World Cup 2010 - GROUP C (England, USA, Algeria, Slovenia) **spoilers**

[CliffyBiro]

Unfortunately I haven't played it for about 10 years, and I think Heskey was probably ok in the game back then.

IN real life, you just need to actually have seen Heskey play, to realise he's completely and utterly crap.

Have you EVER heard of another country playing one of their worst players because somehow one of the WORST players around makes one of the best play better?

Is it not more likely that, Rooney simply didn't have trouble playing against the Latvia's, San Marino's and other tosh we get in qualifying groups, and not actually Heskey that somehow made Rooney look good.

When you can't say "player X is good at x, y and z" he shouldn't be in the team. Heskey is NOT good at holding up the ball, he wins very few headers, he doesn't control where he knocks on the few headers he gets go like other quality target men, he can't pass, he's slow as hell, he's stupid, he can't cross yet repeated ran off to the wing to make himself open, then promptly did nothing except embarasse himself.

Thing is, EVERYONE knows he's crap, Capello knows he's crap, but he thinks Rooney plays better with Heskey than without, based on a few random games against crap teams where Rooney could have scored 2-3 no matter who was on the pitch behind him.

It was a mistake, everyone knows it and guess what, its proved to be a massive massive mistake, as has selecting King, something else everyone KNEW< didn't guess, KNEW. You don't take, and start a CB who has like a 0.085% chance of playing every game start to finish, even if he'd not gotten injured by some miracle it would still have been the wrong decision. Its the world cup, you have one squad, you don't take monumental risks and then make that massive risk the one you count on and practice with as the starting CB.

You'd think for 3-4 weeks Terry/King will have been training together, rather than Terry/Caragher, or Terry/Upson, Terry/Dawson. If king wasn't taken, as he shouldn't have been, our CB partnership, no matter who it was, would simply be better and more practiced.

That said, it's not the defence that have been the problem. It's the forwards.

This "Rooney plays better with Heskey" nonsense has to stop. So what, England need to play 2 people to get the best out of one? If that's the case, drop the pair of them. Bent, Zamora, Cole, Agbonlahor.... any of those should have been on the plane rather than Heskey. Sure, he holds the ball up, but he's a striker, allegedly. His job is to score goals.

It's also the midfield. Too many times, Lampard and Gerrard shot from around the box when they could have passed it into feet for the strikers.

 

[Domo]

in reality with the players we should be up there. It's simple.

But we're not up there, so how can it be simple?
The real stars in our domestic league are internationals. We have to stop kidding ourselves we have a world class international team.

 

[dannyjo22]

Still get the feeling that the FA has a HUGE say in WAY to many decisions around the England team as frankly, 3 vastly different managers, in attitude, reasoning, tactics, style, discipline have all ended up picking mostly the same teams with the same problems and the same problem positions.

Yep, Sven got blamed because he lacked passion which they said rubbed off on the players. Well you could hear Capello screaming at them yet nothing, not a shred of passion between them. At the very least they could run themselves into the ground and fail.

 

[Andybtsn]

But we're not up there, so how can it be simple?
The real stars in our domestic league are internationals. We have to stop kidding ourselves we have a world class international team.

Maybe bad managers.

 

[duc999]

Probably the worst England performance I've seen in all my days on the planet.

Algeria aren't a bad side but England were completely outplayed by them and literally looked like they hadn't played together before.

I don't blame Capello at all, I think it's clear this is just these overpaid **** on the pitch.

The Rooney comment at the end came off ridiculously cruel and I think he will realise very soon just what a moron he looks for suggesting the England fans are disloyal for booing when:

a) The performance was possibly/if not the, worst in 20 odd years.
b) They've paid a lot of money to be there and support their country.

and

c) As if he, himself, has any right to be commenting on other people's discipline or loyalty!

Its okay for him on his 100k a week , those fans saved , took out loans etc and spent their hard earned cash to support England and get rewarded with a display that Accrington Stanley would be ashamed of (no offence to Accrington Stanley)

So shut it Rooney , show some ******** backbone and take the good with the bad , an apology would be nice for the fans too !

 

[jakeke]

The thing that sums it up for me tonight and in general is seeing teams like Algeria perfectly controlling goal kicks that have been to the heavens and back and then constantly seeing England players trying to control simple passes yet the ball bouncing 5 yards off them. Not good enough. With the ball at their feet, England's players aren't good enough, almost every team England play seem to have better technique, even the tiny countries

 

[HangTime]

Anyone see when Terry just casually passed it back to the keeper from almost the half way line with no effort what so ever it was like he just couldnt be bothered? Was almost punished but the keeper was sharpish and sprinted to the ball.

Was another one towards the end of the first half where someone pinged it back into James at knee height, fortunately he was alive to it.

c) As if he, himself, has any right to be commenting on other people's discipline or loyalty!

Once a Blue, always a Blue!

 

[mtrent10202]

Any danger of some sort of ball control from any of the England players tonight?......sigh

Rooney looked disinterested, and then to say that at the end. I feel sorry for the fans that paid stupid amounts of money to go and watch that performance tonight!

 

[Merlin5]

But we're not up there, so how can it be simple?
The real stars in our domestic league are internationals. We have to stop kidding ourselves we have a world class international team.

It's true actually. There are too many foreign players imported into english teams who all fly off to play for their country in world cups, leaving the crappier english players to fend for themselves. Football has become one big expensive joke, purely and utterly focused around profit. A player joining an english team today is less about loyalty and the desire to play for that team as it is about how much money they can earn from it.

This is what the FA should do:

Stop buying players from other countries.
Invest in breeding talented english players.
Pay them less money and give them hunger to play better.

 

[nicktay2605]

Only decent players on that pitch tonight were David James and the Algerians!

That is the worst I have ever seen England play (that I remember anyway). Rooney was appalling, Heskey shouldn't have been picked in the first place, Barry looked off the pace, Lampard was non-existent, and Gerrard was clearly unhappy and out of his depth on the left wing. The only way to sort it has to be to get rid of donkey Heskey and replace him with Crouch or Defoe, and for god's sake put Joe Cole on!!! I don't know what he has done for Capello to dislike him so much but he had to play him tonight!

The biggest worry is that we didn't even create any chances. I wouldn't have minded as much if we had created chances but just been a bit wasteful like Spain vs Switzerland, but we didn't even create anything. It does not bode well for the game against Slovenia. I also have a horrible feeling that Capello will play Upson instead of Dawson in the next game even though all the pundits and pretty much every England fan would rather Dawson played!

 

[CliffyBiro]

Stop buying players from other countries.

That would only result in the rapid decline of the league's standard.

 

[Chong Warrior]

I care very little for England these days, hardly paid much attention to the overpaid, self absorbed knob 'eds.

Overall we have a very unlikeable squad of undeserving millionaires. Will I get upset when they fail? Not one jot...

 

[Merlin5]

That would only result in the rapid decline of the league's standard.

I'm sure it would. But it seems to be the easier option to shell out millions on foreign players who probably don't even know where manchester, tottenham or liverpool are on a map, then spending that money investing in english players so that we don't have to rely on the likes of the ivory coast or portugal to prop up a substandard team.

 

[Tute]

Meh.

 

[fizzle-187]

I'm glad this is happening. People need to wake up (media), England are nothing. GTFO

 

[drunkenmaster]

That said, it's not the defence that have been the problem. It's the forwards.

This "Rooney plays better with Heskey" nonsense has to stop. So what, England need to play 2 people to get the best out of one? If that's the case, drop the pair of them. Bent, Zamora, Cole, Agbonlahor.... any of those should have been on the plane rather than Heskey. Sure, he holds the ball up, but he's a striker, allegedly. His job is to score goals.

It's also the midfield. Too many times, Lampard and Gerrard shot from around the box when they could have passed it into feet for the strikers.

Confidence and better play starts from the back. If people are confident with the defence, they'll feel more comftable pushing forwards, and a smarter quicker to play the ball defence, will get the ball forward quicker, and nick the ball off the opposition more and, not concede goals.

We played an out of form USA and a frankly crap Algeria, we havent' conceded, I'm still talking ultimately about a team that would be capable of winning the cup..... which would require a better defence. Terry made uncharacteristic mistakes tonight, Caragher and Johnson made completely normal for them mistakes, Cole, actually not sure he really didn't anything wrong, nor anything great either.

The thing I was getting at is just all the clearly and massively obvious mistakes Capello had made, and its not "we can say that in hindsight" rubbish, we ALL said King would be nice, if he were fit, but he's not and you can't take someone you fully expect to not play all the games. consistancy where possible, you do not start a CB partnership you should have a VERY good idea will not finish the cup together.


As you also said though, this argument of sacrificing a spot on the team to help another player look good, even IF it was true, which it absolutely is not, is fundamentally flawed. Any good player, can link up with Rooney and make him play better, the best player along with Rooney will have Rooney playing the best he can, thats football.

Seriously, can you see Argentina ditching Tevez and playing the Argy Heskey, because he makes Messi look a bit better. Firstly, no they wouldn't and secondly, better players make other players look better, not worse ones, its just flat out utterly stupid.

I really do wonder if the FA simply pays expensive money grabbing managers to be a "front man" for the team and some dodgey old twit who thinks he knows what he's doing has the real say behind the team. As there has been such little change between such vastly different managers.

 

[Chong Warrior]

How many times do we need telling about Lampard, Gerrard and Heskey?

Carragher in current form? Barry so good he can go straight from an 8 week lay-off to England first choice?

Rooney so off the boil I'd rather have Gordon Banks up front as a lone striker!!

So, so teribly bad.... I think we will make the final.

 

[mmj_uk]

On another note, if the USA don't qualify they will be hard done by...

http://thumbsnap.com/yqOkiNp4

What the ref saw to give Slovenia a freekick I have no idea, one of the Yanks is being held in a bear hug.

 

[thecremeegg]

Capello has hardly done any better than Sven to be honest.

From what I can see he's a clueless tit as I said earlier.

Sven had a bloody good record for England, got us to a World Cup semi ffs!

 

[fizzle-187]

For all the fans giving Rooney ****. England are **** and so are their fans they deserve each other. United > England