Grounded Wingman

If Shearer's expert analysis on Match Of The Day is anything to go by then he will be a useless manager. After Chelsea drew 4-4 with Aston Villa he pointed out that a lack of a target man had been a problem for Chelsea, but that Carew had played well as a target man and created goals for Villa. Completely ignoring the fact that Chelsea still managed to score 4 goals without a target man, so it was hardly goalscoring that was a problem for them that day. Fat Sam's days were numbered because he was not a Mike Ashley appointment, and I doubt that Ashley would accept underachievment for too long when it was his money being spent but not his own man in charge. £18m odd for Alan Smith, Joey Barton and Jose Enrique was not exactly great business, but Allardyce did do okay at the cheap end of the market with Faye, Beye and Viduka.

Today's hugely exciting rumour is that Paul Lambert, who is currently managing Wycombe (and who failed spectacularly at Livingston) may be in the frame for the Scotland job.

Stevie Nicol is a great shout actually. McAllister has ruled himself out. He says if he gets back into football it would have to be day to day involvement. But while we are shouting out stupid pedictions: LUGGY STURROCK FOR SCOTLAND MANAGER!!!!

The SFA can't offer the same kind of money that the Premiership can. It is almost a year until Scotland have another competitive game and, for any manager, let alone a relatively young one who's stock is high, it would be almost unbearable spending a year watching players and not doing any coaching. The problem with giving the jobs to the likes of Davies or McAllister (or Levein or John Collins) is that they could do well and, if they do, then they'll no doubt be tempted to leave for a better job with more money. I don't think that Souness would be that bad of an appointment, if we don't manage to attract Mourinho, Capello or Sir Alex Ferguson. I've also heard people mention Steve Clarke from Chelsea as an outside candidate, but he's bound to be on funny money.

How many international caps do you have btw?

British players are not tactically adept enough, and the majority of them do not have the vision and the ability to improvise that players from a lot of other countries have. In fact probably only Joe Cole and Rooney have it for England, McFadden for Scotland.

Croatia have qualified, so if England can't get a point at Wembley against a team with nothing to play for then they don't deserve to go through.

What has Beckham ever done for England that didn't involve taking a free kick? He scored a last minute goal which got you out of jail after the team put in a dreadful performance against Greece. A 2-2 draw against Greece is hardly the stuff of legend anyway. If he's the 2nd best right midfielder that England have ever had then England have obviously never had any decent right midfielders. His form for Madrid at the end of last season was good, granted, helped by the fact that Ruud Van Nistelrooy is awesome and Barcelona lost Eto'o. 1 trophy in 4 years in Spain is not so good. As for the Man Utd youngsters. Yes, he was better than Nicky Butt and Phil Neville. Paul Scholes is a far superior player (and basing anything on England performances where Beckham has achieved next to nothing, bar that free kick against Greece, is daft. But if you want to the I'd suggest Scholes's 2 goals in the 2-0 playoff win vs Scotland were at least as important, in a game you won, and away from home as well). I despise Gary Neville, but he is a far better right back than Beckham is a right midfielder and, if you include Giggs (which I wouldn't) then he shits on all of them anyway. Long passing, crossing and free kicks is Beckham - he can't beat a man, has no tactical discipline and his creativity is lacking. The only thing of vision he ever did was that goal against Wimbledon, which was admittedly the best goal in Premier League history. Compare him to Zola or Figo (both who can take free kicks and cross well) and he is found wanting.

When all is said and done David Beckham will be remembered as the most high profile (but nowhere near the best) of the outstanding batch of kids that Alex Ferguson brought through in the early 90's. A player who introduced himself to the footballing public by scoring from the halfway line against Wimbledon, who got sent of for kicking an Argentinian in 1998 and who scored a free kick in injury time againt Greece so England qualified for. He is lauded as a style icon because his wife dresses him and because he cannot be lauded for his football abilities. He can hit a mean cross (just don't expect him to go past his man before he does it) and take a good free kick (but he's not the only player who's ever done that) and he runs about like a dafty. He was too petulant to properly play in his best position (right midfield) and ended up screwing up the tactics of the teams he played for by always coming inside because he wanted to play as a centre midfielder (which he wasn't good enough to do). He is a pretty boy poser with a talentless wife. As a footballer he will be remembered as, at best, marginally better than good but with very little natural ability. Natural ability is not his only barrier to greatness though. Take someone like his former Man Utd colleague Roy Keane. Keane will arguably go down as a great, not because of his natural ability, but because of his work ethic (which Beckham has) and his winning attitude and ability to drag his team up by the bootlaces when the chips are down (which Beckham doesn't have). Beckham has not wasted his potential - he has been marketed to more than maximise the limited potential he has, but his football career will be a footnote when they talk about the style icon who married a Spice Girl and got paid an inordinate amount of money to be a good footballer in a piss poor league. Fair play to him - I wish I had his money, but at least I am a more talented footballer than he is.

Eriksson had limitations when he was England manager. Sure, he had good players, but it's not as if he could go out and buy someone. He shoe-horned the best eleven players into the England team (much like McLaren did before Israel) and recent games have proven that the best eleven players do not necessarily make the best team. Man City will finish upper mid table - they will likely never finish any higher than 5th in Eriksson's tenure. Whether that's enough with all the money they have, and will, invest is a different matter. Oh, and it should be added that Martin O' Neill isn't turning out to be the messiah that some people thought either.

It'll be interesting to see if McLaren has the stones to keep the same team once Neville, Hargreaves, Lampard, Beckham and Rooney are back. I think he should. I though Heskey was excellent - so much better as a target man than Crouch, and significantly better in the air.

I can only hope that the lucky Tartan Army foot soldiers who are in Paris will strike up many a chorus of "Can we play you every week" tonight.