World Football Thread XVIII: The Beckham has Landed

[MOBIUS]

"At breakfast, McClaren will become toast."

Quote from the Telegraph...

[MOBIUS]

Actually the entire story is great...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtml?xml=/sport/2007/11/22/sfgeng122.xml

Is it an opportune moment to point out that Wales reached as far in the competition as England?

[Locutus]

Originally posted by OneFootInTheGrave
well since last Euro, we lost precisely twice... once against Brazil in the World Cup 1:0, and 5 days ago against Macedonia in the mud, I guess the seeds must be very close, as if we did not top the group today we would have been in group 3... (so if we lost against England by more than 2:0)...

this way that we beat them we are second (and Germans are in group 3 -- if they won they would top you?!?) so I guess all top 5 teams at least are 1-2 goals away between groups 1-3...

Yeah, the top 7 were all pretty close, but that just proves there's something wrong with the system (yeah, big shocker that one...) There's no way the Netherlands and Croatia should be first and second, or that Germany and France be as low as they are.

Well from group 2 you probably want Sweden, from Group 3???? Spain always had a bad record on major competitions... Group 4, you want to avoid the French of course... and the Poles are very good too... Overall very tough no matter what way you make it, but who gets Austria gets the bonus

Spain may suck at major tournaments but I think I'd take my chances with Romania over them, they (Spain) still have a ****load of world class players. But frankly unless we see some fundamental improvements in the next 8 months I don't think we can beat either If only England had qualified, they would probably have been a tier-3 team and much, much weaker any of the current ones...

Originally posted by Maquiladora
... world class ...

England hasn't been world class since '66. Wait, scratch that, I'm not sure they were ever world class It's just your crazy tabloids that make you feel otherwise...

[Cort Haus]

England's best team was actually in 1970, not '66.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by MOBIUS
Is it an opportune moment to point out that Wales reached as far in the competition as England?

You're just a plastic Welshman though, aren't you? I'm probably more Welsh than you.

Feel free to brag about France's achievements though. It is the country of your birth, after all.

[MOBIUS]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
You're just a plastic Welshman though, aren't you? I'm probably more Welsh than you.

Well I suppose I am only half Welsh, but my name is about as Welsh as you could possibly get and I live here...

Feel free to brag about France's achievements though. It is the country of your birth, after all.

Yeah, but I was only trying to be fair giving you a chance...

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by MOBIUS
Well I suppose I am only half Welsh, but my name is about as Welsh as you could possibly get and I live here...

Fair dinkum. I didn't realise you were half-Welsh. That's a lot more than me. Boyo.

[Maquiladora]

Until people stop using this phrase, whatever it actually means, in connection with England players, delusions will persist.

Until more youngsters are taught the basics of technique and passing & movement, instead of "lumping it up to the big fella", this country will continue to produce insufficiently skillful players to compete at the highest level.

McClaren is far from being a great manager, but there's only so much anyone can do with over-hyped, over-rated and over-paid players. You can't, as they say, polish a turd.

He played a 4-5-1 with Crouch as a lone striker and obviously instructed his players to play the long ball to him for flick ons, which then made it impossible to ever become any kind of attacking 4-3-3, thats not the players fault, they do as they're told. The same players don't lump the ball high the first chance they get for their clubs. Gerrard, Lampard, J. Cole, Barry can all pass and move, but McClaren is the one that tells them to play this way game after game, as one journalist put it, he is "naive, almost neanderthal" in his approach.

Originally posted by Locutus



England hasn't been world class since '66. Wait, scratch that, I'm not sure they were ever world class It's just your crazy tabloids that make you feel otherwise...

I said world class abilities, and you can't argue that Terry, Lampard, Gerrard, Rooney, Owen, Beckham, J.Cole haven't shown world class performances at the highest level for their clubs (Owen mainly for England).

[Krill]

Personally, I'd love to see the tactics left to the players to decide. Give the captain the choice of who plays.

[Locutus]

Terry? Beckham??? Owens??? Please... Gerrard and Rooney the only undisputed world class players England has (although Rooney's a f*cking hooligan, nothing classy about that). Cole's pretty good but I'm not sure I'd call him world class, Lampard and Terry are overrated (and Gerrard and Lampard should never play at the same time anyway), Beckham and Owens waaayyy overrated. Sure, Beckham, Owen and Lampard have a great shot, but a great shot alone hardly makes you a great player...

[Maquiladora]

Originally posted by Locutus
Terry? Beckham??? Owens??? Please... Gerrard and Rooney the only undisputed world class players England has (although Rooney's a f*cking hooligan, nothing classy about that). Cole's pretty good but I'm not sure I'd call him world class, Lampard and Terry are overrated (and Gerrard and Lampard should never play at the same time anyway), Beckham and Owens waaayyy overrated. Sure, Beckham, Owen and Lampard have a great shot, but a great shot alone hardly makes you a great player...

2007 world player shortlist of 30:

Gianluigi Buffon (Italy), Fabio Cannavaro (Italy), Petr Cech (Czech Republic), Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal), Deco (Portugal), Didier Drogba (Ivory Coast), Michael Essien (Ghana), Samuel Eto'o (Cameroon), Gennaro Gattuso (Italy), Steven Gerrard (England), Thierry Henry (France), Juninho (Brazil), Kaka (Brazil), Miroslav Klose (Germany), Philipp Lahm (Germany), Frank Lampard (England), Rafael Marquez (Mexico), Lionel Messi (Argentina), Alessandro Nesta (Italy), Andrea Pirlo (Italy), Franck Ribery (France), Juan Roman Riquelme (Argentina), Ronaldinho (Brazil), Wayne Rooney (England), John Terry (England), Carlos Tevez (Argentina), Lilian Thuram (France), Fernando Torres (Spain), Ruud van Nistelrooy (Netherlands), Patrick Vieira (France)

Beckham* twice runner up (Lampard once) and Owen's record speaks for itself (England: 88app, 40 goals, 0.45, Clubs: 275app, 140 goals, 0.5).

How would you define "world class"?

J. Cole drifts in and out of games mainly due to the roles he's given, but wouldn't bring down any team in the world IM-(and Mourinho's -O.

*Beckham, despite his age (32), is still one of the best crossers/long passers in the world.

[Maquiladora]

2007 Ballon d'Or shortlist:

Eric Abidal (Barcelona), France.
Daniel Alves (Sevilla), Brasil.
David Beckham (LA Galaxy), England.
Dimitar Berbatov (Tottenham), Bulgaria.
Gianluigi Buffon (Juventus), Italy.
Fabio Cannavaro (Real Madrid), Italy.
Iker Casillas (Real Madrid), Spain.
Petr Cech (Chelsea), Czech Republic.
Rogerio Ceni (San Paolo), Brasil.
Cristiano Ronaldo (Manchester United), Portugal.
Deco (Barcelona), Portugal.
Mahamadou Diarra (Real Madrid), Mali.
Diego (Werder Bremen), Brasil.
Didier Drogba (Chelsea), Ivory Coast.
Michael Essien (Chelsea), Ghana.
Samuel Eto’o (Barcelona), Cameroon.
Francesc Fabregas (Arsenal), Spain.
Gennaro Gattuso (Milan), Italy.
Steven Gerrard (Liverpool), England.
Ryan Giggs (Manchester United), Wales.
Thierry Henry (Barcelona), France.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic (Inter), Sweden.
Filippo Inzaghi (Milan), Italy.
Kaka (Milan), Brasil.
Frederic Kanoute (Sevilla), Mali.
Miroslav Klose (Bayern Munich), Germany.
Younis Mahmoud (Algharafa), Iraq.
Paolo Maldini (Milan), Italy.
Florent Malouda (Chelsea), France.
Lionel Andres Messi (Barcelona), Argentina.
Shunsuke Nakamura (Celtic), Japan.
Guillermo Ochoa (America Mexico), Mexico.
Andrea Pirlo (Milan), Italy.
Ricardo Quaresma (Porto), Portugal.
Raul (Real Madrid), Spain.
Franck Ribery (Bayern Munich), France.
Juan Roman Riquelme (Villarreal), Argentina.
Robinho (Real Madrid), Brasil.
Ronaldinho (Barcelona), Brasil.
Wayne Rooney (Manchester United), England.
Paul Scholes (Manchester United), England.
Clarence Seedorf (Milan), Holland.
Carlos Tevez (Manchester United), Argentina.
Luca Toni (Bayern Munich), Italy.
Kolo Toure (Arsenal), Ivory Coast.
Fernando Torres (Liverpool), Spain.
Francesco Totti (Roma), Italy.
Ruud van Nistelrooy (Real Madrid), Holland.
Robin van Persie (Arsenal), Holland.
David Villa (Valencia), Spain.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

just shows how those lists are pointless, they are based on counting the players in the big countries, and than adding somebody from outside who still plays for a big club and that is about it...

smaller leagues and players there are big time underrepresented... on the list, apart from one Mexican, there is noone else from Americas, other than Argentina/Brasil... Just one from Czech Republic (arguably one of the best teams on Europe now), noone from Romania either, noone from Poland, all three teams topping their respective groups (vs teams with all those World Class players listed above ) Modric will only get there if he manages to get on well with whomever buys him (be it Chelsea/whoever) and has a standard first team place for a while, even if he plays crap half of the season like half of the people on the list above... & how on earth are Becham,Giggs,Scholes, Maldini on the list at all, or Thuram and Viera?!? on the list above. Is this a list from 1999?

From England, the only world class can be Gerrard and that on effort alone, the rest is so so, Rooney is too temperamental, inconsistent, Owen hospitalized half of the career, Beckham?!? 5-6 years ago, yes... and he is the only English player who knew how to play since Gazza (who was crazy anyhow)...

England has good enough players, but they need to get down from the high horse, and as Keane said: too many egos in there... and if on top of it you add all this negative pressure... no wander that there is no success for over 40 years.

The best is how the English are slaging Erickson and he made the best out of them possible, just lost by 1 goal difference vs Brazil in the World Cup, and out on penalties twice (is he to blame for the fact that when an English player gets out to shoot the penalty he knows that the whole country will be cursing him for the rest of his life for missing... sure one (or more) of 5 will succumb to this pressure)... that is only a part of the point...

fact is that the English are the most unrealistic of all, and if you add the ignorance on top... instead of the team who works hard together you get a bunch of individuals who just try to play together, but there is no coherence or team... the lists such as above just perpetuate the myth, that the players should be doing better, while in fact you should be rejoicing just as the Scotts would (and we do) when you qualify at all. In the end for you it always goes down to the last game, while luck serves you well most of the time, but I guess a bit of that luck run out on Wednesday night...

edit: hopefully can be read a bit easier now

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Locutus
Terry? Beckham??? Owens??? Please... Gerrard and Rooney the only undisputed world class players England has (although Rooney's a f*cking hooligan, nothing classy about that). Cole's pretty good but I'm not sure I'd call him world class, Lampard and Terry are overrated (and Gerrard and Lampard should never play at the same time anyway), Beckham and Owens waaayyy overrated. Sure, Beckham, Owen and Lampard have a great shot, but a great shot alone hardly makes you a great player...

I think I'd agree with most of that, except for the "Cole .... not sure I'd call him world class". That should read "*No way* is he world class." To consider him as such demonstrates the levels of delusion at play when over-rating English players.

Beckham is a one-trick pony now performing in a US circus. Owen is a great goal-scorer for England, but doesn't have a fraction of the skill of someone like van Persie or Berbatov, let alone Henry or Tevez.

Even Gerrard, big-hearted match-winner though he is, is nowhere near the quality of someone like Messi or fake Ronaldo.

As for Lumpard, the insane flukery of all the deflected goals he got for Chelsea grossly distorts his abilities.

[Thedrin]

Venables for Ireland

I think I'd hve to choose O'Neill for England (though I'm not sure he wants the position). I'm not basing this on much facts, but I've always had the impression that he sees through media hype and that's what England needs more than anything. Allardyce or Redknapp would be my second choices.