The Ultimate England Thread

Fluid, and good technically.

Johnson is a better RB than P.Jones and that midfield will be overrun by a team who are better.

I definately think we're second/third tier behind the likes of Spain, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Brazil, Argentina etc

Well perhaps route one was a bit too far. Basically I'd like for us to defend well and win the ball back in our own third and then between our technically gifted midfield, aim to release an attacking trio who have pace and can really stretch a team on the break. Caroll has no pace so that's a no no for me. The team should go from a 4-5-1 when defending into a 4-2-1-3 when attacking on the counter.

We can create a new set up when we play other teams who are seen to be weaker than us (might get one or two in the group) but otherwise we should focus on how we can beat the big teams if we want to progress in the tournament.

England are horrendous when they play big teams - absolutely disgusting.
They adhere to a defensive stance for 85% of the game and only when they go down do they try to be even a little offensive.
It's as if the English players become scared when they put their boots on for England - For REAL.
We probably have one of the best all round team in the world barring the striking but can't get it together when facing big teams.
Even against smaller teams like Montenegro - the performance was absolute trash.
This is the one time England actually need a big ego in the team to energize everything, they're lifeless on the pitch.

If only Rooney/Gerrard/Lampard and other consitent England stars performed at even half of what they do for clubs, we would be in a satisfactory position.
They're different players for England - cursed perhaps?

I personally think it's down to the management. Capello seemed to start doing the right things then obviously we know what happened. He ****ed up at the world cup playing 4-4-2 vs germany needed a man in midfield to stop ozil/muller/others running riot but hey what can you say, we were unlucky that match had the 4th official not been drunk we could have potentially beat them.

Tactics atm are absolutely dire, playing route one football with players who clearly don't play that at their teams. For a manager who's succeeded in italy, he's pretty devoid of tactical knowledge bar 2 banks of 4.

I think we would have won the Germany game in WC because of the momentum and energy we would have developed had Lampard's goal been given.
James Milner is a problem - I commend and respect him for his extremely high work-rates and continuous efforts but he isn't good enough and is not doing the correct thing required on the right/left of midfield.
Walcott - very well over-rated when he players for England. Why doesn't Aaron Lennon get a look in?
we don't have an LM considering Ashley Young has been injured for months.
Too bad we don't have a Bale-type player in our squad who will pick the game up for the team every game regardless of situation.
In the Brazil game the clear thing highlighted was that England players are scared of recieving the ball - Look at the way Neymar was playing, every pass would go to him and he would come up with something or David Luiz would string a wonder pass.
Lampard was unable to play the Neymar type role and no one was doing that for England. Carrick didn't find his range.
I actually pray that we don't make the World Cup so something gets done about this.
If only SAF took the England role - that's the type of guy we need, not Woy Hodgson.
Woy Hodgson's tactics are totally the opposite to what the most successful manager in the world would play - SAF.

I think SAF being england manager would have been absolutely great.

I don't. He's Scottish.

So basically, get an inadequate english manager because he's english.

Get the best English manager.

Get the best English manager.

And who is that exactly, alf ramsey and bobby robson are dead. At least if you make this statement tell me who is good enough to manage england and get them performing like they should be(contenders for the tournament) we have the players while not as rosy as it used to be when we had cole, terry, ferdinand and neville in defence and lamps/gerrard in CM it's still a very good team if we utilise the players strengths.

Don't see a single english manager capable of doing that.

Give me one legitimate reason why England need an English manager. And don't make it the 'he cares more about England than anybody abroad' - you'd think this applied to the players as well but it clearly doesn't.

Let's face it, Scotland have way better managers than we do. The better the manager, the more I want them to manage England. It's as simple as that.

The best English manager is also an inadequate English manager. There's no English manager anywhere that is above average.

Harry Redknapp.

Because it's the England national team.

The clue is in the name.