By 1970’s Gooner
It was a pathetic performance by England.
Pathetic from the coach in selecting the wrong formation and the wrong keeper.
Pathetic from the players who played like a bunch of schoolboys.
And pathetic from the football authorities in destroying Wembley’s turf by greedily staging an NFL game there only recently.
Mclaren got the formation wrong by playing a 4 3 3 system. He tried to pack the central midfield positions with three players in Gerrard, Lampard and Barry.
But this meant that Crouch was often isolated up front with no one there to feed off his headers. What is the point in playing Crouch without giving him some support?
McLaren’s biggest boob was to drop Robinson and give the young and inexperienced, at this level, Carson a starting place.
In such a decisive and crucial massive game! He bottled it of course with that blunder, as Bob Wilson feared he would in his Daily Telegraph piece yesterday.
Hell, even Almunia would not have conceded that first goal and I think he would have kept Croatia’s third out.
May be the next England manger should look Almunia’s way for his next international call up. No I am serious!
The midfielders couldn’t put two passes together and none of them could go forward to assist Crouch. All the players in general bottled it on the night and looked way below in the quality stakes compared to their opponents.
But the truth is Croatia did not perform at that high a quality level anyway.
Yes they were intelligent, efficient and executed a sensible game plan but they did not play fantastic football. They didn’t have to of course.
They are a good footballing side with skillful players. But the truth is that there are a lot of national teams like Croatia out there.
Now if Arsenal were England’s opponents last night the massive difference in quality between the so called superstars of the Premier League and Wenger’s young kids would have been there for everyone to see.
Judging by the way England performed Arsenal would have scored a lot more goals against them.
The passing and movement of the Arsenal players would have run rings around Gerrard and Lampard and Barry and the difference in class would have been more apparent and even more embarrassing. Yes it was that bad!
Can you imagine Fabregas orchestrating play form that central midfield position and even venturing forward to give support to the front strikers.
Hleb and Rosicky would have run rings round the inept Bridge and Adebayor and Van Persie would have dragged the ageing Campell and the inexperienced Lescott into all sorts of avenues.
And in the end they would have scored more goals like Croatia’s second.
Fantasy League Prediction: England 0 Arsenal 3
Arsenal’s "Totaalvoetbal" a First in the Premiership. Wenger and Michels, Hleb and Cruyff
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5 comments:
"And pathetic from the football authorities in destroying Wembley’s turf by greedily staging an NFL game there only recently."
Not true. The pitsh weas always bad. Remember the Brazil match?
Arsenal 3 England 0?????? Gerrrrooffffffff mate. That would have been after 25 minutes. At the end of 90 minutes the score would have been 7-0. And Arsenal would have been their usual profligate selves.....wasting around 8 to 10 chances in front of goal. Imagine if they went all in.
An absolute disgrace from England, first half good start soon enough inexperienced keeper makes a blunder. Few minutes later defence is left watching Croats put the ball in the empty net. I'm sorry England did not deserve to go through, Stevie should never played this formation and use his more experienced players like Beckham who would feed those crosses in for Crouch.
Crotia didnt have to play nice fancy footie, the wanted to make a historic win at the new Wembley and so they did.
Lesson to be learnt here stop blaming Arsenal for having too many foregin players, start looking at the inside first, hiring a head coach that has international experience and certainly he doesnt have to be english!
Any team built around Gerrard is crap. Yes Poo have done alright in the cups, but the league? The best was 2pts off, their worst, 43pts. Against Greece in 2001, Gerrard was called the Invisible Man before Beckham (who produced one of the greatest solo efforts of all time) rescued the day.
Great players impose their style of play, Pele, Zidane, Bergkamp, Roy Keane, Beckham, Kewell for Australia, Ronaldinho, Figo etc etc all the way to Cesc and Ronaldo. They dictate tempo and passing style, they orchestrate players around them. Gerrard and Lampard are water carriers who occassionally peak. Its the guts that win it - think Deschamps and Zidane etc, Vieira & Edu to some extent. Its won there, and England would be better off with Nolan, a high tempo box to box player than a water boy like Gerrard and Lampard.
Bergs
Nigtmare Wednesday. To add salt t ry, Lamlard was named MOTM!
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