English Failure, English Pride

You do not have to be a genius to work out the fate of Steve McClaren. Either he falls on his sword or the blade gets plunged between his shoulder blades by Football Association chief executive Brian Barwick.

With the World Cup finals qualifying draw scheduled for Friday in South Africa, it is inconceivable that the disgraced England manager will be on a plane out of Heathrow to attend the function.

The buck will stop with McClaren and rightly so – although Barwick and FA chairman Geoff Thompson ought to avoid looking in mirrors for a few days because close self-introspection might not be wise for them in the current climate.

The ramifications will be acted out in the corridors of power at Soho Square, but there are far wider implications for English football. Perhaps the shocking debacle at Wembley Stadium against Croatia – a 3-2 loss that kept England out of next year's European Championship finals – will be the reality check that we have been in desperate need of for some time.

When Wayne Rooney, Rio Ferdinand, Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard and Co. are on their sun beds this summer, instead of the pitch at Euro 2008, maybe they will have time to reflect on the fact that the much-vaunted Premier League is nowhere near as good as the English actually think it is.

Reputations have been damaged across the board by the Croats, who were smarter and technically superior and showed a far greater determination to win a game they did not need. There is some genuine doubt as to whether some of those reputations can be salvaged.

Because, quite simply, England was gifted a chance to qualify for next summer's European Championships on a plate by Israel last Saturday, and instead of its big-name players grasping the opportunity with a ruthless flourish, they froze with fear.

None more so than Gerrard, the England captain, who has so often carried his beloved Liverpool on his broad shoulders but was left floundering in the Wembley mud, unable to have any influence on a game of such magnitude.

Ditto with Lampard, who, apart from converting a fortunate penalty kick for England's first goal Wednesday, was incapable of rising to the occasion despite being given the formation that allows him such freedom with Chelsea.

Is this duo really one of the best midfield pairings you could wish for in European football? Or are they simply an overhyped combo that has made us lose all perspective on the real levels of quality in our domestic game.

David Beckham was made to wait until halftime to win his 99th cap and dramatically supplied the cross from which Peter Crouch gave the nation renewed hope. But, surely, that is the end of his England career – despite his claims last week that he still wants to carry on for the World Cup finals in more than two years' time.

Without Rooney, Ferdinand and John Terry, who cut wretched figures as they squirmed in the stands, England was shorn of the three players who conceivably could claim to be good enough to start for any other world team. Michael Owen, the fourth name on that list of absent world stars, also belongs in that category.

Their reputations won't be damaged too much, but the same cannot be said of Scott Carson. The unfortunate goalkeeper set the tone for the evening of disappointment with a dreadful error after only eight minutes to allow Croatia to take a 1-0 lead.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but McClaren never should have decided to blood the 22-year-old in such a tension-ridden fixture. The manager has to accept the blame on this one.

By all means, drop Paul Robinson. But David James should have been the choice in goal, not Carson. The vitriol that will be poured in the direction of the youngster could do irreparable damage for the remainder of his career.

Very few players, ironically apart from Peter Crouch, who so often has been the whipping boy, emerged with their reputations intact, and that is a damning evaluation in itself.

Flawed tactics, an arrogance beyond belief and a total lack of moral fiber were contributory factors in the shambles at the new stadium, and some even had the temerity to suggest the Oct. 28 NFL game did so much damage to the playing surface that it had an effect, too.

That type of blinkered attitude and refusal to accept any portion of the blame for errors made in the past has prevented England from adding to its one major tournament win 41 years ago, the 1966 World Cup.

Maybe now, at long last, it is time for that attitude to change and to realize there is something inherently wrong with our game, even though Sky TV insists ad nauseam that the Premiership is, by head and shoulders, the world's best football league.

Perhaps a summer of inactivity might just be the catalyst finally to end the rhetoric and actually see the FA and English football do something about it. Otherwise, we could be waiting another 41 years.

Foreign Quota in the English Premier League

It is quite amazing the way Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini have come up with things they believe will make the beautiful game of football better. In its reality, the things they have come up would most likely be detrimental if implemented and agreed upon by the rest of the footballing world. First is blatter's idea on a foreign quota that allows atleast 5 home grown players on any starting line-up. As an adept follower of the English premier league, I would like to look at the effect of this on the league. The best players in the world(in terms of creativity and how much fun they are to watch) are from south america, AFRICA, southern europe. Of these three areas, only southern europe housing the likes of spain and portugal have likely capabilites as the English premier league. When fans turn to watch the beautiful game, they want to see football being played in a beautiful manner. Watching most english player based team in the premier league, you will die of boredom as they just quick the ball up high and hope to fondle the ball into the net-the likes of bolton, westham, chelsea and tottenham, derby and so on. Introducing foreign players to the league has made the league the most watched and investment drawing league in the world. For example, "Allow me to draw a comparison between two teams; Arsenal and Tottenham. Not more than eleven years ago these were two clubs of the same size (Tottenham perhaps bigger) with pretty much the same level of success and size of fanbases. One club decides it cannot and will not afford self-indulgent, overrated, playboyish and exuberantly over-priced English players who are so over-priced because they have one or two caps for a second tier footballing nation. Instead they chose to unearth some of the biggest talents in world football at a very low cost but high reward for the viewing public. This club, predominantly through its transfer policy, is now a hugely successful and financially stable entity with a brand new stadium- paid for with the board and the manager's shrewdness- and has billionaires falling over eachother to buy into it, which the club doesn't need. The other club however is languishing, being dragged down slowly by mediocre English players on staggering salaries and more often than not coming off the back of huge transfers (Bent, Jenas, Dawson, Lennon, Robinson, Defoe.)".
Secondly, is the issue of cup winners getting to the champions league, when slavia prague plays rosenborg, how many people turn up to watch this game compared to AC Milan playing Barcelona?My case is closed on this one.

The Emergence of Fluid Arsenal(Part 3)-Passing the litmus test

There has been much talk about how Arsenal has performed this season. Many though question how they will perform when they face stronger opposition like the "Big 4", believing they will crumble in the event of a loss. With this in mind, we head to the biggest week of the year where Arsenal face Liverpool and Manchester United and also face Sheffield united in the Carling cup in between these two games.
The Liverpool game came on Sunday midday and all the fiery power expected in the game was put to extinction when Liverpool showed up with a defensive formation with Xabi Alonso and Javier Mascherano. That Xabi and jAVIER have never played together in the same game because of their defensive likabilities, showed their intention to defend.
Even though all of us at the Emirates Stadium would have hoped this would be a feast of football with goals and thrilling play from the off, reality got into the way of fantasy in an opening half that failed to live up to expectations.As it turned out, the key man for Liverpool in the first half was Steven Gerrard as he did his best to chop down Arsenal's attacking intent at its heart, with Cesc Fabregas struggling to find the space he thrives in. Liverpool players went flying into tackles as there were about 9 sliding tackles in the 1st half of the game, this made chances few and far in between as arsenal were caged and Liverpool had little attacking ambition. At the end of the day, the game ended in a draw as arsenal grew in power in the second half as they were beginning to find more space as Liverpool grew tired. The goal to pull arsenal back was a well defined move, lovely placed on a platter by hleb for fabregas who had made a full field run to collect the well executed chip, that tore the Liverpool defence apart and poked past an hapless Reina. At the end, the result could have been said as fair but arsenal fans felt they could have gone home with the 3 full points. They left Anfield unscathed.
Next is a trip to Bramall Lane. Wenger is going to once again put his faith in a youthful side bearing the likes Denilson, Diarra, Fabianksi and giving debuts to lansbury,merida, gavin hoyte and Gibson. With the manager's confidence and their determination to impress and youthful desire, they tore Sheffield united apart scoring goals just when they are needed-As Sheffield was matching them in play. The first goal was a well taken scorcher to the top corner by Eduardo after good play by Eduardo. Seeing that goal reminded me that In Eduardo, we have a new breed of a striker who is a typical goal poacher, something we have not had in while. Ingenuity and a eye for a killer pass brought about the second. This goal just exemplified what Arsene was trying to teach at the club as ability to produce entertaining football was been thought at all age levels. The third was just a quick reminder that a new cesc was likely in the waiting, something the professor likes to do-creating a new player from an older generation. The game was a whole was satisfactory to the eye and gave lots of hope for the future.
Though, the real litmus test was not performed until early Saturday morning, the tension leading up to the game was quite impressive.