England Euro 2012 post mortem thread.

Providing players progress well and stay free of injury, in our next major tournament the first team will look like this -

---------------------Hart
Walker---Terry/Smalling--Cahill/Jones--Cole/Baines/Bertrand
---------------Rodwell/Barry
---------Wilshere/Henderson---Cleverley/McEachran (Maybe Gerrard).
Ox/Walcott--------------------------Welbeck/Adam Johnson
-------------------Rooney/Carroll/Bent

That looks immensely better than what we went to the Euros with.

The England team lacks that creativity, that spark that young players like Ox, Wilshere, Cleverley will bring to the team. Add that to the eagerness of some of the youngsters and add some experience you have a balanced squad.
 
jaybee said:
Explain?
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Genuine question, did you play football when you were younger?

I can tell you for a fact, between the ages of say 8 - 14/15, it is not the more technically gifted players that influence games the most. Pace and power is what makes the difference in those age groups, and since it's always about winning, that is what's encouraged. That's not to say you can be **** as long as you're fast, but allowing players that actually want to play the game the time to develop isn't conducive to winning.

Think of Xavi, or a player of his kind, he didn't start the game age 10 being that good, but he was allowed to develop his game over time, this means he didn't have coaches who were delighted if he simply 'cleared his lines', or screaming at him if he lost the ball through holding onto it instead of trying a longer ball that probably wouldn't have come off. It's all about the mentality, if you don't coach it, you're then relying on players who would have ended up that way through being naturally gifted anyway, which is a rare thing as we know unfortunately.

We have the basics of football completely mixed up, it's insane to think we're incapable of holding on to the ball for more than a few seconds, but that's the situation we're in. We didn't get here because we forgot how to do it, we got here because the foundations were never laid, we focus on other areas instead because they're more effective at achieving the short term goals.
 
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cheets64 said:
Not really we needed Rooney to do something, he did nothing, a header he should have burred and a bicycle kicked he ballsed up but put one away for Man Utd, Welbeck did nothing, look how much space Mario made for himself

CLUB > COUNTRY
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Rooney seemed to be tasked with man marking Pirlo, how is that getting the best out of Rooney?
 
The elephant in the room is that England just aren't world class.

Very few people seem to want to admit it, but we're just not as good as we like to think we are. Italy played us off the pitch tonight and ought to have won at least 2-0, it would've been a travesty for us to have gone through on penalties after that display, I don't care how patriotic you are.

We keep throwing managers at it, every time it's built up as a fresh start, and every time the same cracks appear in the same places.

The sooner we just accept we're an average team the easier it will be for everyone to appreciate England for the team it is rather than the one the tabloids etc bill it as.
 
wedgie said:
Genuine question, did you play football when you were younger?

I can tell you for a fact, between the ages of say 8 - 14/15, it is not the more technically gifted players that influence games the most. Pace and power is what makes the difference in those age groups, and since it's always about winning, that is what's encouraged. That's not to say you can be **** as long as you're fast, but allowing players that actually want to play the game the time to develop isn't conducive to winning.

Think of Xavi, or a player of his kind, he didn't start the game age 10 being that good, but he was allowed to develop his game over time, this means he didn't have coaches who were delighted if he simply 'cleared his lines', or screaming at him if he lost the ball through holding onto it instead of trying a longer ball that probably wouldn't have come off. It's all about the mentality, if you don't coach it, you're then relying on players who would have ended up that way through being naturally gifted anyway, which is a rare thing as we know unfortunately.

We have the basics of football completely mixed up, it's insane to think we're incapable of holding on to the ball for more than a few seconds, but that's the situation we're in. We didn't get here because we forgot how to do it, we got here because the foundations were never laid, we focus on other areas instead because they're more effective at achieving the short term goals.
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Yeah I did play and I coach now. I get what you are saying now ta. Yeah. I agree to an extent. Difficult to break away from it isn't it, since it works so well being strong as kids grow up. My lad plays, and some teams literally are hand picked to contain the biggest players for that age group. Players that tower over our kids I mean, almost like the age group limits are being breached too.
 
jaybee said:
Yeah I did play and I coach now. I get what you are saying now ta. Yeah. I agree to an extent. Difficult to break away from it isn't it, since it works so well being strong as kids grow up. My lad plays, and some teams literally are hand picked to contain the biggest players for that age group. Players that tower over our kids I mean, almost like the age group limits are being breached too.
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Yeah exactly, I saw it the whole time I played, from under 8's to under 16's, and everytime I've seen people from within the pro game be critical they've echoed what I've seen for myself almost exactly.

Like you say it's difficult to break away from though, it essentially means giving up (or at least putting much less emphasis on) the natural physical advantages you get at those age groups and therefore hurting your chances of success in the short term. But look at what the long term effects of it are, we end up rarely producing certain types of players and it's showing us up badly in the international game.
 
All the Rooney moaning is hilarious, 35 goals last season compared to any other available strikers England have.

What use is having a centre forward like Rooney and telling him to waste 70% of his game and the majority of his energy tracking back the focal point of a three man midfield. Get the tactics right and get your midfield to do their job.

Does it not cross your mind that perhaps if England managers stopped forcing him to track back and man-marking those players like Pirlo, and let him actually play his natural position, that he might do better for England? He doesn't have those issues for United.
 
Tom84 said:
Of course that was my point. England could have done a Greece in this tournament and won the whole thing, it wouldn't of changed the fact that 4 of the games along the way they played **** and didn't actually deserve to win those games.
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At the end of the day, that's how we set out to play. We played to our strengths and we knew it'd be like this. It wasn't going to be pretty, we weren't going to dominate possession and we were always going to score on the counter.

As for playing "****", we may not have dominated the games or played any beautiful football, but bar tonight we defended extremely well for the majority of the tournament. So defensively, I'd say our performances were decent.
 
wedgie said:
Yeah exactly, I saw it the whole time I played, from under 8's to under 16's, and everytime I've seen people from within the pro game be critical they've echoed what I've seen for myself almost exactly.

Like you say it's difficult to break away from though, it essentially means giving up (or at least putting much less emphasis on) the natural physical advantages you get at those age groups and therefore hurting your chances of success in the short term. But look at what the long term effects of it are, we end up rarely producing certain types of players and it's showing us up badly in the international game.
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It's not difficult, poor coaches care about stupid results in a league that doesn't matter and physical football, good coaches don't.

We teach coaches incorrectly, Germany, Holland, Spain, France don't. Our mentality, from parents to their kids and the coaches, what they expect, what they train for, what they teach, its simply the absolute opposite of what they should be doing. The FA simply need to redo the coaching badges(and make them more than a few week course with only a couple nights a week), teach some REAL coaching and making the most basic coaches at the most basic level trained to the highest level, it really is that simple.

You need the better pro's and better coaches to be employed by the FA to go take on the new and improved coaching courses and say, results mean nothing, training technical skills is everything, every time you pick the biggest kids and ignore everyone else, you're failing.

You also need someone like Fergie to tell Rooney to play as a striker, not some wondering chicken wanna be midfielder and to improve his technical skills. His passing tonight, yesterday and most of the past few years is abysmal. He was laughably awful tonight, fit or not fit. If Rooney is playing like a striker Spain would play, kids will want to play the same way. When they see Rooney and Milner all running in circles putting in "work rate" and getting no where, THAT is what they try to copy.

Someone also needs to mention to new coaches that winning some **** league with huge players who have no skill won't get them hired by a league club for a real job, creating create players, spotting real talent, and playing real football might. Scouts go to games, they don't pick the biggest and strongest(good ones don't) they spot the Wilshires and Cleverley's, and they spot who their coaches are helping turn them into good players.
 
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aaron333 said:
At the end of the day, that's how we set out to play. We played to our strengths and we knew it'd be like this. It wasn't going to be pretty, we weren't going to dominate possession and we were always going to score on the counter.

As for playing "****", we may not have dominated the games or played any beautiful football, but bar tonight we defended extremely well for the majority of the tournament. So defensively, I'd say our performances were decent.
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WE didn't play to our strengths, Rooney in the withdraw striker role, essentially as the playmaker.... yet he couldn't make a pass to save his life tonight, and he's normally no good at passing. We wanted to catch them on the break yet put someone who couldn't pass well, nor hold it up, nor shoot, not run with it in the role those things are most crucial for.

Should I remind you that the best chance against France for Milner was created by Young playing in the role he's played in for over a year and been Englands best player. Should I remind you that Young did the same against Sweden, should I remind you of the cross he put on a plate to be missed by our **** striker? When did he get ****, when he was shoved to left wing, asked to track back, asked to create some interplay with Welbeck and Rooney, who were both terrible? Who should he pass to, who should he have done 1-2's with. Sure he wasn't close to his best, but Rooney was FAR worse tonight.

We didn't come even close to playing to our strengths, because Rooney is the best out and out striker we have, and we played him as a playmaker, a role he is not good at(remember when Utd played him there due to lack of options and then bought Scholes out of retirement and the team had a complete turn around?). Young has been superb in the playmaker role for 18 months, so we pushed him out wide and gave him no one to link up with. Welbeck did little, Rooney was awful, Milner, no pace, no guile, no crossing ability. A team that sits back and wants to catch teams on the break, we were set up in the worst possible way to achieve that goal.
 
mp260767 said:
as already mentioned until we can get players happy to pass the move and mix that with decent movement we won't stand a chance of doing anything decent.

but that starts at the clubs/there academies and the FA, and tbh the FA will make sod all useful changes because they don't have a clue.
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Even then you won't see if it's worked till the mid to late 2020s. Few more dreary tournaments to get through before we see if any of it's born fruit.
 
I hate how rooney doesn't really play as a striker anymore. He plays the messi role albeit not as well. He seems to play in the last 2 thirds. He seems to be one of the best passers of the ball in the england team. He's no messi so I think we should either make him play CAM/CF or tell him to stop tracking back and play as a striker like he used to. Not in between.
 
the 4-4-2 just doesn't work anymore it's an outdated formation with the current possession game, u just get over run in midfield, i think england should do everything possible to get guardiola as they're next manager next year.
 
Mason- said:
I hate how rooney doesn't really play as a striker anymore. He plays the messi role albeit not as well. He seems to play in the last 2 thirds. He seems to be one of the best passers of the ball in the england team. He's no messi so I think we should either make him play CAM/CF or tell him to stop tracking back and play as a striker like he used to. Not in between.
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He's not, he's simply not, most of the team are better passers than Rooney. He's not even close to Messi and horrible in the playmaker role, he's useless defensively helping and useless helping us keep the ball up the field, awful in both games, said before, say now should never have been taken.

lucarocks92 said:
the 4-4-2 just doesn't work anymore it's an outdated formation with the current possession game, u just get over run in midfield, i think england should do everything possible to get guardiola as they're next manager next year.
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lol, 4-4-2 isn't outdated, bad players won't magically win in another formation.

Guardiola for England manager is money down the drain.

Germany saw their **** national side, went to their YOUNG players and turned around how they teach football, a decade later one of the best teams in the world, one of the best youth setups, one of the most promising crop of players in the world.

We can throw away another 10-20mil on a manager to manage a team with the wrong mentality, the wrong style, the wrong substance and who WILL NOT WIN, no matter the manager, or we can pump that money into our youth training properly, train kids to play FOOTBALL not physicalBall that we currently teach.

We threw away millions on Sven, threw away millions on the clown, threw away millions on Capello and we'll throw away millions on Hodgson. Or we can let Pearce do it, for a half a million a year and being god damned thankful and put that money where it can make a real difference.

Train coaches, its really really not hard. Send a team of a few guys to go to Spain, or Germany and LEARN HOW THEY COACH KIDS, then come here and coach the kids the same way. Hire 100 German/Spanish/Dutch coaches to come to the UK and teach english coaches how to teach the ruddy game, not how to kick the other guy harder. You do that, in 8-10 years England can be competitive, trying to get a UNPROVEN manager to take a bunch of players who play in a style he's never played, coached, or managed in and expecting results is the exact reason England have failed time and time again.

Managers don't make THAT much difference, players do, we need to some degree better players, and better educated players, and better educated papers and public. Rooney shouldn't have gone to the Euro's, Johnson, lol, Carroll, Welbeck, Gerrard shouldn't be there, Henderson, he's the epitome of "runs a lot, no brain", Walcott, lol. Chamberlain MIGHT be one for the future, he shouldn't have gone the Euro's this year, he wasn't ready, didn't look ready, and now only has experience of failing and a bad idea on how to play for England in the future(the defensive **** turgid football we played).

Horrible team, we could have already sent a much stronger team with players we already have, but not a great team by any means, some of that was due to injury, some due to incredibly poor squad choices. We need fundamental change in the coaching of kids to get larger numbers of Wilshire's, Lampards, Coles to come through the system. There will always ben 5 epic players, because some players are just good, to get 50, like Spain or Germany, you need to train the other 45, and England currently can't come close to doing that.
 
Rooney was rubbish, he wasn't fit. As a professional you would have expected him to turn up fully fit and not gasping for air. He looked like he had been on holiday for six weeks. He may good at home but on the international stage he cannot now be considered to be world class.

As to England, one can't complain. They played as well as they can so you can't complain about that. At least there was a togetherness which we haven't seen for a long time. Anyone complaining about Hodgson should not forget that he's only had a handful of games and when you consider that then start making a judgement a year down the line. The bottom line is that we are simply not good enough at this level.

As to the future I am optimistic as we do have a platform to build on and we will improve over the next two years.
 
If it's true that Rooney was asked to man mark Pirlo then he he failed miserably as I don't think he lost possession once and seemed to have an eternity on the ball. The biggest glaring omission for me is the lack of a quality playmaker in the Gascoigne mould. Someone who can spot the killer pass and who can also run at their defence. The only teams that succeed without one have a world class forward such as Portugal and Rooney just doesn't seem to cut it at international level for some reason, although I do take on board that he is often asked to do far too much chasing back. We seem to be ok defensively, if a little slow in the centre and have some good young midfield players coming through. We also have a good goalkeeper so at least we have something to build on. :)
 
We just lack the players. Stuff the English league full of foreign players and you're killing your own national side.

Top English teams barely have more than 3 English players.

You look at German league, Spanish league, Italian league, they are pobably 95% their respective nationality.

There needs to be done more at extreme foundation to get more English players into football and into the top flight.
 
Rooney and Gerrard get included because "they can do something special".

This phrase is a great surmise of what is wrong with our game. We attempt to win with inflated egos and pieces of individual skill instead of trying to develop a system that consistently creates opportunities to score.

The Italian team, save Pirlo, were devoid of individual brilliance but worked in a system that created opportunities regardless of the player skill.

Obviously having Messi on your team is awesome but at top level competition, having a well functioning team is much more useful than a team of brilliance.

Our whole mentality is screwed in this respect
 
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