Not Good Enough

I had decent hopes for England in the 2010 World Cup. Don't get me wrong, at no point did I think we could win the tournament - eventually we would play, and be beaten by, a far better side. However, last 8 was possible and if we played to our maximum and the draw was kind, then last 4 could happen - that would be a wonderful achievement and a wonderful summer. In fact, my prediction spreadsheet (which I filled in as honestly as I could) had us knocked out by Brazil in the semi-finals.

I watched the draw with the USA last Saturday and thought we looked rusty but we were the better side, had more possession and more chances - Tim Howard was man of the match for a reason. A point was far from a disaster against a more than decent side, and I fully expected us to take control of the group with a 2-0 win over Algeria, not because I'm arrogant, but because we have some very good players and a very good manager. How wrong was I...

Last night was embarrassing. Not just the fact we drew, but the fact there was no fight, no passion, we lost every 50-50, players looked tired/unfit, and Algeria probably deserved to win the game. Make no mistake, that is as bad as I've seen England play for an extremely long time. I can't remember the players stringing more than 4 or 5 passes together all night, there was no movement off the ball, we looked slow, lacking ideas and the whole thing looked disjointed.

I've always had huge respect for Capello - he's achieved a lot in club football and obviously I was hugely grateful for what he did when taking the England job...back to basics, making the players remember who the boss was (unlike McClaren who was overshadowed by "JT and the crew"), what the shirt meant, got the belief back, got us looking solid, scoring goals and winning games. Yet in the past week he has made some really strange decisions.

1. Starting with Robert Green in goal, who was most peoples least favoured goalkeeper of the 3 selected in the squad. As I quoted on my Facebook page last week, BBC revealed OPTA stats has Green down as making more mistakes leading to goals then any other Premier League player last season.
2. Starting James Milner when he was clearly not even 50% fit after the flu.
3. Bringing on Wright-Phillips instead of Joe Cole for Milner

That was just the USA game, but last night I became far more concerned. None of the team were playing well, but on the 4 occasions Aaron Lennon had the ball in attacking positions he played 4 decent balls in to the box. So why the hell was he withdrawn for a player who is slower, has poorer delivery and is unable to get in to Manchester City's starting XI? Why was he telling Gerrard to drift in to centre midfield, leaving Ashley Cole to defend the whole of the left side? Why were the players not pressing? Why was Rooney kept on the pitch when he clearly wasn't right after 45 minutes, displaying the first touch I display in a Sunday League game after 10 pints on the Saturday night? Why did he bring Joe Cole to the World Cup if he cannot get on the pitch when we're that bad, clearly crying out for a spark? Why is our only tactic to lump a long ball up to Heskey/Crouch?

I'm losing my faith very quickly...it's easy to call me fickle but as I've already mentioned, last night was the worst I've seen the team play for years, including McClaren's reign. I watched the game with a group of mates and we all said the feeling afterwards was like Euro 2000, when we were so bad that we weren't even that bothered when Romania beat us to stop us getting out of our group, because we knew that scraping through would have meant a better side giving us a battering. If we do sneak past Slovenia (and it's a big IF), surely Serbia/Germany/Ghana will hammer this England side? I'm not sure I can handle that.

I'll save my final point for Wayne Rooney - he was England's worst player last night and must be carrying some sort of illness or injury to play that poorly. Aside from that, his comments to the cameras at the end of the game as he trudged off the pitch were a disgrace. They were along the lines of "Nice to see your home fans boo you. That's what loyal support is". I'm sorry? Loyal support is saving your hard earned money for years to afford a flight to South Africa, a ticket to an England game, so you can see your heroes represent your country, and cheering them for 90 minutes. Last night every player wearing the 3 lions was awful, but the fans supported them throughout, singing the anthem and drowning out all other noise, including the vuvuzela. At the final whistle, I feel the fans who paid their money have every right to boo that performance, and for Wayne Rooney to say what he said is unbelievable. He earns more in one week at Manchester United then many of those loyal fans will earn in 10 years, and he should never ever forget that. He always seemed fairly grounded despite his success, but he went down in my estimation last night.

Anyway, I've ranted enough. I hope from reading this you get a feel for how much this means to me. I was so excited about this World Cup - I really thought we could make an impact and give our country a summer to remember, but my bubble has been well and truly burst. I will of course be supporting the team on Wednesday, along with 100,000 other fans watching the game on the big screens at the Glastonbury Pyramid Stage, even though I have little hope of it getting much better.

But despite everything I've written, I do still have a "little hope", and that will never leave me. It's time for Fabio Capello to earn the £6 million he'll earn this year, and it's time for these England player to earn our respect back.

Cheers,
AM