I'm with Redruth, WHY bother, it won't make a ****'s worth of difference. It's just another highly paid job for "one of the boys". Here's the brief: Get some overated players together, make them run around a bit. Oh yes Tactics, kick the ball up field, then retire to the otherside of the halfway line, where you wait for the other team to attack. Pick ball out of the back of your goal, place ball on centre spot, kick ball up field, retire to the otherside of the halfway line wait for other team to attack again. Keep repeating until it's not possible for you to win the game. One more thing, you cannot have played well unless you've ran at least 50 miles mostly without the ball, it's called "putting in a good shift". Remember this as you will have to say it to the man with a microphone at the end of the game, it's the law! If I have to make a decision then I would chose my Sat Nav, it's Technical and it's good at Directions! ILD OTBC
Haven't seen the brief for the job but I would look to appoint someone with a lot of experience of a similar position on the continent, e.g. from the Netherlands, France, etc. I don't think the issue is "technique" (though our players, with the odd exception, do still compare badly in that respect), as much as producing English players who actually understand the modern game and what is going on on the field instead of having to be told from the touchline. When Arsene Wenger describes someone as "technically very good", he doesn't mean he can actually control the ball etc.; he means he has the necessary level of understanding of the game, the formations, the patterns, the shape, each players' role, not just of his own team but the opposition as well. The trouble with the current England squad, IMO, is that the great majority of them simply don't have it. I am not among those who think that national salvation on the football field will come from reverting to "the English game". That's a dead end. Yes, the never-say-die Bulldog spirit up-and-at-em mentality has a place, but if that's all you have to offer you will never win a trophy. It may win you the odd game, but you'll be like a giant-killing lower league outfit putting out a top division side in the FA Cup. Wonderful on the day but you're never going to win it. One of the reasons for NCFC's progress, again IMO, is that PL is developing the necessary sort of technical understanding in our squad. His first question about a potential signing seems to be "is he intelligent enough to really understand the game?". The constant changing of formations and having players perform different roles, that we are becoming familiar with, is all part of the process.
