England .vs. Slovenia - Win or Bust

[Rabbits XI]

Where to vent my frustrations and thoughts...? - My mum used to tell me; "If you haven't got anything nice to say then don't say anything at all" ... Problem is, the Country cant sit in silence for the next five days.
I'm always a positive England supporter, I love going to watch my Country at Wembley. I don't care if they players are from Man Utd, Liverpool, Chelsea or wherever, I will always sing my national anthem, I will not boo players playing for my Country (including Frank Lampard, John Terry & even Gary/Phil Neville!) ... I am an England supporter but tonight, Im frustrated, disappointed, embarrassed and to some extent angry as well...

David James in goal; Should probably have started game one, has the most experience, did a solid job tonight - Cant complain about him.
Robert Green, unfortunate with the mistake vs.US but part & parcel of being a goalkeeper. Its 'hero' or 'villain' territory and on this occasion he is unlucky. Joe Hart; Please, Please make sure you are playing first team football - You will be England's undisputed No.1 by the next tournament.

In defence England were sloppy, slow, desperate in some cases. G.Johnson is almost unrivalled for the right-back slot. Going forward he was poor, defensively his positioning was awful and at times he was sleeping and went missing. Ashley Cole, almost unrivalled at left-back. I thought he had a decent game. Not brilliant, but certainly showed the right kind of attitude and application that you would expect from a multi-million pound football star.

What on earth is going on in central defence? John Terry started ok but as the game went on mistakes kept creeping in and he was so negative in possession. Carragher, regardless of whether he should or should not be in the squad anyway, was poor, slow, desperate in his challenges. Strength and experience helped Carragher at times but against decent opposition at this level England will get totally over-run.

Midfield: Where oh where do I start. Beckham, Scholes, Walcott, Hargreaves, Joe Cole. If you really want to be picky; Stewart Downing, Kieran Richardson, Adam Johnson, Scott Parker, Ashley Young? Is this our best midfield? Lennon: pace but no end product. Missing for large amounts of the game. Felt like people didn’t want to give him the ball. Eventually, he only seemed to want to play when it was clear he was coming off. SWP: Sorry, cant think of anything positive. Lampard: Oh dear, just awful. I will admit you are not my favourite player but that was embarrassing. Gerrard: Not much better. Poor use of the ball, gave it away far too easily far too often. Didn’t shoot on numerous occasions when in decent positions, whether left or right foot. You would have done in a red shirt. Carrying a lot of responsibility, pressure? You should be able to handle it by now.

Gareth Barry, defensively did ok. That’s what you are there for. Insurance for the defence, extra cover for our ‘Superstar’ midfielders Gerrard and Lampard. When in possession you were disappointing. The ball was given away far too easily. It was so frustrating to see England give the ball away so often when they seemed under little amount of pressure. There was no desire to win it back, no urgency and no-one who seemed happy to get hurt in the tackle. Very soft.

Rooney & Heskey: Poor first touch, didn’t retain the ball, very square, lack of movement, lack of skill, lack of inter-play and communication. When one went wide the other was so far away, they always looked isolated from one another. England tried numerous shots from 40 yards that wouldn’t have trouble an under 10s goalie. All in all a very pathetic performance that, I’m afraid to say Mr.Rooney, for all the money you get paid, was deserving of a boo or two.

What do I want to see next? - Do we blame Capello? Well, Mr.Capello is in charge and him we must trust. Carragher is suspended, I think that Dawson should replace him at the right-side of the centre defence. Gerrard is the Captain, (that doesn’t make him exempt), but he or Lampard needs to be dropped. Is there room for both? Possibly, but why don’t we see what is like with either/or. I’m struggling for faith in anyone for right midfield bearing in mind we don’t have ANY left-sided midfielders… Joe Cole, he has to play. Lets get Carrick in the midfield and maybe (just maybe), shove Gerrard to wide right. Start Crouch and Defoe? Rooney has to play? Maybe play Milner in the middle of the park with Carrick and Barry with J.Cole and Gerrard supporting Rooney.

So many options, 50 million England managers, what would you do?

[SuperCat1]

That is a fairly thoughtful and accurate reflection of last nights game Rabbits XI. When did Carra ever have pace he has always been slow!

You also provided some good examples of different options, i think Gerrard needs to play in the middle or just off the front as this is where he is most effective/affective as he is no good on the left, I would like to see Joe Cole play as he before his Knee injury he was starting to make that left hand side his own and is creative and inventive.

I also would like to see crouch given a good 90 as his goals to games ratio for england says it all, but the only thing with that is you have to have some one who will put decent balls in the box! if Gerrard played on the right that might happen or Milner could be effective sub.


Is there anything in the world as frustrating as watching England play

[Old Man In Boots]

I should imagine watching France play is slightly more frustrating!!

I have to say, perhaps there is way too much expectation because we simply are not that good.

The previous two posts have mentioned that the soulution could be in bringing in the following players;

Dawson
Crouch
Defoe
Carrick
Cole
Millner

All decent players, but good quality international players? Not one of them.

Want to know the most worrying part? The current players were meant to be the 'Golden Generation' and if you look beyond them to the next generation of English players, they are not there!

As a patriot I have told everyone who will listen that I think we will win it. As an observer of football, the best we can realistically hope to achieve is a last 8 place.

There must be a lot of BHA fans on here and I'm pretty sure that they don't start the season really believing they are going to win the FA cup, they have realistic targets and I think it would be both more enjoyable to the supporters and less pressurised for the players if expectations were realistic.

England good enough to win the world cup, playing anyone, with the players we have? No.

England good enough to win the world cup with luck and the right draw? Yes.

Last thought as it winds me up but I don't think the players froze or succumbed to the pressure, it looks to me that they are playing with restriction and they are instructed to play safety first football (i.e: Don't lose the ball by taking chances in the last third, play it back to retain possession) at all times. But I also think that from a master Italian tactician that is what should be expected. I don't go into hammering the coach though as when we qualified, he was God and the saviour of English football so I'm sure he can't have turned into Harry Basset overnight!!

By the way, I think Lampard should have been sacrificed to let Gerrard play properly in the middle a long time ago and you know what, I think you'll find that in our next match, that will finally happen.

Fans are way too fickle nowdays (Myself included) and by Wednesday evening, we'll all be saying that Lennon is better than Messi, Barry is better than Zico, Cappello can actually walk on water and, my personal favourite........ every single one of us will be saying.... "I told you that we would get through and now, I really do believe that we will go on and win it!!"

[rossco]

I will say what I say every tournament, over paid,spoilt,pampered,selfish,greedy sods.No passion or guts or pride.Why oh why do we keep trying to play keep ball ,we cant do it never could and never will.Harsh words maybe but when was the last time we dominated a game from start to finish.Lets get back to playing a more direct game with pace and power.Aminute to go our keepers got the ball he rolls it out,kick it up the other end for gods sake,for me heskey tried gerrard tried the rest were a shower

[Sidney]

Everyone knows we should play Gerrard off Rooney and Joe Cole on the Left. Job done, then we'll win it

Not sure how you still manage to criticsise a back-four and keeper that kept a clean sheet, what more do you want from them Although i do agree the best thing to come out of Wednesday was Carraghers yellow card and suspension

[SuperCat1]

Sidney, Although i do agree the best thing to come out of Wednesday was Carraghers yellow card and suspension

Only as there are no Everton players in the squad and your an Everton fan

[Smudge9]

Sidney, Although i do agree the best thing to come out of Wednesday was Carraghers yellow card and suspension

Only as there are no Everton players in the squad and your an Everton fan

Easy tiger! Jagielka and Baines would have been the answer to Englands prayers

Capello should have taken Arteta who qualifies for England now I believe

[Sidney]

Sidney, Although i do agree the best thing to come out of Wednesday was Carraghers yellow card and suspension

Only as there are no Everton players in the squad and your an Everton fan

That and the fact that he's s***

[SuperCat1]

LOL I think you need to change your picture underneath youre fourm name too

[Sidney]

done
Think Upson did well yesterday.
One thing that is annoying me still is all the negativity. Before the tournament everyone moaned about the press getting on the players back and not supporting them, now it seems the Great British public are doing the same.
Alright we have been below par, partially down to team selection IMO, but lets be honest USA, Slovenia and Algeria never expected to beat England and never set out to do so, they all got everyone behind the ball and made it very difficult for us hoping to nick a point maybe finish runners-up.
Now we are in the knock-out stages and in the tougher part of the draw this wont happen Germany will come at us and Argentina don't know how to play any other way. This wiill leave more space for England to exploit and hit teams on the counter. Two clean sheets in the last two and plenty of chances created against teams defending for 90 minutes, so lets get back behind the boys. COME ON ENGLAND