International football

[RoscommonGooner]

I did a 22/1 treble last night. Serbia (6/5), England draw (21/10) and Ireland draw (12/5). Fucking wankers couldn't hold on for another few minutes

[northbank123]

Glad I gave the football a wide berth yesterday. Wales shipped in an aggregate 9 goals to a very average Serbia outfit and sounds like England put in another insipid display.

I'll say it time and time again - they need to introduce some sort of pre-qualifying tournament if they want international football to be regarded as anything other than a major inconvenience. Not sure how it would work but maybe start it by teams finishing outside top 3 in their group having to play pre-qualifying tournament for a few spots in the next qualifiers (could be played whilst actual major tournament is happening). The teams then missing out could then play a pre-qualifying tournament over the next 2 years, with the teams finishing bottom of the actual qualifying groups missing out.

Would reduce the number of fixtures and more importantly meaningless games and make basically every game important, as well as giving the shitter international teams a shot at some relative success by qualifying for qualifying. Of course they'd have to stop doing the draws so far in advance but frankly that's a good thing giving the fluctuations in rankings.

[augie]

Glad I gave the football a wide berth yesterday. Wales shipped in an aggregate 9 goals to a very average Serbia outfit and sounds like England put in another insipid display.

I'll say it time and time again - they need to introduce some sort of pre-qualifying tournament if they want international football to be regarded as anything other than a major inconvenience. Not sure how it would work but maybe start it by teams finishing outside top 3 in their group having to play pre-qualifying tournament for a few spots in the next qualifiers (could be played whilst actual major tournament is happening). The teams then missing out could then play a pre-qualifying tournament over the next 2 years, with the teams finishing bottom of the actual qualifying groups missing out.

Would reduce the number of fixtures and more importantly meaningless games and make basically every game important, as well as giving the shitter international teams a shot at some relative success by qualifying for qualifying. Of course they'd have to stop doing the draws so far in advance but frankly that's a good thing giving the fluctuations in rankings.

The only knock I would have on that suggestion, and it is a point that seems to be missed by all, is that you are effectively adding extra fixtures to the international calender not reducing them - if countries (like Ireland and wales for example) have to qualify from a pre qualifying group and then have to play a proper qualifying group then that will add even more games. If/When that happens fifa and uefa will add more international dates to facilitate these games and countries like engerland, spain etc will all play more friendlies to boost their coffers

[northbank123]

Glad I gave the football a wide berth yesterday. Wales shipped in an aggregate 9 goals to a very average Serbia outfit and sounds like England put in another insipid display.

I'll say it time and time again - they need to introduce some sort of pre-qualifying tournament if they want international football to be regarded as anything other than a major inconvenience. Not sure how it would work but maybe start it by teams finishing outside top 3 in their group having to play pre-qualifying tournament for a few spots in the next qualifiers (could be played whilst actual major tournament is happening). The teams then missing out could then play a pre-qualifying tournament over the next 2 years, with the teams finishing bottom of the actual qualifying groups missing out.

Would reduce the number of fixtures and more importantly meaningless games and make basically every game important, as well as giving the shitter international teams a shot at some relative success by qualifying for qualifying. Of course they'd have to stop doing the draws so far in advance but frankly that's a good thing giving the fluctuations in rankings.

The only knock I would have on that suggestion, and it is a point that seems to be missed by all, is that you are effectively adding extra fixtures to the international calender not reducing them - if countries (like Ireland and wales for example) have to qualify from a pre qualifying group and then have to play a proper qualifying group then that will add even more games. If/When that happens fifa and uefa will add more international dates to facilitate these games and countries like engerland, spain etc will all play more friendlies to boost their coffers

Probably didn't explain myself clearly enough - teams would either be playing in the qualifiers for the World Cup OR the pre-qualifiers for the next Euros qualifying. So whilst England would be playing in the qualifiers for WC 2018, on the same night Wales would be playing in the pre-qualifiers for Euro 2020 (having not managed to get into the WC 2018 qualifiers).

It's all a pipe dream and nothing like this would ever happen but I genuinely believe it would benefit almost all international teams as well as clubs. The decision to increase the teams in the Euros to 24 in 2016 is a complete joke.

[augie]

To follow through with that theory though, would mean that a good team that a country might have now, would be denied the chance to qualify for the world cup cos the team was shite 2 years previously and that hardly seems fair. If I use Ireland for example, a new manager coming in would presumably make players like hoolahan, mc carthy, pilkington etc more central to the team and get rid of the sub standard shite like green, glenn whelan etc - I know that still wouldnt make Ireland a great team but would, in my opinion at least, make us better than sweden and austria

I know that I am putting up a strong pro international argument here but the reality is that I cant remember when I last sat down to watch an international game I suppose my fear is that in a few years international football will be all about the elite countries and smaller nations like ourselves will be disregarded as an inconvenience - maybe the best comparison is the champs league where the big clubs get a financial windfall every season that their rivals domestically dont get, thus insuring they have a big advantage for qualifying again the following season and every season after that ensures that they pull further and further away from domestic rivals

[fadidaeus]

There are 53 countries going for 13 spots, surely the common sense solution would be 12 groups of 4 & 1 group of 5, top team goes through. You'd slash the number of games by a lot but make each game important & have a simpler system.

[mcdowell42]

Trappatoni leaves the managers job at ireland today by mutual consent ,talks of martin o neill as the new manager,dont want him think he is overated and tbh his type of football would be similar to trappatoni.

[spendsum4uckingmoney]

There are 53 countries going for 13 spots, surely the common sense solution would be 12 groups of 4 & 1 group of 5, top team goes through. You'd slash the number of games by a lot but make each game important & have a simpler system.

The problem with that is we would be deprived of classics like England v Andorra.

[clockender1]

england are shit because they've got a shit manager and shit players.

the manager has never won anything, same as his predecessor- what did Mclaren ever win ? relegation ?

Venables was the last England manager to put together a team.


the players are mostly waaay overrated too - it used to take 2,3 or even 4 years of playing regularly and then you'd get an England call up. now they have 4-5 games for United, Villa, Spurs or Liverpool and they're in.

Sven and capello were guilty of the same disease - picking players from the top clubs who simply weren't in form or have never done anything at international level (Gerrard and lampard...cough, cough...) to justify their continued selection.

this is last nights team sheet :

England
01 Hart
02 Walker Booked
03 Cole
05 Cahill
06 Jagielka
04 Gerrard
07 Walcott (Cleverley - 87' )
08 Lampard
10 Wilshere (Young - 67' )
11 Milner
09 Lambert
Substitutes
13 Ruddy
23 Forster
12 Smalling
14 Baines
15 Caulker
16 Carrick
17 Cleverley
18 Barkley
20 Young
21 Sterling
22 Townsend
19 Defoe

and look at the names WTF

bear in mind Jack and Wally's poor form, and probably only Cashley and Defoe derserved a start, maybe Baines too.

what of those players would get in the french, dutch or italian squads, let alone SPain or Germany ?

its pitiful, playing three holding midfielders (jack, fatboy and gerrard) away against Ukraine. no wonder they had no attacking impetus !

plus the timing is shite - a week before the Season starts and 3 weeks in - no players have got their form or rythme yet.

they shouldn't play any games til October - give the season 6-8 games, then play two internationals in a week, then again in December, February and April and that's it - 8 games a year.

and I agree make the groups smaller and two tiers - 6 groups of 4 like before - winners and runners up go through, 3rd place goes into play offs against the winners of the second tier groups of four.

playing six games against montenegro, moldova and san Marino is just riduculous and a wast of time.

[1989]

If everyone is fit this is our best XI IMO:

---------------------------Hart--------------------------
Johnson---------Cahill---------Lescott---------Baines
-------------------------Carrick--------------------------
----------------Gerrard---------Wilshere---------------
Walcott----------------------------------------Sturridge
-------------------------Rooney--------------------------


Not too shabby I'd say

[Henry Norris 1913]

what did Mclaren ever win ? relegation ?

league cup with boro, got them to the uefa cup semis, and a dutch championship with twente

[Poldi]

German sports paper "kicker" says there will be an international friendly between England and Germany on Nov, 19th at Wembley if both teams qualify for the WC

[Nos89]

what did Mclaren ever win ? relegation ?

league cup with boro, got them to the uefa cup semis, and a dutch championship with twente

It was the UEFA cup final where they got hammered 4-0 but pulled off two miraculous comebacks in qtrs. and semi, something we have quite managed for last 3 champs league campaigns.

[safcftm]

I don't think a manager needs to have won things prior to taking over to be honest, its more a case of how his style suits the players that are at his disposal. For instance, Joachim Low has done pretty well with Germany (runner up in Euro 2008, 3rd in the last world cup and semi final in euro 2012), especially considering he has been there just at the time that Spain became all conquering. However he hasn't exactly got a great track record of success, he has been managing since 1996 and in that time he's won the Austrian top division once and a the German equivalent of the FA Cup once, hardly sparkling. Then on the other hand you have Capello, a CV dripping with success who (although I don't think he was as bad as many, at least we qualified easily with him!) didn't do any better than expected. Judging managers for international teams purely by their success at club level, which is totally different, can be dangerous. Further evidence comes with Glenn Hoddle, arguably one of the better England managers of recent times but he had won literally nothing prior to getting the job.

England simply don't have the players to be a world force but I must admit it is disappointing that we're making such hard work of a piss easy group - Ukraine were shit and Poland and Montenegro are no better, even accepting that we're far from a top echelon team we should still have pretty much got our place booked by now.

Also can't agree with Cahill being in a "best XI", he's fucking woeful - for me Jagielka is streets ahead of him. But realistically there's not much we can change, there just aren't enough genuinely good players pushing for places.

[Nos89]

The issue with the manager is a mute point. If the FA were to select the English coach who has proven to be consistent and successful in the last 10 years Sam Allardyce would be top of that list. His success comes from sustaining a mid table team in the mid table. Steve Bruce can also be added to that list.

I was listening to R5L and Graham Taylor, surely the unluckiest England manager in recent years, mentioned that the FA has never spoken to former managers to get an idea of where they are going wrong. Greg Dyke has a great opportunity to get round the table the last 5 England managers and ask them what do we need to do improve our international team. They have great experience and will know what the limitations were of the national squad.

I must also state that if Arsenal were actually winning things and consistently successful, I doubt I would be too bothered about the national team. Just as long as our players didn't come back injured.