Rant about football

Listen, it really isn’t that difficult…

We need players who hold their positions, who know their position in the team.

An advantage sometimes and disadvantage (last night) is that our whole team wants to score, they all want a shot at goal.

That isn’t team play.

We made a strategical error.

England and Germany both played evenly, check the statisitcs… the difference was that Germany played better and more efficiently as a team, knowing where they are supposed to be and supporting each other whereas our team were attacking, attacking, attacking, throwing bodies forward in desperation to get a goal. This was particularly evident in the 2nd half and that is why we conceded goals 3 and 4.

It wasn’t fair for us to have that goal denied… 2-2 at halftime and the psychology may have been different, we may have played a stronger defence line to win a goal off a counter attack… we don’t know.

Having said that, the Germans overall played more consistly, their passing was more accurate, their movement was good and their team had a unified purpose.

I will not stand for people saying ‘we’re rubbish’, etc… why?

I don’t like it when people complain and do not come up suggestions for imporvements: don’t just trash your team when you’ve got nothing constructive to say to progress the thinking.

I have several suggestions:

1. Keep Capello – Hiring and firing managers is stupid, we need some level of constancy, others a new manager always has to come in and adapt to the team, rather than the other way around… it’s like centering a piece of clay on a wheel if you’ve ever done pottery.

2. Do not glorify the individual – this is to the media, to managers, to other players. we must focus on the TEAM because overall in 90 minutes it’s the team that wins the game, individuals only contribute towards it.

3. Military style training – our players can no longer be overpaid and pampered, they need to feel pain, feel struggle and be drilled to be effective machines… they can learn something from the British Armed Forces in that sense.; instilling discipline, compassion, camaradery, sacrfice, national pride, loaylty. Virtues of a soldier that should be evident in our footballers. This is not to say that they are treated poorly/

I’m talking training on top of regular football training. Dribbling assault courses, matches with trip wires and thunderflashes, drilling, camping etc etc. It may sound wierd but it could work.

4. Young players – we need to start looking for National players from a young age, 15/16/17 these are the ages when youth are more trainable and mouldable… of course if we have an older team used to their own ways they will find it hard to adapt to a different system… people complain that they are overpaid and cannot adapt, fair enough… but it’s also a matter of age and maturity. The older you get, the more set in your ways… we should have academies that are training kids to play as a team from a young age…

5. The past – People need to get past wearing spitfires on their heads etc and have more respect for the other nations, we need to show that we are respectful… the players and the managers of both England and Germany were respectful… but it is still a problem with a section of our fans. The attitude is wrong.

6. Learn from our mistakes – last night we saw that we lacked a defence, even though we had good attacking we sacrificed our defence as a consequence… our players were clean and fair and didn’t complain or fight, so we learned from past red cards… we need to bear in mind all these lessons of the past, we need to reflect on games to see what we should improve… we need to build our system bearing these things in mind.

7. Flexibilty – 4-4-2, 3-5-2 etc it doesn’t matter, we need to act fast and adapt to the situation and hand but we need to lead the game, not adapt at a slow rate… after the 1st defensive error, we should have realized the weakness and rapidly acted on it. That could have prevented the other goals, particularly 3 and 4.

8. Speed – It’s not good enough to have only strikers with pace… our defensive players need equal speed to be able to keep up with opposition attacks. Another reason why we need younger players and to train them for the national team from a younger age.

9. Dribbling Of all 4 England games this tournament I have not seen any dribbling. Team play is important and passing has to be accurate and good however, sometimes we need to dribble and we need to improve on this.

10. Media – we need to ignore the media… they are only out for profit… stories of crash of fall, and hope and glory are sold to us purely for monetary gain. We shouldn’t allow ourselves to become a victim to it. It’s a corrupt system, parasitic and saps the life out of the game.

11. Enjoy We need to enjoy the game – we’ve forgotten how to, it’s all about scoring and winning, it should be about playing good football and our players just need to be able to enjoy the game.

12. Code. We need a code of Honour, a set of values and principles and ethos that we uphold, that our team strives for… we have lost ourselves to money and we need to bring ourselves back to earth, we need humility, respect, integrity, courage etc. If I was manager, I would even tell me troops to be honest… if you handball and the ref doesnt see then call it. Do you want to be known as the player who robbed another team like Henry against Ireland? Do you want to win dirty and be hated by other nations?

Last night we went all out, just like in a game of poker, and we were called on it. Don’t be dishearted by 4-1 loss… it’s the way the game is.

We need to know our strengths and weaknesses and we need to work on them all the time.