I'd like to comment on knee-jerk reactions that people make. This is largely within the context of England's defeat to N.Ireland in last night's World Cup Qualifier game.

What was expected to be a walk in the park win for England, turned out to be a bit of a humiliating parade of multi-millionaire show boaters who couldn't string together a decisive attack against an international team that really shouldn't have posed us any problems.

Of course much will be said about the manager, ladies man Sven. Now in most cases, managers are ultimately to blame for a botched strategy and/or team selection. However, one has to ask the following two questions:

• In a game like last nights, surely the millionaire gentlemen playing could have upped the tempo somewhat and really turned the show on to walk away with a deserved win against a comparitively weaker team?
• What exactly did three-girls Sven do wrong, and does this really deserve a sacking from his £5m-a-year job?

My answers to these are as follows:

• Yes, damn right they should have turned on the show and won. They can do it, they've shown they can do it, so why on earth didn't they do it?
• No. He's done alright as far as English coaches go.

Now, the vampyric press are baying for his blood right now, swede vs turnip etc. However, look at it this way. The loss against Denmark wasn't too much of a shock - they are recent European Champions are they not? And didn't they play some outstanding football in Mexico 86? I certainly remember wanting to be Laudrup in the playground as much as Platini/Maradonna/Zico!

Losing to N.Ireland though, is not good. It shows that there is something wrong with the morale and determination of the team. A loss against a minnows is a demonstration of a lack of concentration. It's not a good sign at all.

So my question to the world of media and football fans at large is - do you really think a knee-jerk reaction is the right thing to follow at this moment in time?
Lets address the more critical issues of:

• improving our grass roots acadamy system to encourage better growth and emergence of talent for the senior team
• lets instil a better work ethic into our players, reminding them that millions are better spent for pension and retirement than ferraris and lavish diamonds for earings
• lets get a system that the team believes in, and play it like the grand executioner would in medieval times
• lets get the coaching system in England revamped so that we GROOM successors whilst the current incumbent is still doing a great job
• lets not get carried away with a single defeat - after all, winning a world cup is the ultimate aim, and you can still win that if you lose a group stage game!

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Todays post was sponsored by Backfire.

Posted 9/08/2005.

Comments:

1.  swisslet says @ 8:31 pm
   I agree. I find Sven's private life, erm, remarkable... only in the sense that he is a dull, middle-aged swede. I don't much care what he does, really. What does worry me is his apparent inability to lift his players, or to change the shape of the game. Much of the blame must be put on the players, who went into this game arrogantly believing that because the opposing left back plays for Plymouth Argyle (for example) that they would be able to turn up and win with their eyes shut. Turns out they were wrong, and it was a throughly deserved defeat.
   
   Sven's tactics were non-existent (Wright-Phillips off early, Hargreaves on when we went a goal down...).
   
   It's been a long time coming though, it really has.
   
   Rubbish game.
   
   ST
2.  Jenni says @ 3:56 am
   Growing up the daughter of a coach, I don't believe you can really expect people to be objective about sports. No matter how much you wish they would be.
3.  changeofhart says @ 9:28 am
   thank you for giving me the forum...
   
   the english press make me absolutely furious sometimes. especially the lazy football journos.
   
   they have never got over the facts of:
   -sven isnt english
   -he earns a lot
   -he pulls famous women
   
   its just pure out and out envy, coupled with the english press arrogance which seems to dictate that england should never lose a football match (england are crap, manager is crap, referee robbed us, cheating johnny foreigner etc) - maybe, just maybe, teams raise their game and want to beat england more than we want to beat them.
   
   referencing an earlier comment, I have been a big fan of sven - I really dont want to go back to the dark days of keegans ineptitude and bulldog bluster with no substance. ok, so england play more dour football than they used to, but they usually get the results. however, coming back to the comment reference, I agree that sven has gone a bit nuts with his subs.
   how owen hargreaves (bayern's phil neville) gets a game when england are 1-0 down to a poor team who dont like defending is utterly beyond me. in both games the only player getting space was SWP, yet he is the easy substitution. Lampard was absent for the entire 2 matches. Gerrard and own havent played much and it showed. continuity is one thing, but playing unfit players just feeds the press and their conspiracy theories that rich footballers dont like to muck in. bollocks.
   
   bad result, 2 bad performances. england tried something and it didnt work. play beckham in the middle if you want, but with gerrard OR lampard, not both. rooney in front of them in mf, swp on the right, cole on the left.
   owen up front if you must, although I'd be tempted to build the team around someone up front who can hold the ball up.... heskey, crouch, anyone? owen n a front 3 or a front 1 just wont work. build a formation around the team you have, OR build a formation and put players into the positions who can play there...
   
   frustrating, but hardly the end of the world.
   
   England need an English manager. My ass. Steve Bruce? holy christ save us.

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