Germany V England

[Blueshrimper]

Our defence was just so slow and played far too high up the pich. I think all of there goals came from the counter attack.

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

Our lack of depth defensively really cost us. For all the talk of Rooney, it was actually Rio Ferdinand that we couldn't afford to lose. Fabio seemed aware of his importance: he made him captain and he knew how dodgy we were at centre-half which is why he gambled on King and Carragher.

The other injury that cost us was Hargreaves. Boy, did we miss him today. We really needed someone to sit on Ozil and neutralise him.
I still can't get over just how incompetent we were defensively though. The trouble is what options are there?

Dawson doesn't convince me, Onhua the guy from Man City and Wheater at Boro aren't ready and Micah Richards is positionally suspect.

Who else is there?

Are there any other English centre-halves? Lescott and Jagielka - were they both crocked?

 

[Boreham Shrimper]

I've scoured the press this morning but must have missed the apologies from the officials, Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini :stunned:

Can someone put me straight please? ;)

 

[blues_r_best]

As a positive, any West Ham fan who says they won the World Cup in 1966, you can say they lost our chance in this one, through Green's mistake and Upson generally being crap (though not the only one).

 

[Jedi Shrimper]

I don't blame Capello for all this, rather alot of overpaid, overplayed, spoilt players so insulated from the real world and told they're amazing all the time, they start to believe it. That said a team performs badly and you have to look at the manager, and he may have to go but I feel for him. Yes, it was terrible decision (as was argentian's first goal) but come on, we weren't good enough and never were.

Roy Hodgson would be a good replacement. I'd also be happy with Martin O'Neill or maybe Arsene Wenger.

One thing we really have to adjust in this country is our ludicrous expectations though. We are not world beaters. But we are not dire either, we're just a decent-ish team. And can we please get over this pathetic preoccupation with the germans. Germany don't regard us a a big rivalry - and they lost the wars!, to them it's just another game, which is why they win.

players useless. get rid of all of them, start again with youngsters and hodgson in charge,

So bye bye Rio, Fat Frank, James, Heskey plus couple of others

I'd like to see the likes of Hart, Dawson, Johnson given starts next campaign

Dawson doesn't convince me, Onhua the guy from Man City and Wheater at Boro aren't ready and Micah Richards is positionally suspect.

Who else is there?

Are there any other English centre-halves? Lescott and Jagielka - were they both crocked?

Agree with most of this. It finally seems as if the number of foreign players in the premiership is catching up with us, take a look at the last Engalnd U21 squad, it's pretty uninspiring stuff.

Our squad is ageing and there are several that after their performances in this world cup (and a general failure to live up to their reps) should be dropped now as the will be too old in 4 years anyway ie. Terry, Gerrard & Lampard. Players like Heskey & Upson simply aren't good enough. Bring in the likes of Agbonlahor, Shawcross, Onouha (to be honest I'm struggling to think of others).

I think Rio still has a part to play, if he can regain full fitness, same goes for Hargreaves.

As Graham Taylor and the like have said, we need to overhaul our entire system, the way we develop young players. Then they need the oporrtunities, we may have the 'Best League In The World™' but it starves young english players of experience, something it seems the Germans don't lack in their 'inferior' league. Maybe introduce a cap for the number of foreign players in a squad, maybe 2/3rds of a squad should be english. I'd love to see a wage cap, you know it's gone crazy when SWP is apparently after £100k-a-week. Do we play too many games? probably. But I can't see the Champions League / Europa league being shortend so maybe we need to reduce the premiership a bit, to 18 teams and cut any teams that qualify for europe from the League Cup.

At any rate something needs to change.

 

[canveyshrimper]

Is that the Siegfride Line?

I'd imaginot so!!

 

[C C Csiders]

Along with missing our 2nd 'goal' the linesman was also to blame for the second German goal. He wrongly gave Defoe offside, and from the resultant free-kick Germany sped down the pitch to notch number 2. This, as far as I can see, has not been mentioned elsewhere.

 

[MK Shrimper]

At any rate something needs to change.

The same thing has been said post WC '98, '02, '06 after Sven, McLaren and now this Italian idiot who let us think he was the bees knees when he reality he was far more catastrophic than the rest.

Nothing will ever change it English football. Far too much money rides on it and we will never win anything.

 

[osymandus]

I'd disagree on the England U21 because remember we were runners up to Germany , so its not as bad as people make out .
The senior squad however is . The premershite is a brand and as such its best brands must be sent into teh wider adervting opportunit... err sorry i mean tournaments.

Most ex players and pundits saying get rid of Capello would be to huge a mistake , he is about the best manager we could have at the moment anyway . The blame is squarely on the players , they failed . Now if some because they we're not up to it or have been over played by their domestic teams who knows

 

[Ayrshire Blue]

Schoolboy defending, it was like watching a Sunday league side who all had hangovers.

 

[EastStandBlue]

I dare say Ferdinand’s injury caused considerably more uproar than the England management will ever be prepared to admit. Ferdinand isn’t only the captain and an integral part of the defence, but he’s also one of the most liked members of the squad and in an environment such as the World Cup, the morale of the team is of equal importance to talent. Look at Argentina, one of the most gifted frontlines I have ever seen is propping up a shambolic defence managed by a drug-addled buffoon, yet every member of their squad is enjoying their football and is paying great testament to the environment generated by Maradona.

Defensively we were an absolute shambles. Upson’s positioning was, as ever, all over the place and Terry was so far away from Johnson having been dragged inside it caused ample space for Podolski to drift inside unnoticed. Johnson himself ran around like a headless chicken, adding weight my theory that he has no football brain on his shoulders; he’s just been blessed with enough pace to rectify errors for his club.

The only defender who can escape with an ounce of credit to his name is Ashley Cole, who remained calm and composed and kept his head when all those around him were losing theirs. He tracked his men well, got forward whenever needed and just generally looked comfortable.
I don’t want to fall in the familiar trap of blaming English attitudes to youth football on our poor performances, that’s not the biggest reason for our failures, but it does need to be said that the midfielders we took were so technically so far behind other countries it was frightening. Gerrard was negated by occupying a position alien to him, but I can’t remember a phase of play that Barry or Lampard looked comfortable finding a compatriot with a pass. Compare that with the likes of Schweinsteiger, Sneijder, Xavi and even Mascherano and the gulf in technical ability is clear visible.

As YB says, Owen Hargreaves, the only English midfielder with experience playing overseas, was sorely missed and nobody knew that more than Germany. Barry’s complete incapability to track Ozil at all left him wide open to wreak havoc in front of our back four.

Milner was distinctly average (but better than most) but should have had a field day against a very poor Jerome Boateng and, as a result, Defoe was strangled out of the game. I actually thought Rooney was as good against Germany as I’ve seen him throughout the entire tournament, his passing and movement was sharp and he looked to bring himself into the game, but once again a complete lack of creativity from midfield left him wanting.

I fully expected the sensationalised, knee-jerk reactions from the tabloids calling for Capello’s head, but it’d be a terrible decision to axe him. He was left with a defence incapable of its duty, a pedestrian midfield and a talismanic striker that was, quite clearly, unfit following his ankle injury entering the World Cup.

We do this in the wake of every national tournament. A poor performance and the manager is axed, and it’s either an English manager with passion or a foreign manager who’s tactically astute that is identified as the replacement. There isn’t a more experienced, more talented or more decorated manager that would consider the job than Fabio Capello, and we need to stick with him now he has experience of managing England at a major international tournament and knows where to go from here. Sir Alf Ramsey had three years of managing England before ’66 and Sir Bobby had the reigns for eight years before ’90... Let’s make history, back Capello, and have him lead a renovated English side into the European Championships where we can blood some of the promising talent we have coming through the U21’s and U19’s.

Hell, the £12million saved by sticking with him could, controversially for the backwards-thinking FA, actually go to finally getting the National Football Centre off the ground after more than a decade of postponement. That’d be a novel idea.

It’d also help if the FA could negotiate factors with the Premier League. Reduce the number of teams to 18 and incorporate a winter break. Goran-Eriksson took a world renowned scientist (whose name escapes me) with him to the FA four-freaking-years ago with a folder of scientific evidence proving that English players were far more likely to suffer over-use injuries and fatigue because of the exhausting Premier League schedule, and this could be fixed with a simple two-week break in the Bundesliga style. It’s time the FA dragged itself kicking and screaming into the 21st century, or we’ll be stuck in this rut for some time.

There are, however, positives. Starting from the back going forward, we need the likes of Joe Hart, Jack Rodwell, Chris Smalling, Ryan Shawcross, Gary Cahill, Lee Cattermole, Tom Huddlestone, Jack Wilshere, Ashley Young, Theo Walcott, Adam Johnson, James Milner, Gabriel Agbonlahor and Victor Moses to come to the fore. All of whom are tremendously talented players.

 

[MK Shrimper]

Re: press conference.

Capello hasn't quit, but the FA have told him that he's going to have to wait 2 weeks for a decision. I hope that decision is to get rid and appoint Roy Hodgson.

 

[Heskey]

I'd Rather Harry Redknapp !

 

[Usual_Suspect]

Apparantly the players were tired!

However, I don't quite go with the idea of getting Roy Hodgson in - lets face it, nobody was touting him for the job until Fulham went on a good European cup run.

For me, whoever they get in should get a contract to Euro 2012 and then reviewed after that, why we give managers 4 year deals is beyond me.

 

[Heskey]

For me, whoever they get in should get a contract to Euro 2012 and then reviewed after that, why we give managers 4 year deals is beyond me.

Why do people always just copy what the pundits on the BBC say?

 

[Clinton Baptiste]

Problem is will Capello go for that youth. This is the guy who begged for Carragher and Scholes to come back. Hardly placing his trust in youth!
As for the winter break, been siad before but then why was Tevez not tired after playing virtually every game for Man City? What about all the other prem players. It cant be just english players that are tired, I think thats a constant cop out. At the end of the day they just dont play like a team, there are too many egos, too many internal rivalries.
Capello should go, yes he cant be blamed for the paucity of english talent but his rigid 4-4-2, his total lack of tactical knowledge to combat the Germans, and his puzzling substitutions (Heskey, Wright Phillips) mean he has been our worst manager at a world cup that I can remember. Anyone could see what was wrong yesterday yet he didnt change things at all. I also think his general communication skills are appalling, 2 years in the job and he still needs a translator-WTF? Hodgson or Redknapp would be good choices and I do think there are some good english players coming through with potentialy high skill levels- Wilshere, Moses, Gibbs. But overall you have to say it does not look good until there are mass changes in the premier league and grassroots.

 

[Usual_Suspect]

Why do people always just copy what the pundits on the BBC say?

Yeah nice one

 

[Napster]

I do think there are some good english players coming through with potentialy high skill levels- Wilshere, Moses, Gibbs.

Remi Moses must be ancient by now.

 

[canveyshrimper]

I'd Rather Harry Redknapp !

I'm sorry there's no way that Redknapp should be allowed near the England job. Luckily for us I don't think he will be as he has too much baggage, not least a court battle over his tax affairs, and the FA aren't going to want that.

Notwithstanding that Redknapp is a ****, he gives the image in public to 'Appy 'Arry cheerful cheeky Cockerney chappie when he is anything but. I've been told by a few in private he is a nasty piece of work, some of his transfer dealings have been utterly laughable. He managed to manoeuvre his way out of the Portsmouth job once, when the Saints job started to go tits up he managed to get himself reinstated at Portsmouth. Don't forget that a lot of Portsmouth's problems are down to Redknapp's transfer dealings. And finally he like as not engineered his move to Spurs. One FA Cup is not a good return for all his years in management.

And apart from all that he played and managed W*t Sp*m.

 

[Pubey]

absolutely no way should 'Arry be anywhere near the England team. Capello has 2 weeks to come up with a a decent strategy for the next 2 years. The problem is that even if he does that, the FA are such a bunch of complete muppets they wouldn't know a 451 formation even if it was etched into their prawn sandwich.

why give Capello a 4 year contract BEFORE the World Cup, why?!