Thought Greg Dyke had his head up his arse. The FA and the EPL are the problem. English players at every every level are not good enough. If they any good they play. Other leagues are full of home grown players. Dortmund v Bayern the overwhelming majority were German. A fifteen year plan is needed. It worked in France and Spain. The above is just a sticking plaster. A fifteen yrar plan wont happen because the FA have to admit their top product the EPL is wrong, and that might affect their gravy train. Till then they will carry on as they are. Come on Ukraine **** the England stars out of it.
I agree Ender, and have said that for a while, we need more people playing in other leagues and gaining the knowledge and ideas if those nations coaches for us to be truly successful. Look at the strong French side between 97-00, barely any of them played their club football in France.
It makes no difference if players lack skills of their opponents. That french team was the product of thinking that started in the eighties. france still produces masses players who have very good core skills because of what they did decades before and that was to put thousands of coaches into kids football. Spain germany the dutch they all have far far more kids coaches than england does and it shows everytime the top level team goes out. England look like dinosaurs v germany and spain.
Some great points on here. There is no "magic bullet" that can be used to make England better - we need a myriad of initiatives - some will be short-term, but others will take 10-15 years to come to fruittion.
Read the Spanish have 27000 coaches and England have 2000. What a waste of money .. Spain need to stop all that tippy tappy and GET IT UP THERE. English players, or some of them cant play much, two, three passes all sorts can go wrong there. V the Italians at the euros England tried to pass the ball far too much. They kept giving it away in dangerous areas e.g where they started in their own half. No good ... Good old old toes through the ball up the park would have been better and might have worn Pirlo out bringing it back with this unecessary one touch, pass, move, pass, move. nonsense .. GET IT UP THERE.
English players essentialy are powerful and thats about it with the odd exceptions. Think about who could they realistically play like or take elements from. Brazil .. No ****ing way. Spain and tiki - taka ... No ****ing way agaiin. Italy ... Well Italy do that, England tried and were not very good at it. Netherlands ... They are brought up like that from infancy to play like that. Germany ... 4-1 last time. Dyke should be saying back to basics and look to creating players in fiteen years time, after a huge investment in coaching in schools and junior football. Truth is they would rather give money to Balotelli and agents than leave a legacy.
The Premier League (or Division 1 as it was known then) had 22 teams and a 2 year plan was made to reduce this to 20- (Around 1986?)- The play offs came from this system and are still with us today. They are very popular, keep the season alive for a lot of teams, not least to say are very attractive financially. The original system didn't work, as no sooner the league was reduced, they wanted it back to 22 (2 less games meant 2 less fixtures and revenue) it went back again after to 20, but by then the play offs had become an integral part of the end of season. For that reason, I don't see the EPL reducing to 18, though if you look abroad, most leagues are of this size. English football will always suffer due to the sheer number of foreign imports. How many English goalkeepers play in the EPL? and remember, it wasn't that long ago, that a certain Frank Fielding was picked by England!
Other countries have foreign imports and their national XI's do not suffer because of it. English football is creating sub standard players. Englands physicality has been matched and surpassed with technique. You read posts on here up about putting a foot in and big hard lumps there is no place in modern football for it anymore. Skill and technique rules and England isnt producing that becase it isnt set up to.
Fair point that- Other countries players do play over here, but very few of our top players play abroad. How many of Brazils team play in Brazil. Probably not many?- Bale now does, though he is Welsh.-Brazilians play in Spain as well as in England so their experiences are wider spread. Maybe, Englands are more restricted. Those that don't make the Premier league drop to the Championship, or sit on the bench. Either way, they don't get to play at the top regularly enough that way.
I think we still need imports, but they need to be good ones - our players can learn from playing with the best. The problem is too many cheap journeyman foreigners blocking the path of English youngsters. 90% of the best will make it anyway, but even so would they get there quicker, or be even better, if they are given game time earlier.
Nothing wrong with imports , but they are used as a smokescreen, as a flimsy excuse for the poor development of players in England. Robin Van Persie is a fantastic import, he came crom a league that loses its talent consistently, and then back fills with imports and yet more home grown players. The Dutch keep on pushing out high quality stars. That should given the size of the country is not a statistical anomaly, its through a cohesive strategy from infant age upwards. Robin Van Persie interestingly runs his own coaching school for children. Start them young is the Dutch mantra. The English ethos is wait till nine and maybe there will be a good un somewhere. It is totally wrong thats years already wasted.. Anybody interested in kids croaching look at Brazillian soccer schools, FFS and compare lads and girls to those who have not. Those kids have real touch and technique if they apply themselves. That coaching costs. parents. Abroad quality coaching is FREE.
the only way to change the English game is find the balance of non home bred to foreign 5 outfielders of each ilk any goalie but 5 English players on the outfield.....the same for Championship, first and second divis maybe 6 outfielders of English heritage.... mainly curb the agents..63 transactions and almost half a mil on fee's...the agent gets over £7000 a player.....
The only way!! That is no panacea. English players are sub standard. They are sub standard technically already at academy level. They are behind st five and six. Raising the skill standard nationaly prior to academy level will raise the standard of player at 13-14, under sixteen, under 21 and on. That can be achieved by a cohesive national strategy. Elements of strategies which are used by nations producing superior players from an early age can be employed in the UK. The model here prior to professional level is broken. Quotas later will have no impact on that model.
Probably as many as Ashley Young will, but I would question if he would get many games at any top level team in another national league. He is a squad player. I would highllight Jack Wilkshire as more to the point. He is a very well rounded player, a modern player, two footed with skill. That is the future, or should be. And then it goes back go the same flaw, why do so many players in Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain ... Possess that level of competence of a football and England does not! England gets the odd one, nations which use a very differfent development path have left England behind.
English league football has simply been ruined by money, greed, and cheap foreign imports. I haven't followed the England national team for years now due to the total over indulence by apologists like the FA and SVE of the likes of Beckham and the laughably called Golden Generation who have delivered nothing when it mattered (i.e in real tournaments), because they are technically nothing like as good as they think they are, or the media would have us believe. Luckily all of the players in question are multi millionaires so thank god that their lack of skill, effort and stamina doesn't affect their bank balance or ability to buy the next chav mobile. When push comes to shove we still cannot compete with the likes of Germany, Spain, Brazil, and others. Sure we beat teams hollow in qualifying, but when it comes to the crunch we are always found wanting on so many levels it's sickening. The last half decent squad we had which performed to any degree was for Euro '96 and before that in Italy in 1990. I simply dont care about the national team any more and that's the saddest part of all. I used to live for it.
I understand the disinterest in the national team. The paradox is though that XI also reflects the standard of footba from grass roots up, including Bristol City. The lack of cohesion between kids football to competitive football to clubs and the premier league does afffect City. Germany were dismal at Euro 2000. The result was a restructuring of their football. The German FA forced their clubs to improve and they started from kids up. The Spainish did the same, the French likewise .. The results affect clubs and even school teams positively.
A think-tank of players and professional, both from here and abroad, to restructure the game from the earliest kids right up to the Premier league. Academies right across the land, mentored by Spanish and French aficionados using the model created in those countries that has brought them such international success. For the kids, more emphasis on ball retention and skill, less on physical and traditional English values. Generally much more importance instilled into the youngsters about artistic expression, skill and imagination For the adults, less long passing, which slows the game down and makes it easy to read and play against, and more short 3 & 4 man passing moves through the opposition. Organizationally, 4 less teams in the Premier league, A MID-WINTER BREAK !!!, abolition of the League Cup for Premier League teams, a rule to guarantee 6 British players per Premier league 11, more time put aside for the international squads to work together like they do in club sides. This would be a start, but would take at least 5 years to bring forth fruit (like it did in France 94-98) Of course, being as all the biggest clubs are foreign owned, its never going to happen because there is not the British interest where it matters - in the boardroom. Those foreign billionaires couldnt give a XXXX about the England football team, and would certainly not sanction such changes at their own expense. Its a fact of life in England. The players are invariably exhausted by the time they get to the World Cup. They are infested with the English disease of long balls, aimless crosses into boxes, unfit and unprofessional life styles that make us the laughing stock of Europe, and our precious premier league which is just too powerful and all consuming to stand aside for the sake of British football. Still, at least we can implement some of the suggested changes, which might up our game a little. Frankly its a national embarrassment that we have only won one single WC in all our history.
