Roy Keane

Originally Posted by Spiffy

Same applies to Mark Hughes. It hurt me to have to hate him when he was City boss. Why can't they just pretend?

One of my faves as a kid, he's just a David Brent style idiot though

Originally Posted by treme

Waynes Ears would/does. Then again he is a bit simple.

As fo Ronaldo - it's fair enough, Ronaldo had won everything. I said the same thing.

As for the 16 year old kid - he probably deserved it.

As for the World Cup - Triggs needed walkies so he had to prioritise. Made the right call in my opinion.

waynes ears has aspergers or adhd or something.

as for keane, some people can't seem to accept that all our players are not as one eyed or fanatical about united as we all are. keane just calls it as he sees it and most of the time is dead on.

Originally Posted by Switching Off

One of my faves as a kid, he's just a David Brent style idiot though

Look at is this way. If everyone was like Ole and Eric, Ole and Eric wouldn't be special.

Originally Posted by treme

"... didn't have a great season"

"....didnt have a great season"

"....didnt have a great season"

Glad to see someone else just coming out and saying what people with a brain can see.

But Keane said don't blame Capello, yet it's Capello's who's the one who picks all those shite players.

Originally Posted by Sandman

But Keane said don't blame Capello, yet it' Capello's who's the one who picks all those shite players.

Exactly, it was Keane's usual mix of spot-on honesty and complete shite.

'Criticising the manager's crazy'. Er, well it's not is it, he's on £6 million a year and when England really needed goals he brought on Heskey. So I wouldn't call it 'crazy' to criticise him.

Originally Posted by Sandman

But Keane said don't blame Capello, yet it' Capello's who's the one who picks all those shite players.

Who did he take who he shouldn't and who did he leave out who he should have taken? Darren Bent and Theo Walcott are 2 regularly mentioned. If our world cup hopes relied on those two, they may as well not even enter the tournament.

The Premier League should call their bluff and introduce a winter break for the next world cup. Then when we're shit they might start looking at the problems afresh.

Originally Posted by Spiffy

Who did he take who he shouldn't and who did he leave out who he should have taken? Darren Bent and Theo Walcott are 2 regularly mentioned. If our world cup hopes relied on those two, they may as well not even enter the tournament.

The Premier League should call their bluff and introduce a winter break for the next world cup. Then when we're shit they might start looking at the problems afresh.

I would have taken Wilshire and Johnson instead of Wright Phillips and Heskey.

Originally Posted by Sandman

I would have taken Wilshire and Johnson instead of Wright Phillips and Heskey.

Furry muff.

Can you think of any team under any circumstances who would benefit from having Heskey play for them? I don't even buy this shit about him allowing others to play. We've seen it isn't true. I bet we score more goals as a team when Crouch plays instead of Heskey.

agree with keane tbh

what happened yesterday was nothing to do with the tactics or the formation or whatever

he picked arguably the best team he had available

this line about bringing on Heskey is just cheap talk and is exactly what Keane is on about about blaming the manager. Heskey was part of the team that got us there with 9 wins on the trot. he also set up gerrard's goal in the opening game. he was just as likely if not moreso to create a goal as any other player we had. you might also point to it as being a statement of what capello thought of the job the other strikers he had on the pitch were doing. heskey may not be all that, but england were 4-1 down with what they had before he came on.

Originally Posted by Tumescent Throb

agree with keane tbh

what happened yesterday was nothing to do with the tactics or the formation or whatever

he picked arguably the best team he had available

this line about bringing on Heskey is just cheap talk and is exactly what Keane is on about about blaming the manager. Heskey was part of the team that got us there with 9 wins on the trot. he also set up gerrard's goal in the opening game. he was just as likely if not moreso to create a goal as any other player we had. you might also point to it as being a statement of what capello thought of the job the other strikers he had on the pitch were doing. heskey may not be all that, but england were 4-1 down with what they had before he came on.

Can you edit your post please? I'm struggling to disagree with any of that. The team who got them there may not have played any really decent sides but the qualifying campaign went better than I think anyone expected so it's only fair to keep faith with those players, you can only beat the teams you play.

Having said that, there were some substitutions that seemed odd. Naturally we don't know who had a knock or who was shit in training but all in all, if you need to score I'd go for Defoe rather than Heskey if time's against you.

Originally Posted by Spiffy

Having said that, there were some substitutions that seemed odd. Naturally we don't know who had a knock or who was shit in training but all in all, if you need to score I'd go for Defoe rather than Heskey if time's against you.

i'd rather crouch, suits our style of play better. pretty decent international record but barely got on the pitch

it's amazing some of the flag displays that got taken down overnight tho. giddy £#%&!ers, who in their right mind would expect anything other than what we got with barry, milner, *insert other abject shite here* just because you pay them astronomical wages doesn't make them world class, or even close.

tbh england are trapped so far in a vicious circle it's difficult to see how they'll emerge from it. the infrastructure, the unprofessionalism, the psychology, the relationship to the media and the parochial, naive attitude to the international game as a whole have all brought this about, and those factors are so far entrenched it's doubtful they'll overcome them in the near future. we're talking a generational shift rather than a short-term one, no matter what the promises of 'root and branch restructuring' and the like.

someone like keane would have done his nut in a set-up like that. and rightly so.

Originally Posted by taff

tbh england are trapped so far in a vicious circle it's difficult to see how they'll emerge from it. the infrastructure, the unprofessionalism, the psychology, the relationship to the media and the parochial, naive attitude to the international game as a whole have all brought this about, and those factors are so far entrenched it's doubtful they'll overcome them in the near future. we're talking a generational shift rather than a short-term one, no matter what the promises of 'root and branch restructuring' and the like.

someone like keane would have done his nut in a set-up like that. and rightly so.

Even if the England set up is shite, it's not shite at OT, Chelsea, Arsenal and to a lesser extent, Anfield. How can those players who have access to some of the best coaches and medical staff in the world become so shite a few weeks later?

Anyway there's an easy answer. Harry Redknapp . All we needed was an Englishman. We won the world cup every time we had an English manager. Oh what we'd give now for a Steve McLaren or a Kevin Keegan. Forget Capello's won league titles and European Cups, he's got a dodgy accent and that must be the reason.

england's world cup record is one final (won) and one semi-final (lost)

the marketing circus created by the media around the national team is possibly the single most successful manufactured money-spinner in modern life. not to mention its effectiveness as a distraction.

Originally Posted by Tumescent Throb

agree with keane tbh

what happened yesterday was nothing to do with the tactics or the formation or whatever

he picked arguably the best team he had available

this line about bringing on Heskey is just cheap talk and is exactly what Keane is on about about blaming the manager. Heskey was part of the team that got us there with 9 wins on the trot. he also set up gerrard's goal in the opening game. he was just as likely if not moreso to create a goal as any other player we had. you might also point to it as being a statement of what capello thought of the job the other strikers he had on the pitch were doing. heskey may not be all that, but england were 4-1 down with what they had before he came on.

I don't really agree with any of that.

But if you are saying you would have taken the same squad, picked the same team, play them in the same rigid formation which marginalised your best player and you see no problem with anything Capello did then fair enough that's your opinion.

Originally Posted by Sandman

I don't really agree with any of that.

But if you are saying you would have taken the same squad, picked the same team, play them in the same rigid formation which marginalised your best player and you see no problem with anything Capello did then fair enough that's your opinion.

shut up ffs

nobody marginalised rooney or gerrard. They just weren't fit or in form. Stop making £#%&!ing excuses.

It's because of numpties like you that england are in the state they are.

you could have £#%&!ing fergie/mourinho as manager and england will be shit. No wonder they wouldn't touch the england job with a bargepole.

Originally Posted by Sandman

I don't really agree with any of that.

But if you are saying you would have taken the same squad, picked the same team, play them in the same rigid formation which marginalised your best player and you see no problem with anything Capello did then fair enough that's your opinion.

most of it was pretty much what happened tbh, re heskey anyway. we'd scored 3 goals and he made 33% of them ;-}


another factor people are overlooking in all this formation tittle-tattle is that the South African winter was supposedly going to be ideal for the English players, and yet they were simply not fit enough to compete using the formation and tactics that had got them there in such convincing fashion. they couldn't run, they couldn't cover, they couldn't track back. do you honestly think capello instructed them to play in straight lines? of course he never. do you honestly think he instructed them to leave the back door wide open or duck under punts down the pitch or even stand and watch from the halway line as their man strolled into the back stick to score? of course he never.

this mantra people seem desperate to present about rooney being hamstrung by playing 4-4-2 is beyond a joke now tbh. last season rooney did score a fair number of goals in a 4-5-1, but mostly it got us nowhere - we beat the vermin in a poor poor game at OT, we had a very good counter-attacking win at Arsenal (who defended even worse than England did against Germany btw), and we had a few cracking cup ties including the League Cup semis. but in the final we were clearly with 2 up front. and guess what? rooney scored in that one as well. in fact he scored most of his goals last season in a 2. the games that effectively decided the two major trophies for us last season were blown using the very formation (tactics) that was supposed to be the great solution for winning them without Ronaldo. and the big reason for that failure was that United, not entirely unlike England in SA, were not up to going a whole season physically. the formation is a good excuse. but it's not the real issue, and it's definitely not the whole story. far from it.

Originally Posted by Tumescent Throb

all this formation tittle-tattle

this mantra people seem desperate to present about rooney being hamstrung by playing 4-4-2 is beyond a joke now tbh.

the formation is a good excuse. but it's not the real issue

you should really explain this to loew. the deluded idiot seems convinced it might be relevant somehow.

Originally Posted by borsuk

you should really explain this to loew. the deluded idiot seems convinced it might be relevant somehow.

poor effort there borsuk tbh

loew claims he saw 4-4-2 and decided to get klose to hang back slightly from a goal-kick to exploit john terry's weak mindset and poor form and suddenly he's a genius. anyone would think he'd seen a/ john terry getting done like that all season, b/ john terry in the papers, c/ john terry being stitched up after the algeria game

why not go the whole hog and suggest that beckenbauer softened the entire england camp up by accusing them of playing like the england of yore against the states in the build up to a possible meeting. which would be a lot closer to the truth anyway imo. capello pretty much agreed with him as well, which is just as important. there's a stat somewhere that says john terry hoofed the ball out of defence 37 times in the 4 games england played. that is not what capello wants them to do. you accept this much i trust?

Originally Posted by Tumescent Throb

poor effort there borsuk tbh

loew claims he saw 4-4-2 and decided to get klose to hang back slightly from a goal-kick to exploit john terry's weak mindset and poor form and suddenly he's a genius. anyone would think he'd seen a/ john terry getting done like that all season, b/ john terry in the papers, c/ john terry being stitched up after the algeria game

that's not what he said at all. he pointed out that england's midfield lacks a defensive player, identified how to exploit the space, chose to draw england out to allow the counter. separately, he identified england's back four, lacking midfield support, as a weak formation that he could drag apart to create gaps. nothing to do with goal kicks - in fact, he made the point that they wanted to get klose on terry to pull him out of position; the goal kick goal was the one goal where klose was on upson and it was a freak goal tbh, with collective and individual £#%&!-ups to blame. the other three were exactly as loew described: break at pace with runners exploiting the fact that england's midfield was constantly trying to support the attack and exploit the gaps between the full backs and the centre halves.

why not go the whole hog and suggest that beckenbauer softened the entire england camp up by accusing them of playing like the england of yore against the states in the build up to a possible meeting. which would be a lot closer to the truth anyway imo. capello pretty much agreed with him as well, which is just as important. there's a stat somewhere that says john terry hoofed the ball out of defence 37 times in the 4 games england played. that is not what capello wants them to do. you accept this much i trust?

i don't think beckenbauer was wrong, but i don't think he was saying anything that wasn't obvious in any case. on terry, i have no idea what instructions capello gave him. i do know that england's midfield gave the back four precious little alternative, being stuck high up the field and lacking a player with the discipline to sit deep in any game. he had carrick sitting on the bench who could have performed this role but chose not to play him, for whatever reason.

if players are not following instructions then the manager has to make them do so, or drop them in favour of a player who has the necessary discipline. again, that falls at capello's door.