Re: World Cup 2010
Posted: 29 Jun 2010, 16:23
Root - a good summary of the England team managership situation, I think! It really does sound like a great racket to get into - employers who don't really know what they're doing and who panic very easily, a multi-million pound contract, a multi-million pound pay-off when it all goes horribly wrong .... and bring along all of your friends and advisers to join in the fun .... and the loot. I think that Capello may well have been very shrewd in getting that 'break clause' removed from his contract just before the World Cup began. I do wonder just how well-founded those 'rumours' of a possible courtship by Italian side Internazionale actually were .... ?
As for what comes next on the managerial front, goodness only knows. The money's pretty good, but the hassle isn't. The baying hoards expect instant and continual success; if they don't get it, they then turn into a lynch mob. However, if you can withstand the hassle, the continual media intrusion into your private life, the death threats if the team doesn't do well enough, etc., etc., then I'd say that being England manager for a few years is worth it for the income that it brings you. I'd do it - for a few million quid a year!!
Turning to the team, the suggestion made by Capello that they are all 'too tired' is, in my opinion, complete bollocks! When you look at what other sportsmen have to do, soccer players have got it pretty easy. Rugby union and rugby league must take much more, physically, out of the human body; cricketers may well have to play for five days on the trot in full sun and very high temperatures; tennis players don't exactly have it easy sometimes (70-68, anyone?!). Professional soccer players play for ninety minutes or so, usually no more than once or twice a week. A year of that should be well within the capabilities of a fit young (or even young-ish) man, given an appropriate training regime and a life-style in which sport and fitness play the dominant roles (as opposed to luxury and excess).
No; I think that the problem is that the England players are all multi-millionaires and that their clubs are where the money is. Playing for England is just an inconvenience; one that disrupts their millionaire life-styles. Getting back home early from the World Cup will just enable the players to continue to enjoy their luxury life-styles, but for rather longer than would otherwise have been the case. They can have a nice long holiday, lots of late nights and early mornings in expensive night-clubs, etc., - with all the media attention, scandals and misdemeanours that seem to attend their lives and activities.
Whether England will ever be able to put together a world-beating team in the future has to be open to question. I agree that there are far too few England-qualified players playing in top-flight football; this must limit any manager's choice when it comes to team selection. The more foreign players there are playing in England, the lower the chances are of England being able to field a strong team. In the English game, clubs are far more important than country. That's just the way it is. Nothing is ever likely to change.
Interestingly, I read somewhere that a French commentator had said that, in his view, the English clubs' money-only approach to football had contributed to the culture that had led to the French team imploding so spectacularly. I think that he has a point. However, I suspect that in many other cases, foreign players playing for English clubs actually find that very helpful to them. They get to know how the English game is played - and, if they themselves have a strong enough allegiance to their own home country, they can use that knowledge to the advantage of their national team, against England (if they happen to be playing them).
And so to the next few weeks .... Well, the media will continue to howl and howl. The FA will dither (as usual). A deal might eventually be done with Capello such that he sails off into the sunset with a nice juicy cheque in his back pocket. The hunt will then be on for the next England manager. All of the 'usual suspects' will crawl out (or be dragged out) from underneath rocks. The FA will utter all of the usual platitudes and promise a full, root-and-branch, review of English football (but nothing will actually change). Then, they'll do all of the usual things - lots of consultation, expensive trips abroad for FA officials to look at and possibly interview potential contenders for the job, offers of loads of money in attempts to tempt someone to take the job, etc., etc. Then, somebody will get appointed as manager. And then the whole shambles will start all over again, just in time for whatever the next international competition is.
I agree with Starkey - now we can get back to the cricket!
Roger.
As for what comes next on the managerial front, goodness only knows. The money's pretty good, but the hassle isn't. The baying hoards expect instant and continual success; if they don't get it, they then turn into a lynch mob. However, if you can withstand the hassle, the continual media intrusion into your private life, the death threats if the team doesn't do well enough, etc., etc., then I'd say that being England manager for a few years is worth it for the income that it brings you. I'd do it - for a few million quid a year!!
Turning to the team, the suggestion made by Capello that they are all 'too tired' is, in my opinion, complete bollocks! When you look at what other sportsmen have to do, soccer players have got it pretty easy. Rugby union and rugby league must take much more, physically, out of the human body; cricketers may well have to play for five days on the trot in full sun and very high temperatures; tennis players don't exactly have it easy sometimes (70-68, anyone?!). Professional soccer players play for ninety minutes or so, usually no more than once or twice a week. A year of that should be well within the capabilities of a fit young (or even young-ish) man, given an appropriate training regime and a life-style in which sport and fitness play the dominant roles (as opposed to luxury and excess).
No; I think that the problem is that the England players are all multi-millionaires and that their clubs are where the money is. Playing for England is just an inconvenience; one that disrupts their millionaire life-styles. Getting back home early from the World Cup will just enable the players to continue to enjoy their luxury life-styles, but for rather longer than would otherwise have been the case. They can have a nice long holiday, lots of late nights and early mornings in expensive night-clubs, etc., - with all the media attention, scandals and misdemeanours that seem to attend their lives and activities.
Whether England will ever be able to put together a world-beating team in the future has to be open to question. I agree that there are far too few England-qualified players playing in top-flight football; this must limit any manager's choice when it comes to team selection. The more foreign players there are playing in England, the lower the chances are of England being able to field a strong team. In the English game, clubs are far more important than country. That's just the way it is. Nothing is ever likely to change.
Interestingly, I read somewhere that a French commentator had said that, in his view, the English clubs' money-only approach to football had contributed to the culture that had led to the French team imploding so spectacularly. I think that he has a point. However, I suspect that in many other cases, foreign players playing for English clubs actually find that very helpful to them. They get to know how the English game is played - and, if they themselves have a strong enough allegiance to their own home country, they can use that knowledge to the advantage of their national team, against England (if they happen to be playing them).
And so to the next few weeks .... Well, the media will continue to howl and howl. The FA will dither (as usual). A deal might eventually be done with Capello such that he sails off into the sunset with a nice juicy cheque in his back pocket. The hunt will then be on for the next England manager. All of the 'usual suspects' will crawl out (or be dragged out) from underneath rocks. The FA will utter all of the usual platitudes and promise a full, root-and-branch, review of English football (but nothing will actually change). Then, they'll do all of the usual things - lots of consultation, expensive trips abroad for FA officials to look at and possibly interview potential contenders for the job, offers of loads of money in attempts to tempt someone to take the job, etc., etc. Then, somebody will get appointed as manager. And then the whole shambles will start all over again, just in time for whatever the next international competition is.
I agree with Starkey - now we can get back to the cricket!
Roger.
