LBBlue
Manager⭐
The standard of player and football in league 1 and 2 is higher now than 30 years ago before the large influx of foreign players. Take all the foreign players out of the top two divisions and I suspect the players left would all move up a division. We've had stand out players going back but a lot we've managed to forget who wouldn't get a look in at league level now.
There has been a major shift in attitude of managers and coaches over the last 30 to 40 years. Now defence and a clean sheet is the be all and end all. This is thanks to the likes of Italian Coaches, Jose, Sam, Phil, Pulis, etc who have put the emphasis on fitness, athleticism, work rate and organisation at the expense of ball skills - creative players are closed down and taken out of the game very easily. Entertainment and excitement has suffered -games are a lot quicker.
30/40 years ago we didn't have 7 subs sitting on the bench every week and squads were a lot smaller. Nor were there as many Champions league games and internationals I suspect the level of player in each division has not been greatly affected by the influx of foreign players - we just have more of them
George Best, Jimmy Greaves, Frank Worthington, Alan Hudson , Rodney Marsh, Tony Currie, Charlie George, Dennis Law, Stan Bowles, Willie Morgan, Charlie Cooke etc -we wont see the likes of them again.
Mind you it will be interesting to see how the current crop of English youngsters fare in the next few years. Loftus-Cheek did OK last night - and Italy might not even make the world cup finals.