The bottom line is that England don't have good enough players. There were a few young players in the squad, who have emerged since the World Cup debacle, but England still play in the same disjointed, "lump it in and hope for the best" way. We continue to lack players with a good first touch, who are able to pass and move coherently and are clever enough to to find space and time or the bit of skill or class which gives the better teams the edge (for example Griezmann's timely intervention yesterday for France).
Some of our players look good a club level because they have star players around them who provide that coherence or creavity, which enables them to shine. When you put the England players together in the same team their lack of real ability is painfully obvious - as has been shown tournament after tournament. We revert to trying to wear down the opposition by lumping the ball into the box as often as possible, but teams are wise to this now - and all the teams are very organised. Wales and Iceland are proof that good organisation and playing to a plan can compensate for lack of ability to some extent. Unfortunately, England lack organisation too. The players don't play to a plan, nobody seems to know what their roles are (how do Kane, Vardy, Sturridge, Rooney and Alli all fit together?) and the personnel changes so often that there is no understanding.
A total shambles.
We have enough good players to make the last eight at most tournaments. If Iceland and Wales can manage it, so could we if:
1.The FA could appoint someone half decent as coach who would do more than pick Rooney and hope.
2. We'd stop picking injured players for tournaments.
3. We'd stop picking out of form players. We'd have done a lot better in this tournament with Noble in place of Rooney and Townsend for Sturridge.
4. We stop treating the team as Brazil of 1970 when we win qualifying games against San Marino or Andorra.
If we follow The Huddlefro's suggestion and get an Eddie Jones figure in to kick some ass,we could go from piss poor to reasonable again. I vote for Hoddle. He's a good coach and can be ruthless - see Gazza in 98.
