Cant agree with that England have nothing now to match this - Seaman Neville Pearce Ince Adams Southgate Platt Gascoigne Shearer Sheringham Anderton. the gulf in quality is massive. its not our premiership because its stinks and it is not ticking boxes as it creates an international team that got beat by Iceland. A psychologist wont give the players skills they do not have.
It still endures to a lesser degree. I no longer attend due to the poor quality of the players, I can witness mediocre at Ashton gate for less.
The truth is we don't have and arguably have not since Gazza had a player in the side who can do something magical to turn a game, nearly every other side (except zee Germans) have had a flair player like Zidane, Ronaldinho, Cristiano Ronaldo, Messi etc. All the players that fulfil that role at club level in the Premiership are foreign. The only player in the last decade that came close to have that skill was Joe Cole and he never lived upto his potential, possibly because he never really got a look in over the favoured work horse duo of Lampard & Gerrard.
It's kind of ridiculous the talent we had at that time. As strikers now, we have Rooney (ish), Sturridge, Vardy, Rashford, Welbeck, Carroll, and that's about it, most of them are based on potential anyway. Back then we had Shearer, Sheringham, Owen, Fowler, Wright, Ferdinand, Cole, Dublin, Huckerby, it was ridiculous. I still think the mid 00's was the best England team on paper that I've ever known. Robinson/James, Cole, Terry, Ferdinand, Neville, Downing/Barmby/whoever, Gerrard/Lampard, Scholes, Beckham, Rooney, Owen - that team really should have won something, particularly if you rejigged it to have 3 CM's to fit in Lamps, Gerrard and Scholes with Hargreaves as backup.
I was and still am a member of the England travel club since 1989.. I have been to every major tournament we were involved in since then up to Brazil.. I have no interest whatsoever in watching England at this present time and the appointment of Southgate has only strengthened that feeling..
'compared to Venables & Bobby Robson who were considered successes' I certainly agree about Bobby Robson, not so sure about Venables who I think was vastly overrated and in charge for a very short period. Correct me if I'm wrong, but he only managed a few competitive home matches. The one competitive game England played away was in Ireland - they were losing when abandoned at half time in.
I think Hoddle was a better coach than Venables - and many of his brightest moments came on foreign soil. I also think Greenwood would feature in a top ten England managers…..not that I would expect anyone on here to agree with me because hardly anyone ever does :-(
I must admit England games do not do much for me at the moment . but being of dual nationality .nor does the other lot .... as for gareth well when he was " in the considered" list for us I was on his side!
Venables was in charge for Euro 96. England destroyed a very talented Dutch team and obviously lost on penalties to Germany. That was a team that looked like it truly belonged at the tournament, and played like they could win it. That type of form and team is now a memory. Success is now not losing to anybody in a knock out game.
