My mate here at work says that according to his twitter Joe Hart had the highest number of completed passes for an England player last night....in a perverse way I hope thats true

Teach children to play football, not to "knock it up to the big lad" at the age of 9, enocuraged by ignorant bellowing parents on the touchline, desperate for their little treasures to win something. That would be a start. Can't see how anyone can be too disappointed this morning. Played off the park by a very average Italy side. Its just not in our nation's footballing culture to play posession football, despite what the individuals are taught at their clubs. It all seems to go out the window when they put on an England shirt.

England haven't beaten a major footballing nation in the knock out phase anywhere other than Wembley....Belgium in 1990 don't count as they hardly count as a major footballing nation,neither do Cameroon, neither of them were going to win it that year,even if they'd put England out. If they do it tonight they'll be putting out a nation who have won 4 world cups and have been runners up twice. There is an understanding in Italian football culture about tournament football that is usually nowhere to be seen when England arrive at summer tournaments themselves. Italy look average so far but they didn't look any better in 2006 when they won the WC. Putting them out removes a potential winner. That for me is huge. I've not seen too much in Englands games that has suggested this time is going to be any different to the countless other times we've messed it up at this stage but if we deny Pirlo space and time then theyve got little else tbh. Getting to the semis will be a major over acheivement in view of our history but its do-able iyam.

Talking of flounces, I take it that lot who appeared from nutz went back there without telling anyone?...and where have all those mad scandies gone?....

I thought this was the landscape gardener who wouldn't pay his debts....turns out its the internet pyschopath one.....welcome back anyway

Is there a fritz playing called Schoeller or something? Has the Fenham Eusebio found a highly unlikely granny in Nuremburg?...