I'll forgive him that when he admits that it was jealousy. Glenda does have a huge ego and I think he suddenly realized one day, "****, there I someone as good, if not better than me" In Glenda's defence, he had spent 30 years on training grounds as a player and coach, shaking his head wondering what planet he had landed on.
I liked what he said about Luxury players. I think he's right, and in England we see technically gifted players as luxuries. The real luxury player is somebody who constantly gives the ball away, either by pointless long shots (Lampard and Gerrard), Poor ball control (Carroll), inability to cross (Walcott, Lennon, Young, any other English winger in the last 10 years). The thing is, I just cannot see the FA changing. The Germans totally overhauled their system after what they saw as the embarrassment of losing to England in Euro 2000. They did this with the cooperation of the clubs. England since then have experienced far more embarrassing moments, be it deserved failure to qualify for Euro 2008, Being destroyed by Germany in South Africa, being outplayed by everybody at Euro 2012 and the imminent failure to Qualify for Brazil (trust me, if we make it, it'll be more by luck than ability). The FA's response has been to do the square root of FA. I don't know the answer, but as far as I can see we ain't never gonna win anything when there are more qualified youth coaches in Barcelona than in Britain.
I always thought a "luxury" player was a technically brilliant, attacking outlet who couldn't defend for ****, much like the great Le Tiss. They're seen as a luxury because you have to be able to afford to accommodate them and look like you have 10 men when not in possession. Players who constantly give the ball away, I tend to refer to as "crap".
Whilst Ardiles is obviously correct, I am sure that all Saints fans are pleased that we have technically brilliant foriegn players in the Southampton squad such as Morgan not be mention othe players like Maya, Yoshida, Jos Hooiveld, Jose Fonte, Gaston Ramirez, etc. We are as guilty as any other team. I wonder how many Saints fans would be prepared to ditch our foreign contigent for their English counerparts and how soon we would slide back down to League One as a consequence. I would recommend that anyone interested in this subject should read Jonanthan Wilson's excellent "Inverting the pyramid" which explains that England has actually been behind the curve with regard to tactics since the 1920's when Austria took a more scientific approach to football. The FA is changing but the power of Sky is dictating the English football improves as a product and this means employing techniccally gifted players from overseas. If you want to compete, it is becoming obvious that it is increasingly impossible to go this with British footballers. For all the negativity about England, I think the situation with Scotland is even worse. Having grown up watching football in yhe 70's / 80's, Scottish players formed the backbone of many of the better sides. This hasn't been the case since the formation of the Premier League. Unfortunately, the only way to prevent this is to have a cap on foriegn player which, I believe, will probably contravene EU employment regulations regarding the free movement of labour. I also think that the idea of acadamies does promote English players. Unfortuantely, the global nature of the game now means that many of these acadamies will be full of foreign apprentices as is the case with Chelsea, Man Utd and Arsenal I believe. It made headline news several years back when Chelsea fielded a team with no English players. Nowadays, no one would be surprised. Ardiles is right about the calibre of the current squad and when you see the likes of Leighton Baines lauded, you can appreciate the the standard of our national team is probably the worst it has been seen the early nineties when the likes of Carlton Palmer was guaranteed a match. A very good point was made above about the lack of English players performing abroad. For a long while, our better players have not set a good example and even players like Ian Rush who you would have expected to have succeeded have struggled. I suppose the best examples have been Lineker, Hughes (Welsh), Keegan , Hoddle and Waddle. I don't think there are any players in the current squad half as good as these players. Technically our players have not been good enough and writers like Simon Kuper have commented that the social standing of the footballers may also have a bearing insofar that football is more of a working class sport than it is in elsewhere in Europe. My final point is this. Having watched some of the Confederations games, they have largely been boring. I can't bring myself to watch Italy as they are so dull despite their undoubted skill. I think that the English prefer a more physical game and faster style of play which makes skill less of an issue. We often talk about a game being played in the spirit of a "cup tie." For me, there are two sides of the coin on this. However, it is interesting how foriegn player adapt to the style of play in the uK (interesting to hear the little Brazilian player to played for Boro in the 90's comment on this last week on TV) and how some can cope whereas others struggle.
Ian, back to the OP, which you haven't really you he'd on in your post; we do not develop players (youth and younger) technically. We teach them to win games. When you are 8, 10, 12, 14 and even 16 or 18, you can win by being bigger, stronger and quicker than your opponent. We must stop the "win at all cost" attitude of parents and coaches to concentrate on technical development. The first thing I would do would be to stop parents watching from the touchline and do it have any league tables published until 14/15 years of age.
Fatletiss I think you have raised a valid point. I don't have any involvement with kids football and I think that most of the games played by kids are purely for enjoyment. YOu can understand the "play-to-win" mentality with all the money at stake whereas also understanding why fans' disappointment at watching dire football has led to managers like Pulis getting the sack at Stoke because the directors are worried about season ticket sales. Ardiles' remark about football being ruled by the PL, FA and FL is true. However, the formation of the Premier League has actually increased the quality of English football by an incredible degree - in fact to the extent that the Championship is far more of a step down than the old Division Two. However, the quality has largely been through the introduction of foriegn talent. This has now perculated down to the Championship with most younger English players tending to gravitate to the lower league if they wish to further their careers.
I don't buy the line about Foreign talent stopping young british players. There are plenty of foreign players playing in France, Germany, Italy, Holland, Spain and Portugal and all those leagues have enough money in them to buy in more players from abroad if they want, yet all of those have immeasurably better international sides than England. The reason is that young French, German, Italian and Spanish players have enough technical ability to justify putting them in the side.
The other thing foreign countries tend to teach is versatility. Due to the focus on win at all costs in this country, players learn one position and stick to it for all of their junior career. In countries like Belgium and Netherlands, youngsters are given the opportunity to play in and learn a variety of different positions with less pressure.
Ok, two key, very key points: 1. When I said "play to win/win at all costs" I meant kids, grass roots football. Professional football has to be about winning. We must change the attitude at grass roots right now! 2. I disagree that the quality of English football has improved since the EPL. The quality of the entertainment available from watching the EPL has improved hugely (I think you may have meant this) but the quality of "English"football has stagnated if not reverted. Changes must happen now. It starts at grass roots now. Arduous is right that we won't win a thing if we don't change our mentality. Those who read my posts on this regularly will know what I'm going to say next; I've said it once or twice; We suffer from the English disease.
Boy you've got me on it now. I have coached my team for 5 years from 7-12 years of age. This season I've lost 5 boys. The two biggest reasons: 1. I played them in different positions when Little Johnny is a striker! 2. I rolled on and off the subs, based on time on the pitch not playing ability. Parents didn't understand despite my continually explaining. Example I always give is Kevin Phillips: released by Saints at 17/18 because he wasn't good enough as a fullback. Turned out a pretty good goal scorer, but one of the best youth academies in the land hasn't bothered to rotate where he played to see what else he could do and understand all positions.
It really wouldnt be hard to change. Other countries like Germany have paved the way, worked out how to do it, we can literally copy what they did! Not hard
