England Squad

[Dr Kenneth Noisewater 0]

Warnock hasn't exactly stood out i'd stick Bridge there personally. Why isn't he in the squad anyway? Is he injured or just cause he isn't getting any games in the Chelsea squad hes the best full back avaliable

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I think he's either injured or coming back from injury.

[sweetleftpeg 0]

Both Parker and Murphy should be in ahead of Jenas, that's not a bitter and twisted assesment either, it's fact. Eric Gates made a good point about Crouch last night on the Leg-Ends, English centre forwards used to be picked if they were scoring goals, Crouch hasn't scored in the PL all season. He's in because he's a freak of nature.

[Sonatine 11262]

The England Players With The Mostest

Tuesday October 04 2005

 

There's no doubt who's the tallest England player of recent years (though he has, of course, got a good touch), but what of the shortest? The hardest? The stupidest? The grumpiest? Read on here...

 

By Sarah Winterburn

 

Peter 'good touch for a big man' Crouch is officially the tallest player ever to pull on an England shirt, taller even than Billy 'Tiny' Foulke, who at 6'6" and 20-odd stone was almost as lofty but roughly seven times as heavy.

 

But who else qualifies as the mostest to ever play for England (though of course being young folk our memories only go back about 20 years so we're drawing an unofficial line somewhere in the mid-Eighties)...

 

 

THE SHORTEST

It has to be Shaun Wright-Phillips - you can forgive him for sometimes having a poor first touch when the ball actually comes up to his knee. They say good tennis players 'see the ball like a football', little SWP must see the football like a beach ball. Imagine how frightened he must be stood next to Crouch. Especially as he'll come up to his groin.

 

Honourable mentions go to Paul Parker and Dennis Wise, though both would tower over the official holder of the 'shortest England player ever' - one Fanny Walden from the 1920s who stood at 5'2". And was called Fanny. Nature dealt him a cruel blow.

 

 

THE FOULLEST

No arguments, it has to be the Beardo - and the awful thing is that he could never stick up for himself because he could never quite get any words out in an approximation of clear English. There's also that picture of him with his, erm, ugly bits on show - enough to give the sturdiest sleeper nightmares.

 

We have to though mention the collective foulness of the current England crop - the Nevilles, Rio Ferdinand, Joe Cole, Crouch...it's not only the football on show that's not too pretty.

 

 

THE FATTEST

Unfortunately we're unlikely to get anyone to match Billy 'Tiny' Foulke for size in these oh-so-dull days of footballers generally weighing less than 20 stone, but we can doff a cap to Neil Ruddock, who was certainly a little on the hefty side when he donned an England shirt in the Nineties. And in those days the England shirts were a little tighter. Not nice.

 

 

THE HARDEST

No questions, it has to be Stuart Pearce - a full-back who liked to shout and had balls of steel. Two out of three ain't bad, Neviller. And we're betting Pearcey could grow a proper moustache as well. In about an hour.

 

Wayne Rooney might think he's hard - but we must always be careful not to confuse hard with hardly got a brain cell.

 

 

THE STUPIDEST

It's too easy to give it to Rooney (signing a note for a prostitute 'I shagged you - Wayne Rooney' is just one of the highlights from his 'career'), so instead we turn to Ferdinand, a man who missed a major international tournament because he wanted to go shopping in Harvey Nichols. We just hope he got some nice socks.

 

 

THE WEAKEST

Steve McManaman always looked like he would break, Darren Anderton usually did.

 

 

THE LAZIEST

There have been a few - Chris Waddle and John Barnes spring to mind as masters of the 'I'll just stand over here and wait for us to break and then I can look really good when I flick the ball past this Austrian bloke' school of football. But the king of all lazy kings was Matt Le Tissier. He played in the same England team as Neil Ruddock - just imagine the fight for the pies afterwards.

 

As for the current England team, we can only assume we fail to spot Jermaine Jenas on the pitch for reasons other than that he's lying down somewhere...

 

 

THE GRUMPIEST

Let's face it, you didn't really care whether Paul Ince smiled as long as he looked dead hard and dead good in the midfield. But the same cannot be said for Alan Shearer towards the fag-end of his England career, when he looked like he had the permanent hump. Rarely touching the ball, he had two stances of choice - the 'standing with hands on his hips looking narked' and the 'standing with arms in the air looking narked'. We weren't keen on either.

 

 

THE JUST PLAIN ROTTENEST

Take your pick from Keith Curle, Andy Sinton, Carlton Palmer, Steve Hodge, Seth Johnson, Michael Ricketts and pretty much anybody who went to the 1992 European Championships. Or 1988. Though, Mr Jenas, at least you noticed old lanky Palmer was actually on the pitch...

 

Poor old JJ.......

Edited October 5, 2005 by Sonatine

[sweetleftpeg 0]

I have to say, whilst I agree that JJ is overated, I think Football365 have developed a boring agenda with him now. Change the record.

[Gemmill 43849]

Even with a place in the finals as his destiny, the mythology over Eriksson's record is nonsense

 

By Martin Samuel

 

DID you know that Sven-Göran Eriksson has lost only one qualifying game as England manager? Of course you did. It is the most overused statistic in sport right now, seamlessly replacing the previous one, that Eriksson had never lost a qualifying match as England manager.

“To talk of the head coach’s position after his only defeat in qualifying matches was ridiculous,” Gary Neville said, while Michael Owen chorused: “People seem to have forgotten that the defeat against Northern Ireland was his first in a qualifier in over four years.”

 

 

 

Actually, what is forgotten is how damnably difficult it is to lose a qualifying game as England manager. Do you know how many qualifying defeats the national team have suffered in 30 years? Thirteen. Do you know the largest number of qualifying matches lost by any manager in that time? Three. The average in a managerial tenure is 1.8. Between September 9, 1981 and June 2, 1993, England lost only one qualifying game.

 

It is nonsense, therefore, to insinuate that before Eriksson’s white-charger arrival, England’s footballers were regularly knocked from pillar to post in qualifying matches — or that a single defeat places him in a league of his own.

 

Eriksson is a little better than most, but not the best. Over three decades, England, on average, have lost 0.86 games per qualifying tournament. Eriksson, so far, averages 0.33 defeats. Sir Bobby Robson averaged 0.25. He also lost only one qualifying match as England manager in four campaigns and at a time when second place did not always carry the second bite of a play-off; now that genuinely is something that people have forgotten.

 

As is how close Eriksson came to losing precisely the same number of qualifying games as Kevin Keegan, Glenn Hoddle, Graham Taylor and Don Revie: a David Beckham free kick, four minutes into injury time at Old Trafford against Greece, to be precise.

 

From day one, when the FA tamed the country into believing that there was only one man for the job, there has been a mythology around this head coach. It prevails in the suggestion that Eriksson’s record places him beyond question, when it is roughly par for the course.

 

Since June 7, 2002, when England defeated Argentina in Sapporo, Eriksson’s England have beaten every team they were expected to beat (most qualifying opponents, plus Denmark, Switzerland and Croatia), drawn each match they were expected to draw (Turkey away) and lost to every good team they have played (Brazil, France and Portugal). His best and worst results cancel each other out.

 

Just as there is no precedent for the 5-1 victory in Germany in September 2001 in at least three decades, no England manager has suffered a night as humiliating as the 1-0 defeat in Belfast. The difference is that Eriksson’s peak was four years ago, his trough last month. Hence the debate, Gary.

 

The only qualifying result in 30 years that in any way compares to Eriksson’s nadir was the “Winston Churchill your boys took one hell of a beating” defeat in Norway in 1981, under Ron Greenwood. England went on to qualify, though, and Norway proved to be a rapidly improving nation, as England’s record in subsequent meetings (three draws, one defeat) suggests. A Norwegian blue 12 years later as good as did for Graham Taylor, one of only two England managers in 30 years to suffer multiple defeats in the same qualifying campaign (Greenwood was the other, with three, yet his team still progressed to the 1982 World Cup finals as runners-up to Hungary). Taylor’s other reversal came against Holland.

 

Indeed, many of England’s qualifying losses are against countries that would be placed in this superpower bracket. Italy upset Hoddle and Revie, Germany forced out Keegan, Holland scuppered Taylor. On other occasions, England simply ran into the team in form: the Czechoslovakia side that defeated England under Revie in 1975 were crowned champions of Europe in 1976; Robson’s sole qualifying defeat was inflicted by a Denmark team who went out of the 1984 European Championship at the semi-finals stage on penalties.

 

So Eriksson is good, but not great and in the next eight days in Manchester we shall see if the players intend providing him with anything more tangible than deepest sympathy. Having suffered one qualifying defeat, England are not due another until mid-January 2008 at the earliest — one roughly every 27.6 months is the average — so the omens against Austria and Poland are good. Austria have no manager and Poland’s status as a bogey team is hugely overrated — they won a single game against England, in Katowice in 1973, since when they have lost seven and drawn five. Two home games scheduled last is also in England’s favour.

 

Yet if England qualify automatically, as is the rightful expectation given the relative strength of the group, what then? Is Eriksson the man to lead what was touted as this country’s golden generation into another leading tournament? Hardly. Right now, the head coach has two ways of playing, one of which proved disastrous in Belfast. Some might argue that at least he now has a plan B. Yet if plan B is such a wipe-out, what has really changed?

 

If Eriksson had a genuine plan B, then this Saturday, with no Gary Neville, no Wayne Rooney, no Ashley Cole and his three best central defenders at last available, his team should pick itself, by making a virtue of where his defence is strongest. It does not because, in all the years of relentlessly overcoming the might of Wales, Liechtenstein and Azerbaijan, the head coach has never once played three at the back. If he had, on Saturday, problem solved. John Terry, Rio Ferdinand and Sol Campbell forming a solid block in defence, Shaun Wright-Phillips right wing back, Kieron Richardson drafted in at left wing back, David Beckham, Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard across midfield, Joe Cole behind Owen. As it is, England will have Luke Young at right back, no place for one of three world-class central defenders, at least one right-footed player out of position on the left and, in all likelihood, a man without a goal to his name since May 7 partnering Owen, in a match where scoring is vital. Again, a debate is not unreasonable. Eriksson’s failure to evolve ideas means that, once again, England will not be playing to their strengths, and one of his most experienced defenders will make way for two novices.

 

The moment Eriksson saw Peter Crouch, his eyes lit up. The Swede was more animated discussing him during England’s summer tour to the United States than at any time other than when a pretty girl enters the company. Eriksson is firmly with those who believe that Crouch gives a team something different (which is true, in a way, because he gives it a striker who does not score goals) and the player was odds-on for a World Cup place from that moment. Crouch will delight those who feel that England need a big target man, as much as he will appal those who wonder why Brazil have not got round to it.

 

“Brazilian national coach Carlos Alberto Parreira was widely castigated yesterday for naming a World Cup squad without a big lump upfront. ‘It is all very well having players who can shoot from anywhere, do tricks, dribble and put it on a six-pence,’ a spokesman for the Brazilian federation said, ‘but when we need to bang aimless long balls up the middle for the entire second half, what is going to happen then, eh?’ ”

Crouch has his worth, but why would he suit England’s purpose in a match in which victory is essential? Because he is a striker and Joe Cole is not? Questionable. Cole has scored five times for club and country since Crouch last found the net and in a 3-5-2 formation he can drop deep, linking and inter-changing with the midfield, exactly as Rooney does.

 

Ah yes, 3-5-2, the formation that dare not speak its name. “Nobody plays it” is the standard curled-lip response. True, if you discount Brazil, the world champions, nobody does. Yet they seem to muddle through.

 

This week, three at the back would suit England, as it would on Wednesday, when Rooney returns but not Neville. Neither Austria nor Poland are expected to be adventurous, which means, on occasions, Ferdinand would step into the holding role, giving even greater freedom to the midfield.

 

Sadly, it is a game plan that requires more than five days’ work; a little less than five years should have been enough, though. For an England manager, qualifying is not the half of it.

 

Quite a good article. And it does put into persepective all the stuff about Ericsson's fantastic qualifying record. The stuff about Crouch makes sense too - I, for one, cannot believe that the lad is getting a game for England.

[Guest alex]

Warnock hasn't exactly stood out i'd stick Bridge there personally. Why isn't he in the squad anyway? Is he injured or just cause he isn't getting any games in the Chelsea squad hes the best full back avaliable

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Jesus wept tbh.