Euro 2012 Qualifiers 12/10/10 **Spoilers**

Overly unimpressive performance tonight and I am still waiting to see the "new era" that we were promised by Capello after our World Cup performance.

See this is the thing, the coach can be blamed and changed as often as (quite laughably) the fans/people want, but in each case he can't do it with the players he's got or with the pool of players he has to choose from.

As has been said (more often than not by Arsenal fans and Wenger :p) time and time again, the whole country's setup is totally wrong. We look for guys with the wrong attributes and give them places in our teams, and then wonder why on earth we keep failing at international standard.

We don't protect, teach, look for, give importance to, compliment and by and large give places to those guys who have really good technical abilities - that most important factor. It says it all really when Kevin Davis gets a call up (the second oldest debut was it?) through sheer desperation even though we all knew that he's undeniably wrong for international football but somehow right for (and fairly successful) for Bolton. It says it all when there are so many other English players get ignored but Jack Wilshere, who has barely played but a few games for the Arsenal first team, gets called up by both of our sides.

The Montenegrins were big tough lads, but - they possessed a lot of technical skills. They were better on the ball, their tactics and awareness was excellent. They still got tackles in here and there but never was their play dangerous.

Also, our impact men were SWP and Davies, for christ's sake we had Wilshere on the bench, a truly gifted footballer. Maybe I have Arsenal bias but stick him in the hole for the last 20 and he will have caused at least one or two problems, he can actually play football

Agreed, though him not playing, well, gotta say I'm not too disappointed. :p

Brum this weekend will be another good test for him.
 
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Kuyt's picked up a serious ankle injury with some reports saying he'll be out until the new year. Oh and Agger picked up an injury for Denmark too :o
 
A-ha you have inherited Arsenal's luck, I thought there had been a very suspicious lack of injuries for Arse this week, then again, most of Arsenal's internationals are already injured and tbf Sagna did get injured without even playing

Kuyt's second injury in a row from international duty? Jealous of RvP?
 
How does a team with Cole, Young, and the two Johnsons on both sides of the pitch, utterly fail to:

a) run at the opposition
b) take it past a man
c) get a decent cross in the box
d) do anything remotely inspired?

I'm glad I spent most of tonight watching the Ireland game, and even that wasn't particularly great shakes.
 
How does a team with Cole, Young, and the two Johnsons on both sides of the pitch, utterly fail to:

a) run at the opposition
b) take it past a man
c) get a decent cross in the box
d) do anything remotely inspired?

I saw those 4 names down the flanks and I thought we might actually see some entertaining stuff, I think there were about 3 times when I was impressed with a run. :(

Young a right footed winger played on the left, Johnson a left footed winger played on the right, so instead of playing them so they can cross with their stronger feet and supply Crouch, they cut inside 9 times out of 10 and fail to produce anything.

:mad:
 
Young really can cross, when a manager does what Ancelloti does and spanks the diving out of him he'll be fantastic again, but with a slow Davies and a useless wannabe midfielder Rooney there was no one to cross to, its no excuse but he and Johnson tend to run into a dead end waiting for anyone to be in a dangerous position in the box.

Johnson though, is just crap, he's Lennon, and SWP, and Theo, and Joe Cole, these flash players who people THINK are doing well because people give them a lot of the ball. Johnson with a freekick from 30 yards, went wide, shocked, he shoots constantly and constantly misses, SWP did the same and for a few years people thought he was good because 3 of his 758 shots went in one season.

Johnson just runs, with zero thought to what he's going to do. he "did" his man what must have been 15 yards inside their half, managed to run the ball to the goal line, then almost to the 6 yard box before he crossed it. Of course with the box full of defenders, and having closed the distance so dramatically he had no space to pick anyone out, thats Johnson. Runs into a dead end on the outside or with a crap cross, or cuts inside and shoots.

he's actually quite useless, just the flavour of the month, with a bit of confidence and a few goals. SWP seems to start every season with confidence, plays a few games, gets a few goals, dissappears compeltely, Hleb is another one who does that. Lennon has way to many crap seasons behind him, one season, half with confidence still wastes chances left right and centre, 4 years maybe was it to get the confidence for that half of a good season last year, and its gone again.

Xavi, Iniesta, Villa, Torres, Fabregas.... do any of them try tricks or try to do their player as often as Johnson, or Cole, or Young? No, simple but perfect football is much harder to teach and do, than running really fast into space with no idea what to do next.

We need to stop picking the "can do loads of keepie uppies and one of those stupid crossover leg crosses" and start picking the best passes with the best vision, and dropping utter turds like Barry.

Right back, I honestly have no clue who should be first team right back, but to improve our defence, Jagielka, Richards, Lescott, Phil Neville, Dixon would all be a massive improvement.

I've also said for years, Rooney wants the fame of the best striker, but his ACTUAL game is playmaking, I don't think he's fantastic at either, but its clear as day for the non blind people that he WANTS to drop deep and get involved, thats what he enjoys doing. Thats why I said he had his most consistant and best football when he was actually a left winger for 3 months consistantly. He started off from midfield and was always running forward, Rooney running forwards with pace is scarey, thats his biggest strength in his game. When you're running TOWARDS midfield, its hard to receive a pass and run onto it at full speed. Last year he may have scored a lot but he had a LOT of woeful games and a lot of games where he was barely visible for 89minutes and popped up with a tap in.

he doesn't like being upfront, he just thinks he should be, he wants to be a midfielder, and the one time he was fully commited to it he was very good, but no one will just stick him there.

He needs a position, be it striker, or midfield, and to stick to one or the other. He was crap tonight, he's been crap for Utd, on current form he shouldn't be in the squad, and the only thing that might make him actually try to play football, is being dropped.
 
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Watching England last night just brought back all the World Cup nightmares - again England couldn't break down an organised team. Where's Rooney's first touch gone, anyone know? Reckless tackle by Rooney too, too hot-headed these days, imo. Plus England could have easily lost that game. Same old team (for the most part), same old England - look good on paper but in practice, mediocre at best.

On a postitive note though Andy Johnson looks good, you can see he has the hunger and desire to want to do well for England. Hopefully some of it will rub off.

So it looks like that if England do qualify they will come unstuck against the first reasonably organised, hard-working side they face.

Where the **** is this new England we were told we were going to get? A load of bullocks if you ask me. Getting very tired of watching England under-perform time after time.
 
Ashley Young wants taking out back and shooting, he has gone from being a minor embarrassment to football to an absolute disgrace. We constantly hear about the Eduardo incident against Celtic despite the fact that the same week in UEFA cup he was diving all over the shop for pens.

Also on the basis of that performance, Rooney has more chance of scoring with Coleen than England.
 
He won 2 penalties a night later in the same game iirc and both were dives. Never got mentioned, it was outrageous
 
Nothing disappointed or surprised me about last night's England performance due to the fact that it was the same as always.

The last time anyone cared about playing football for England was Euro 96.
 
He won 2 penalties a night later in the same game iirc and both were dives. Never got mentioned, it was outrageous

Yup, thats why the Eduardo thing irked me so much, rules for all, or no one not randomly picking to punish people.

I'd think the same for De Jong to be honest, if the FA give him some huge ban, why not Henry, or some of the other guys who have done awful tackles.

Young is a joke, thing is going back to before that season and he wasn't a diver, now he is and one of the worst. Though I'd say he's been less bad in the league in the last six months, but then plays for England and he's back to his worst.

Only reason he's slightly less bad than Gerrard is that Gerrard has a better success rate at actually changing game outcomes with his cheating.

Chelsea should buy Young, have a manager who dislikes diving slap the crap out of Young and get him back to his best. When he focuses on his game rather than cheating he's the best winger England have by a mile.
 
ENGLAND'S football chiefs have declared last night's 0-0 draw null and void after failing to find Montenegro in their 1959 Atlas Of The World.....read the Daily Mash for more details.
 
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