I'm useless, me!
Well what a complete and utter unmitigated disaster that
was. Out of the World Cup after two
games, out without winning a game, out having played passably for half a game,
bottom of the group and in the worst 3 or 4 teams out of the 32 at the
tournament. GARBAGE.
Roy Hodgson of course had a free hit at Euro 2012 and he
went with a conservative 4-4-2 formation with Milner and Chamberlain on the
wings. Rooney was banned but was of course brought back as soon as he wasn’t
and we crashed out but Roy was given a free ride because he was only in the job
about a month before the tournament started.
This time it’s all his own work and he has no-one else to blame. The qualification started terribly and we
came to life at the end of it in a very easy group and qualified comfortably
enough.
The squad was announced and it wasn't bad on the face of it. There were a couple of shockers in there like Chris Smalling and Frank Lampard but there were some young players like Barkley, Sterling and Shaw so not bad. He had a team in mind for the first game of the World Cup
and there were vague assurances that he’d pick players in form which we all
knew was rubbish as Rooney was not in form, nor was Welbeck who were both
guaranteed to start. Adam Lallana, who
had had a superb season was pencilled in to start on the right but the press
wanted Raheem Sterling on the back of 15 good games at the end of the
season. Despite getting sent off in the
last warm-up game, Sterling was picked and Lallana was benched instead of
switching to the left and replacing Welbeck.
This was down to Hodgson’s naturally cautious approach. We are the only team who has players who are
‘defensive wingers’. In other words,
wide players who offer next to nothing going forward but are picked because
they work back well, allegedly. We have
James Milner and Danny Welbeck in this role and I guess the theory is that they
cover to compensate that both of our full-backs in Johnson and Baines, cannot
defend. To be fair, only one of them
ever gets picked to start a game and it’s usually Welbeck but by definition, it’s negative.
Liverpool’s fine end of season run had also propelled Jordan
Henderson from being a joke player who can’t control a ball to a starting
defensive midfielder for England, despite the fact that he doesn’t play this
role for Liverpool. We were chronically
short in this area as a natural like Jack Cork was overlooked and aside from
Henderson and the ageing Gerrard (also not a natural in this position) we had
Jack Wilshere who is a) never fit and b) not a natural in this position and
Frank Lampard who is an attacking midfielder who can’t defend and is 35 years
old and his legs have gone. Shocking
squad selection. What a surprise – we
got completely outplayed and overrun in this area and Hodgson did nothing. He didn’t put a 3rd player in
there and he didn’t change the personnel until we were out of the tournament.
Leighton Baines was shocking against Italy but did have the
bottle to bring Luke Shaw in for Uruguay – of course not. Henderson and Gerrard
were woeful against Italy but did he have the bottle to change it for Uruguay –
no. Did we do the same things in the Uruguay game and did we get the same
result – yes of course! Hodgson’s
substitutions were a joke a well as he just put on the players he probably felt
were unlucky to be left out. Against Italy, Barkley was
brought on, Lallana was brought on, Wilshere was brought on like it was pre-planned as they were all unlucky to not be in the starting line up. There were no formation changes, nothing
different was tried. In the Uruguay game
at 2-1 down he took off Henderson and brought on Rickie Lambert... with 4
minutes to go and we went 2 up front... with 4 minutes to go and we were
desperate. The only bit of decisive
management that Hodgson came up with all tournament was to slag off Ross
Barkley for losing the ball too much after an energetic and lively cameo
appearance. Yeah, we can’t have players
who are exciting and make things happen can we?
Much better to have a team of plodders who play it safe. Hodgson conveniently overlooks the fact that
Rooney gives the ball away more than anyone.
We were poor all over the pitch with the attack missing
chances (Sturridge) and giving the ball away constantly (Rooney). The midfield didn’t close down and neither
protected the back for, nor supported the attack and as for the defence. When we coughed up possession then we were
almost always caught in a 4-2-4 formation with no protection for the full backs
and the central midfielders not being able to cover all the ground. Defending is a collective thing and all 4
goals we conceded were shocking. For
Italy’s first we allowed Pirlo to dummy a short corner while we slept and Marchisio
was allowed a free shot. For their
second there was no pressure from Baines or Rooney on Candreva as he crossed it
and neither of the defensive midfielders got out there. Balotelli was allowed
to peel off of Cahill and unimpeded by Johnson, allowed a free header from 5
yards. Uruguay’s first goal was
identical to that one with just a different cast of characters. Cavani crossed under no pressure, Suarez
peeled off of Jagielka and free header.
The second Uruguay goal was straight off of the local park. Big boot from the keeper, flicked on by
Gerrard who took his eye off it, Suarez runs on and scores with no centre back
covering round. Pathetic. We weren’t a team, we weren’t a unit, we
weren’t playing to any plan, we weren’t anything.
We all know that our players are not as good as Sky Sports
Hyperbole channel paints them to be. As
a rule, our players are one trick ponies who can’t adapt to anything but what
they’re used to, be it conditions or positional changes etc. I think we have a right to epect a player to be a bit versatile when he's paid £150k a week or whatever. Where you have players from other countries
who can play right back, central midfield and left wing, we have players who
can’t perform when they’re moved ‘a bit to the left’. Our players don’t appear to be trying or
playing with any urgency and after an hour, many of them look like they’re
blowing out of their backsides. Not fit enough, not prepared enough.
There’s a general attitude problem. From the national anthem to the end of the
game, players from countries such as Chile, Croatia, Brazil, Uruguay to name
but 4, look like they’d be prepared to die for their country and they are
certainly going to put 100% into the 90 minutes that’s in front of them. You get the impression that when their
playing careers are over, they will be in the crowd at future tournaments,
supporting their country because their country is what matters most. Even though many will be earning mega-money
abroad, there’s a real sense of when they pull on their national teams shirt
that they haven’t lost the connection with the man in the street. No matter how well or badly they do, you get
the impression that they want to be able to look the normal supporter in the
eye and at least say “I gave it my all” and sleep at night happy in that
knowledge. Do you get that impression
with any of the England players? They'll sleep at night because they don;t give a stuff - they might think they do but do they really? Maybe
it’s a society problem in England where you can’t be patriotic or thump your
chest in nationalistic pride in case you offend someone. Can you imagine telling a Croatian or a
Chilean that you’re not really allowed to outwardly promote your own nation
when in your own nation as it might offend someone who is not from here
originally? I guess it’s the manager’s
job to inspire the troops – Roy Hodgson.
Yes.
Our players just care about their clubs – witness the
behaviour of Adam Lallana. He went to
the World Cup, probably the only one he’ll ever play in, bleating on about his
move to Liverpool and how much he wanted it.
He even signed a Liverpool shirt for a fan when in Brazil and got caught
on camera saying he hoped it went through.
I hope that his pre-occupation with this lead to him being dropped by
Hodgson but that would imply strong, good management so the chances are that it
was just the media clamour to play Sterling and the conservative desire not to
drop our defensive winger in Welbeck.
A few managerial failures have been sticking their head
above the parapet to have a go including Rent-a-quote Redknapp who did his
usual and threw in an accusation without anything to back it up. Apparently, some players want to get out of
international call-ups but he didn’t say who and he didn’t say when. Even when Steven Gerrard asked him to name
names, he didn’t. The last time Gerrard
and Redknapp were in the same sentence was when Harry said that he’d received a
text for Gerrard saying how he wished he’d got the England job. That turned out to be a big lie as well so I
wouldn’t believe a word that ever comes out of Redknapp’s mouth for this and a
whole host of other reasons.
Then we had dear old Sven who said that if Hodgson was
foreign then he’d have got the sack.
Maybe he would have but one thing is for sure; he’d have got the sack if
he’d a) wasted a golden generation of players, b) openly touted for the Chelsea
job whilst England manager, c) took
turns with his boss to bang his secretary.
Ah Sven – what a genius he was – took the best generation of English
footballers for years and totally wasted it, forcing Paul Scholes to retire in
the process as he had to accommodate all the big names like Beckham, Gerrard
and Lampard.
Under Ericsson we used to be fine against the Croatia’s and
Mexico’s of this world but we would always come up short against anyone from
the traditional top tier of nations.
However, Hodgson’s England could only dream of getting a result against
the Croatia’s and Mexico’s of this world.
Now we’d struggle against Australia and I reckon we’d be deserved
underdogs against the USA. After the
Costa Rica game, Roy did his interview and if he’d come out and said “not good
enough” or “we’ve been shocking” or better still “the players and I have to
have a damn good look at ourselves as the standard of the performances by
England in this tournament have been totally unacceptable”, then it would at least show a recognition of
the problem and a desire to improve.
Instead of that he said, ‘I’m
pleased’. Pleased with what Roy? Pleased with bottom of the group, pleased
with mediocrity – not even mediocrity – pleased with coming last. You can’t fix anything unless you acknowledge
the problem after a failure and that is what this is. A complete abject failure and you, Roy Hodgson
are the main architect of that failure.
You can blame the players that are available to a degree but if you gave
Hodgson James Rodriguez from Colombia – one of the outstanding players from
this World Cup, I guarantee he wouldn’t start him in the 10 role. He’d want Rooney there as he’s undroppable
and now he unmoveable so Rodriguez would be competing with Welbeck for the left
wing spot which he wouldn’t get as he’s not as much of an athlete. My point is that even if he had an
embarrassment of riches, Hodgson would have no idea.
Greg Dyke is the man in control and he could start the ball
rolling on the recovery by getting rid of this abject failure of a manager, one
who settles for mediocrity, has no tactical idea and who fails to get the best
out of a group of players. Before the
dust had even settled though, there was Greg saying that the managers’ job was
safe and therefore condemning us to more of the same in the next tournament in
2 years time. Great, I can’t wait. He then said that the motivation in the squad
would have been better if Prince Harry had addressed the squad first. Unbelievable. Mind you, I’m sure The Ginger Prince could
have given a better motivational speech than Roy Hodgson but then so could
anyone. Cheers Greg, can we have a vote
of no confidence in you?
How many teams in this World Cup do you reckon we could have
beaten in a competitive game? As far as
I’m concerned, the only ones we could have had a shout of beating are South
Korea, Honduras, Cameroon and at a push, Australia. All of these teams in their 3 games showed
more dynamism, will to win and commitment than we did. We’d have been better off not qualifying as
this tournament has been a complete waste of time for us but even then, Hodgson
would probably still be in charge for the next 2 years. How bad does it have to be Mr Dyke before you
realise that it isn’t working? Hodgson
is a monumental failure and he needs to be treated as the monumental failure
that he is and got rid of. We will
qualify for the Euros as it’s practically impossible not to but we haven’t; got
a prayer of doing anything in it if Hodgson is in charge.
Much was made of the fact that we had really low expectation
as a nation in this tournament. So, we
went in the low expectations and after World Cup 2014, we haven’t even come out
with the bare mimimum, which was some hope that the future will be any
better. Personally, I don’t think that’s
acceptable and can’t believe Greg Dyke or anyone else does either. We need a strong manager who is going to make
us over-perform, who is not frightened to drop big names if it’s for the
benefit of the team, who is prepared to tell some players that just because you
earn £200k a week, you’re not the finished article. That man is not Roy Hodgson – get rid of
him. It can’t possibly get any worse.
**** (Insert your own swear word here)
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