rooney would be much better off partnered with carroll. him and welbeck just never seem to work in my eyes, too similar. even for man u i'm underwhelmed by their partnership. hodgson should learn: rooney was always at his best for england when paired alongside heskey. now i'm not calling for heskey to be called up, but carroll is similar to heskey in build (height and strength). he would hold the ball up well and give rooney space by occupying both CBs. welbeck only occupies 1 when he runs down a channel, leaving the other free to mark rooney. carrol and rooney would be a much more effective partnership for the euros and england.
Agree - it should be Rooney and Carroll, Rooney can feed off Carroll far better than feeding off Welbeck who offers nothing physically up front. English football is odd when you think about it. We comment about them not being technical enough, that is utter bollox. Any professional footballer is technically sound, what separates semi pros from pros is speed of thought, first touch and passing ability/shooting accuracy. In training they will play small sided games, they will practice passing and moving, they will practice 2 and 1 touch football. Whenever a team steps up a division what they notice immediately is the touch and movement of the teams above them but players at the top have already reached the highest level. Coaches actually "coach" skill out of players, if you play for a team that doesn't encourage keeping the ball your first instinct when you receive it is who to give the ball to immediately, sometimes percentage football is played so, instead of playing a simple pass, you'll look to knock the ball in behind a defender, for example. After playing football like this for a while it becomes instinct. If you look at the passing and movement of the England team it is pretty non existent. When Spain have the ball you will see numerous options for players to choose, passes to make. You will also see that even if a player has "man on" he will receive the ball. English players tend not to pass to you in those instances, as soon as they are put under pressure they just hoof it away. This is why I rate Wilshere so highly, he is anti English in the way he plays football. Look at Arteta on the ball, he will only pass it when he is ready to. Until we get more Wilsheres in the England team we will not be able to play the type of football that it seems everyone else is playing. We need to be composed and calm on the ball, we must stop being afraid of it, we must learn to make angles and give options all over the pitch instead of playing in a very obvious and predictable way. English players have the ability to play the right way, they just need to be coached and encouraged - this goes for grass roots football too. Football is football at the end of the day, its not the Spanish sun that makes the Spanish so good at the game!!
No i said Arsenal fans overrate their OWN English players and think all other English players are overrated. Chamberlain being the main example and Walcott is average at best.
Lol when do we overrate Walcott? It's the complete opposite. But out of our current crop of English players, OXO and Wilshere are the real deal. It's not just us going on about these two, it's everyone else too. Gibbs is another player, but he has an outside chance, depending on his injuries and development.
If you knew what you were talking about you would know that opinion is split regarding Walcott, some think he is pants, some think he is good, everyone says he is frustrating and inconsistent. Wilshere IS good, hence the country's disappointment that he wasn't fit for the Euros. Name a better young English midfielder than Wilshere. OXO's performances for Arsenal this season against Milan and Man U put his name on the map. A player technically superior to any other English youngster in the Premier League (except Wilshere). Name an English youngster who is a winger OR attacking midfielfder who is better than OXO. Gibbs is a left back who has been unlucky with injuries but whenever he plays for Arsenal he looks good. The only other English youngster I can think of is Bertrand and - he doesn't look a patch on Gibbs in my opinion, who's passing is much better than Bertrand's. I believe Gibbs will develop to be the best LB in the country by a mile. Walcott has also been unlucky with injuries and he has also, lets not forget, been played out of position - Walcott is not a winger. As a winger most think he is pants, as a forward he is a different proposition. Will he become the player we think he might ? Not sure, I am less sure about him than I am of Gibbs, OXO and Wilshere, but there is no denying on his day - he rips teams apart, he is a game changer - he did it against Spurs for us and he did it for England.
Ok .. not every .. Carlton Palmer, for example, definitely was not and I doubt anyone would ever say Vinnie Jones or Gus Ceaser were either
One of the weird things that's happened to us Arsenal fans over the last few years is that we've become snobs. Let's not forget we played pretty shocking football under George Graham. Italy and Germany have both won major tournaments playing conservative somewhat unattractive football. As long as England are winning I'm happy. I genuinely think we can win this tournament, we may not be playing good stuff but we look resilient and hard to beat.
I see that Chiellini has been ruled out for the England game. Arguably their best CB so will be a big miss. Think we can take advantage.
Some German websites are saying that Podolski, Gomez and Muller will be left out in place of Schurrle, Klose and Reus. No idea how reliable they are though. Podolski and Muller aren't having great tournaments so far, so those changes are understandable. Klose is more suitable to play the Greeks than Gomez, so these changes could turn out to be very good.
They could play their B team and still comfortably beat the Greeks. But Pod, Gomez and Muller are their best front three. We haven't seen the best of Germany yet....
Line up is true, has been confirmed. http://www.dfb.de/index.php?id=511739&tx_dfbnews_pi1[showUid]=34766&tx_dfbnews_pi4[cat]=168 Klose, Reus and Schurrle in for Gomez, Podolski and Muller. Bender is also back on the bench for Boateng.
Reus has really impressed me in this game. Have not watched much of him before and his performance today has been really classy.
