The England thread

[Jimmy]

Of our ten? That's cool. Pass all the judgement you like.

[Lineker]

Ashley Cole is a doubt with a rib injury - he's due to have a scan early in the week.

[Adam]

Harry Redknapp claims not to be bitter in extremely bitter rant about not getting the England job:

Harry Redknapp: FA bosses 'do not have a clue'

Harry Redknapp says that Football Association senior officials do not have the knowledge required to choose the best England manager.

The QPR boss was overlooked for the role when Roy Hodgson succeeded former coach Fabio Capello in May 2012.

"I wouldn't trust the FA to show me a good manager if their lives depended on it," he wrote in his autobiography, serialised in the Daily Mail.

Redknapp, 66, says he holds no grudge against Hodgson after the decision.

But he insists he was the leading choice with England fans and players, claiming senior players texted him to offer him their support.

"This isn't about them giving the England job to me or Roy Hodgson, but English football being run by people who really haven't got a clue - and they get to pick the England manager," he said.

"Everyone said I was the people's choice, the only choice. All the senior players seemed to be up for me to get the job.

"I got quite a few text messages at the time from players saying they would love me to manage England: Steven Gerrard, Wayne Rooney, Rio Ferdinand, John Terry.

"But the FA went for Roy Hodgson to be the England manager - a man who is more their cup of tea."

Redknapp, who was manager of Tottenham when the decision was made, said he wanted Liverpool boss Brendan Rodgers - then with Swansea City - to be his assistant.

"My thinking on Brendan was this: if he can do it with players from the lower leagues at Swansea what can he do with Rio and Terry or Rooney and Gerrard?" he added.

"So when Tottenham played Swansea on 1 April, 2012 I pulled Brendan after the game and said that if all the speculation about me and England was true would he consider coming to the European Championships in the summer as my part-time coach?

"I told him I wanted England to play with as much technical ambition as Swansea. He was up for it.

"Some Tottenham fans might think I was distracted from my club job, but I can assure you the conversation took five minutes. And we beat Swansea 3-1 that day."

Redknapp's side won just twice in 10 matches following Capello's resignation as Spurs failed to qualify for the Champions League.

He was sacked in June 2012 before taking over at QPR the following November.

I especially like how he states this view has nothing to do with him being overlooked for Hodgson, before he goes on to talk about how he should've been given it because the players and fans wanted him, including his mates Rio and Gerrard etc. Wrapping it all up by calling Roy "more their cup of tea".

It just reminded me how happy I was when he didn't get it. That would've been a nightmare.

[Colly]

He was the peoples choice! Apart from all the people I know.

[Lineker]

Yep, confirmed. Cole is out of the England game. Kieran Gibbs has been called up as a replacement.

[METALMAN]

Well of course I'm not going to speak for other Spurs fans, they're entitled to their own opinions.

Christ, walking away from this shit.

I think we should continue this argument. I was enjoying it.

And if you walk away, there won't be any Spurs fans left. :/

[Rafael]

England is shit. Period. Why discuss that?

[Starvinho]

Because we're gonna win the World Cup!

[The Lusophone]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/24455721

List of players Jack Wilshire believes should never have played for England:

Owen Hargreaves

Leroy Lita

Fabrice Muamba

Matt Le Tissier

Wilfred Zaha

John Barnes

Luther Blissett

Raheem Sterling

Graham Le Saux

Shola Amoebi

Victor Moses

Nedum Onuoha

Terry Butcher

Jlloyd Samuel

[Walker]

"We are English. We tackle hard, are tough on the pitch and are hard to beat.

"We have great characters. You think of Spain and you think technical but you think of England and you think they are brave and they tackle hard. We have to remember that.

Lol.

[Nerf]

Jack Wilshere in being a cunt shocker.

[MDK]

I lol'd something fierce this morning when I read that

[Matt]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/24455721

List of players Jack Wilshire believes should never have played for England:

Leroy Lita

Fabrice Muamba

Wilfred Zaha

Raheem Sterling

Shola Amoebi

Nedum Onuoha

Jlloyd Samuel

To be fair you can't argue with those. They shouldn't have played for England.

And to be fair its a different kettle of fish to the situation with Ziggyzag (I don't know or care what his actual name is), because he's blatantly not English in any way shape or form.

[Nerf]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/24455721

List of players Jack Wilshire believes should never have played for England:

Leroy Lita

Fabrice Muamba

Wilfred Zaha

Raheem Sterling

Shola Amoebi

Nedum Onuoha

Jlloyd Samuel

To be fair you can't argue with those. They shouldn't have played for England.

And to be fair its a different kettle of fish to the situation with Ziggyzag (I don't know or care what his actual name is), because he's blatantly not English in any way shape or form.

Sterling shouldn't have played for England? He's lived here since he was 5...

[Matt]

It was a joke about them not deserving caps.

[stokeriño]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/24455721

List of players Jack Wilshire believes should never have played for England:

Victor Moses

Guess it's a good thing he told the senior team to fuck off then, eh Jackie boy.

[brenchill]

Harry Redknapp claims not to be bitter in extremely bitter rant about not getting the England job:

Harry Redknapp: FA bosses 'do not have a clue'

Harry Redknapp says that Football Association senior officials do not have the knowledge required to choose the best England manager.

The QPR boss was overlooked for the role when Roy Hodgson succeeded former coach Fabio Capello in May 2012.

"I wouldn't trust the FA to show me a good manager if their lives depended on it," he wrote in his autobiography, serialised in the Daily Mail.

Redknapp, 66, says he holds no grudge against Hodgson after the decision.

But he insists he was the leading choice with England fans and players, claiming senior players texted him to offer him their support.

"This isn't about them giving the England job to me or Roy Hodgson, but English football being run by people who really haven't got a clue - and they get to pick the England manager," he said.

"Everyone said I was the people's choice, the only choice. All the senior players seemed to be up for me to get the job.

"I got quite a few text messages at the time from players saying they would love me to manage England: Steven Gerrard, Wayne Rooney, Rio Ferdinand, John Terry.

"But the FA went for Roy Hodgson to be the England manager - a man who is more their cup of tea."

Redknapp, who was manager of Tottenham when the decision was made, said he wanted Liverpool boss Brendan Rodgers - then with Swansea City - to be his assistant.

"My thinking on Brendan was this: if he can do it with players from the lower leagues at Swansea what can he do with Rio and Terry or Rooney and Gerrard?" he added.

"So when Tottenham played Swansea on 1 April, 2012 I pulled Brendan after the game and said that if all the speculation about me and England was true would he consider coming to the European Championships in the summer as my part-time coach?

"I told him I wanted England to play with as much technical ambition as Swansea. He was up for it.

"Some Tottenham fans might think I was distracted from my club job, but I can assure you the conversation took five minutes. And we beat Swansea 3-1 that day."

Redknapp's side won just twice in 10 matches following Capello's resignation as Spurs failed to qualify for the Champions League.

He was sacked in June 2012 before taking over at QPR the following November.

I especially like how he states this view has nothing to do with him being overlooked for Hodgson, before he goes on to talk about how he should've been given it because the players and fans wanted him, including his mates Rio and Gerrard etc. Wrapping it all up by calling Roy "more their cup of tea".

It just reminded me how happy I was when he didn't get it. That would've been a nightmare.

Because bringing in Brendan Rodgers as your assistant manager would instantly erase everything the senior England footballers had been taught from the age of 10 and get them playing pretty, passy passy football.

[brenchill]

Wilshere, who earlier this week insisted he is not a smoker despite being pictured with a cigarette outside a nightclub, added in the earlier interview: "We have to remember what we are.

"We are English. We tackle hard, are tough on the pitch and are hard to beat."

We aren't that hard to beat...

[Starvinho]

Wilshere, who earlier this week insisted he is not a smoker despite being pictured with a cigarette outside a nightclub, added in the earlier interview: "We have to remember what we are.

"We are English. We tackle hard, are tough on the pitch and are hard to beat."

We aren't that hard to beat...

We don't actually lose many games to be honest...

[therockbox]

"We are English. We tackle hard, are tough on the pitch and are hard to beat.

"We have great characters. You think of Spain and you think technical but you think of England and you think they are brave and they tackle hard. We have to remember that.

Lol.

It's an attitude shared by a lot of English fans/journalists/coaches and it's a massive problem. Xabi Alonso summed it up years ago:

There is a pause as Alonso reaches, again, the crux of the issue. A single English word he returns to that, unpacked, analysed and investigated, explains much. "I don't think tackling is a quality," he says. "It is a recurso, something you have to resort to, not a characteristic of your game. At Liverpool I used to read the matchday programme and you'd read an interview with a lad from the youth team. They'd ask: age, heroes, strong points, etc. He'd reply: 'Shooting and tackling'. I can't get into my head that football development would educate tackling as a quality, something to learn, to teach, a characteristic of your play. How can that be a way of seeing the game? I just don't understand football in those terms. Tackling is a [last] resort, and you will need it, but it isn't a quality to aspire to, a definition. It's hard to change because it's so rooted in the English football culture, but I don't understand it."

But I suppose thundering into a 50/50 is all we have, really.