Since England's last decent showing (Euro 96), Greece have won a comp (Euro 2004), Turkey have made the SFs of the WC (2002) and Uruguay semis of WC (2010 & 2014) plus adding an other couple of Copa Americas..
I think Roy gets some harsh criticism at times, but he really is an expert at saying silly things after matches.
For an experienced manager he does says and does and says some really stupid things. Recently we’ve had the monkey comment about Andros T, the Rooney/scouse public speaking and telling the press about Sterling saying that he’s tired. Here’s a few more: http://tomkinstimes.com/2010/11/hodgson-putting-the-gaffe-in-gaffer/
I think we need to get talking about more important things, who is having pumpkin pie today and who likes it?
Calgary, on the topic of off topic things, MrsFT and myself are just booking a jaunt to Calgary for Jan 2016 Washington first for 4 days then Calgary (inc Banff and Lake Louise) for 10 days then home via MY for 4 days. I'll be looking for guidance if that's ok?
Regardless of what the player said or what his motivation was, Roy could have managed it differently - if he was inclined to do so. Was Sterling acting of his own accord or was he on instruction from his manager? Today, on Talksport, Tony Pulis was very forthright about how he would try his best to persuade players not to turn out for their country in friendly games; whether or not he has a point is a discussion in itself. But this was a fully competitive game and you would hope every manager in the PL (at least) would support both attendance and wholehearted participation. i find it very hard to believe that a 19yr old lad would use such a pathetic excuse to try and avoid starting a game of football for his country - unless he was between a rock and a hard place. i really don't know the answer, but I can't escape the question that I would like someone to ask the Liverpool Management: Did any of you encourage, cajole or instruct Sterling to take the position he did? Roy is either being a tad daft or he is playing a longer game for his role as England Manager.
England have a lot of black players, and I'm guessing they're of African descent; Welbeck's parents are Ghanaian. Jagielka is of Polish descent, Sterling was born in Jamaica and Lallana has a Spanish grandad. I'm sure there are plently of English players in the Premier League who have foreign ancestors. Our squad is more ethnically diverse than most people think, and foreign names in the squad mean very little.
It's not so much the names, but we see a lot of countries picking up players that are originally from other countries. My point was that England has such a diverse population nowadays, so why aren't there more youngsters with different backgrounds or dual nationalities? Pretty much all of the English players in the Premier League are either white or black. You don't hear of a Pawel Michniewicz breaking through into the U21s. And given Hull's strongn Eastern European population, why aren't there more of them in our academy?
Well there seems to be an awful lot of Polish, Lithuanian, Latvian and Romanian people in Hull, I'd class that as Eastern Europe.
So would I, but I don't class it as a 'strong' population. Leicester's Asian population is what I'd call strong. Hull is 92% White British.