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yep, last night was a shock, i've not seen an england team freeze like that since the '94 qualifying campaign.

I agree with you that there is obviously a battle of wills in the camp, you could see that in microcosm when James snapped at Cole when he shouted at him to pass it short - James wanted to put it 'in the mixer' and damm what Capello says.

It's not the manager's fault - if you hire someone from the 'jungle fighting' school, he produces a team of jungle fighters, if you hire a union breaker, he'll break the union. We all perceived the problem as players who played their own game, who wouldn't bow to an overall system (anyone who has had TQM introduced to their workplace knows how they are feeling).

Capello brought discipline, introduced a system (4-4-2) and it was successful, but it required some players to fit themselves into the system rather than play their own game. Now they've been together, sitting around playing darts for 2 weeks, the revolt is starting to brew.

Gerard is captain and he is one of the main offenders. Rooney is the star player, and he has lost his love for the national team - is it any surprise the way the stultifyingly ill-informed and fickle fans behave? How can we demand the players are facistically proud of the shirt, while we reserve the right to be so disloyal?

Having said that, of course you're right, criticising the fans is an 'i want my life back' style blunder that players and managers are paid big bucks not to make.

Next week is interesting - will capello bend? i think he will, but i hope he won't, then we can draw with slovenia, and bow out of a tournament that behind our backs, is shaping up to be on of the best in decades.

Paul

You have well and truly shown that you know which way up a soccer ball goes, and asserted at least your keyboard macho credientials.

Now, do you have anything to tell the people about the humungous EU/India Free Trade Agreement that is being rushed through (while everyone is watching World Cup?) that will allow Indian and other transnational corporations to bring in shedloads of cheap Indian labour, across all sectors, putting UK people now and for generations to come, out of work?? or is it really less important?

While Indian people rage against the effects there, this remains completely unreported here.

Apart from the effects on lives, the effects of this at the leve of the national economy, include - and in contrast with budget cuts:

- avoidance of NI and tax by workers and companies for workers and employers instead of NI and tax payments into Treasury coffers when UK workers are employed
- earnings repatriated or even paid out overseas insted of paid to UK workers and spent and circulated here
- a rapidly increasing welfare bill here, as workers are displaced
by migrant worekrs brought in , whereby big outsourcing companies are the biggest winners
- the generational effects as the measures allowing this are set in stone for the future

Too hard??? Back to the pitch, and the armchair football???

Come on - lay off the England football players and YOU do what you are paid for.

For England (and the rest of UK)

'What is wrong with England is, as always, self-belief.'

If the England team don't go into a match with Algeria with the self-belief that they can roll them over then perhaps they should pack their bags now.

The team seem unable to keep possession, perhaps the players feel more comfortable fighting for the ball rather than just keeping it.

Tactically I would have started with Heskey and Crouch, Capellos' idea of not announcing the team until just before kick-off would have surprised the opposition who, given all the hype about him, would be expecting Rooney.

Rooney and Dafoe would then have made a good double substitution with 20mins to go.

Gerard is playing out of position, all England managers do this to him (why ?) and he ends up collecting the ball on his own 25yard line when he should be picking the ball up on the half-way line and running at the opposition with the ball.

Is it the managers' fault that the performances so far have been poor ?

Yes, he has responsibility for facilitating the best conditions to allow the team to get on with the job in hand.

Enforcing the team to play in a particularly ill-fitting style/formation is not good management and only undermines the players self-belief.

Hopefully the manager will ask the team what it is they need in order to win, give it to them and stand back and let them get on with it.

When they win he can take the credit, if they lose he can apportion blame.

As far as I can ascertain, the problem seems to be the ball seems often to fail to go into the opponents' nets, or is prevented from going into the English one.

Then everyone involved is bad, but they still make a pot of dosh. By contrast, if the reverse happens, they are good, and make more.

That a vast remora industry depends on making a lot more of this than is warranted suggests, especially in places it seems hardly relevant, some very poor priorities at play.

Maybe the Newsnight studio needs jacking up onto the roof of Charing X Hospital to get a nicer view of Wembley as economics editors discuss 'stuff' not adequately covered by 400+ ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ employees elsewhere?

Bloated, decadent old Europe, out-played, out-run and outwitted by emerging nations...

...but enough about the global econonmy, England were rubbish.

The media can't wait for Capello to fail because he gives them short-shrift. They hate it when someone does what the media say is unthinkable: exclude them from the inner circle because they add zero value and often cause problems. Good on Capello for doing this.

Well done to Rooney as well. Typical English - we've paid for it so it's our right to boo. That's not what support is about. Anyone can cheer on a winning team.

England have no new players coming through as the FA (50 years plus no doubt all with final salary pension schemes) have sold out the future of our game for their immediate gain by allowing in too many foreign players. Old men overleveraging, causing systemic rot and leaving the younger generation to pick up the tab - sound familiar anyone?

Emergency budget: 22nd June,England (maybe) out 23rd June. English people complaining instead of getting on with it: forvever.

ps come on lads, and ignore the media and the negative fans!!

Paul, great piece this, inspired by the sentiment experienced while in Sheffield earlier this week and a deep understanding of football.

I was in a beer garden of a massive pub last night watching it on the big screen, if I were to judge the reaction there as being grass roots typical then it is clear that this is a fragmented worried nation under massive pressure whos self belief is very badly shaken and with a hugely diminnished sense of collective identity.

The whole experience of watching the match last night was like going into the attic and looking at the nations 'Picure of Dorian Grey'.


I actually feel very sad this morning, not because England played poorly but because of the deeply uncomfortable broader experience I had last night.

In between complaining about the football a good deal of the conversation revolved around economic concerns and personal difficulties arising from it, everybody had a tale to tell. The only solution available involved repeat visits to the bar to top up on beer at a promotional £1.50 a pint and 'make it a double for an extra £1'.

There is a hugely significant force of change building here and in the broader world, I am convinced that historians of the future will identify the point at which 'peak oil' happened as the date Deep Water Horizon exploded for example. The USA anger at BP is gaining momentum and getting nastier, it seems to be becoming a focal point for American anger at their plight in general it seems. Everybody is jumping on the band wagon, they seem incapable of looking at themselves to see the underlying source of their plight, it has to be an 'incompetent foreign company'.

This is no where near over, the oil will not be stopped for a long time yet. BP will not survive this in its current form in my opinion. The real issue here is that fundamentally it is not agood idea to drill oil wells under 1 mile of water...why on earth would anyone attempt such a thing? It is not BP's fault, it is the global economic models fault that this disaster has occcured and the US administration is desperate to bury that truth under a pile of rhetoric and mis-direction.

If you want to see the modern day equivalent of a 'biblical' type event the explosion of the deep water horizon is likely to be seen in that kind of light in years to come.

A deep renewal is badly needed. The best thing that can happen long term is for England to get beat comprehensively by Slovenia next week so that the renewal process can begin. The same applies to the bigger picture too.

I am not a footie fan by any means but I found this view of things quite interesting:

#7 Jericoa

Excellent. I watched the game last night in different circumstances. Somehow I also saw it in the context of a broader vision, similar to yours.

Thanks for the post, which may have been lurking in many minds which you have given light to.

whjat wonderful Karma, all the rich bloated nations...France, England, Germany, Italy etc., all being humbled by teams who play football for their shirts, their country and the pride of just being there gainst the gross, capatalistic ugliness of players that would sooner be on their yachts in the Med than performing for their country and being booed, hissed at (all richly deserved) because they are so far removed about what the games really mena.Imagine Nat Lofthouse, Mathews, Finney putting on a display like that? They would be so appalled they would have stayed in their dressing room rather than emerge and utter foul mouth profanities like Rooney did last night. If ever a game summed up a nations character in 2010 in the UK this game did all of that. The team reflects the national mood, an era of grubby, I want it all and sod everyone else...this was the result. The Serbias and Slovenias of the competition are the true competitors of a devalued tournament....

looks to me the players are sulking about something.

This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

#9

Thanks for that.

Feeling more positive today, Brazil are playing Ivory Coast and I have a great reason to cheer along with them, my wife being Brazillian and my second daughter was born there (first was born in Hong Kong), I speak the language and love the unique culture (African fused with southern European with a dash of native american and Japan).

I am going to leave the beer soaked cheap plastic flag draped pub beer garden experience behind me. Today I will be watching the match at a Brazillian friends house with commentry on the radio from Brazil.

GOOOOALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL...... BRAAAAAAAASIL...KaKa fez goal muito bonito com ajuda de Miacon


I will let you know how I get on.

Belief: a general theory of inane ramblings.

Fundament to belief is to have something you can genuinely believe IN. sounds obvious but merely trying to summon up courage and determination is impossible unless you have something, an object person or merely an idea, outside yourself to put your faith into. to take concentration away from yourself and perform to and for someone or something else. this team to be be lacking in belief in their game plan whatever it is and paralyzed by self-consciousness.

Belief in the game plan. Gerrard had been detailed to be on the left game after game strays to the centre cos he likes it there. "Er, what about doing the job you've been given Steven?" bizarre. Maybe you are better used elsewhere but the plan requires u to stay where u are: I wanna be Hamlet but i'm cast, instead, as Marcello. I REALLY believe i am a better actor than the guy in black so, do i barge Big Actor aside and do my version of "oh would this too too solid flesh..." No. I stick to my role and play it SO well that i am asked to play Iago in the next production!

Who am I? Anyway gratuitous self references aside, another possible mental conundrum might be the players lack of self belief at the this level. Who are they? Or rather who do they believe they are? English yeomen soldiers of days of yore - a la Bridge too Far, El Alamein, Dunkirk, General Wolf's at Quebec, Rourke's Drift (yes they were welsh i know) Agincourt, Crecy - OR are they cosmopolitan Rock-star internationals with silky skills the greatest players in the world. Do they know which ones they are?

English players are at once both lauded as world-beaters at club level yet at the same time told they can't play like continentals. Yet they can at club level. Something changes when they put a England shirt on. Is it that they feel they have to be different to their club personas because "international football is different". But different how? We host both the best league in the world (???) and yet have players without the skills to compete with Messi n co. They have no real identity to believe in. It's like a non actor asked to "just be yourself" and yet ends up looking wooden or hammy. Afraid to just do what they normally do cos they think it won't be enough an over eagerness overwhelms them and they try to show that they are BEING themselves or "being international players" instead of just doing what they do normally. Stage fright is when you care about what the audience thinks of you and respond by 1) feeling judged 2) getting nervous and then 3) losing presence by trying to show the audience what you're doing instead of just getting on with it.

The identity of english players seems framed by several contradictory messages: England Expects, You're the best England have produced, and yet ALSO you're not as good as you think you are, you're CERTAINLY not as good as the continentals, and so, basically, mate, you can't play at this level. At once they are asked to be the boys of '66 and yet told that REALLY you're are the boys of '53. don't try n be clever adn so don't try to be the heirs of Puskas, Pele and Cryuff, but rather the heirs of Hunter & Harris. Yet they KNOW they CAN play like Cryuff n co at club level. It's as if they become convinced they're faking it at club level and it won't wash wash when faced with top notch players. Imagine being told that 1) you're brilliant and as good as any player in the world AND that 2) you're never going to win playing how you do at club level. double bind. Result? You freeze.

As to English heroes they can believe in how about spending time in Helmund on patrol (as has your colleague, Mark Urban) instead of the golf course? Or watching a few films about other heroes in wartime, there are a thousand and one examples of documentaries on Youtube plus innumerate B&W films. It might make them realize that football and all the "pressure" is somewhat relative and to go out their and just enjoy playing a game, for it is just a game, for that would be joyful for the fans to watch.

The really sad thing watching the game (and let's all remember this isn't the first time England have been woeful - it's the norm) is that none of the players seemed to want to be out there. They all looked hideously scared and embarrassed, sick with fear even. I pity them that they can't even enjoy the job they've spent their whole lives preparing for. i would rather watch them enjoy themselves trying to win and trying to play exciting and creative football, enjoy playing the system correctly, enjoy doing what the manager wants and trying to eb the best and most exciting player then can be (and failing) than watch 11 men freeze and look like they would be anywhere else on the planet than on that pitch. Pick 11 fat blokes from the stands and they'd at least try their hearts out as much as possible and show spirit in defeat, and maybe a little humour.

To blame the individual players as individuals is as moronic as blaming the manager. England have ALWAYS struggled to believe in themselves at this level and, only when faced with annihilation, have they delivered. Something is wrong in the state of England (and has been for decades). We can't quite shake off our fear that under the swagger of Premiership glitter we really are the kick n chase merchants of old. Maybe we are. Have we bred a footballing culture which instils the maxim, "get rid of it", "get it up there!" etc etc? Listen to fans week in week out and we still here, "get stuck in" and "get it in the box...". It seems to me we DO want kick and chase and bemoan the passing game when it isn't harum scarum football. We are as confused about our national game as we are about our national identity.

Or maybe they really are just fat, stupid, over-paid, over-hyped, celebrity junkies with minimal brain cells and imagination, work-shy, thought-shy, and with an over-attachment to their golfing handicaps and their position in the locker-room pecking order.

there is NO way the team will not give it everything on Wednsesday, if nothing else they don't wanna get lynched when they return to blighty. It will probably redeem them and we'll then proceed to reach the QF and then be valiantly defeated by BIG team. Cue repeat in 4 years time.

Maybe a thrashing by Slovenia might do us all a bit of good and allow a root and branch re-examination of what we expect from English footballers. Do we want them to be truly English. Or truly footballers? Seems being both is a bit of a paradox at the moment. It's the old question again. Artists or Artisans. Heads or hearts. Little Englanders or World Class. We've never really got over the fact that Being English isn't enough anymore. And in any case What IS England now? Tescos? What huge mythical, political and sociological baggage we put on a bunch of 23 well-meaning blokes who we've decided "represent" England. No wonder they choke.

Brazil were very impressive tonight, the right balance of defensive pragmatism and atacking flair with the players to pull it off.

One gets the feeling they are just getting warmed up as well. kaka started to play near the end, he may miss one game but i reckon the fracas tonight will provide him with the required fire in his belly that has been lacking thus far and Luis fabiano showed us why he leads the attacking line.

Watch out everyone else.

Football seems to be holding up a mirror to broader geopolitical reality at the moment.

On that basis the Portugal north Korea match will be interesting and England playing the day after the emergency budget...well lets see.

Watching the match with our Brazillian friends was great, not a tacky plastic flag made in China in sight.

From time to time I am accused of pedantry.

In my view the issue is more about who are the English and what is England?

I can understand Britain and the British; and I laugh at those who proudly declare themselves Scots and Welsh including my relatives who assert that nationalist nonsense.

I feel as though my country, Britain is being divided by a stupid game. Our common solidarities that existed for at least two centuries and even longer in parts are being destroyed by a narrow minded parochialiam which can only conceptualise easy money.

Sure, the England football team has lost the plot. But so has the rest of the island. The joke is on us and we know it but we don't want to embrace any possible solution as the fantasy has become to real.

#15
I possibly forgot to mention that all the family was there watching the match, age ranges from 18 months to 41 years old. Everybody stood hands on heart and sang the national anthem along with the players before the game (most schools still sing tha national anthem every day before school in brazil, they lived every pass, foul, mistake, injustice (the refereees mother was a hot topic of conversation in the 90th minute) and goal along with the team.

We gave the Brazillians football, they took it said thank you and proceeded to play the game better than we ever did, maybe they are now studying the UK's version of a much bigger game called 'nation building for the greater good' also with potentially similar results.

Shame we dont seem to be any good at either of those things anymore.

It's a theme for the year. 2010 is where delusion meets reality.
For World Cup after World Cup since 1966, the England football team has failed to deliver, even if it qualified for the finals. Again and again we tell ourselves the 1st Division/Premier League is one of the best leagues in the world. The technical limitations of the English players neatly glossed over, the "luxury" players ignored, tactical naivety abounding. The World game has developed, yet the English game stagnates with the FA a dysfunctional basket case where county level administrators and time servers hold sway. There is a lack of leadership in the FA able to reform and map a plan for the future, to ensure the game has a structure able to support a sustainable future. Money in football will start to be squeezed and pressure will build to change the way football is organised in England.

The high level of delusion holds for the economy too. The government has nationalised bank debt to preserve the financial system lest anarchy prevail. This bank debt was added to the unsustainable level of government spend planned for on the basis of a bubble economy and artificially inflated asset prices. The end to the delusion that we can spend as much on the safety net, health, education and defence etc. starts tomorrow. We still lack the leadership to articulate a vision of what British society and economy will be like in 10 years time or what steps will need to be taken to establish an economy capable of growing in a sustainable way (not just cuts in spend, direction to support growth). Pensioners may no longer be able to rely on BP dividends to pay pensions. The pressure will build to spell out the sacrifices needed to be made as we pay off public AND private debt.
After that I feel psychologically wrecked and need a beer....or two.

headcases had this a while back which now looks prophetic?

Is the smart money quietly moving money out of Spanish banks?

Rumours are circulating online today that this has been going on for a few weeks now. Nasty rumours going around about a possible collapse? Spanish banks being the new Iceland?

Where will this leave British savers with money in A&L and B&B? Are both banks still covered by the guarantee scheme? Does each bank still have a separate guarantee or are they now both merged into a single guarantee potentially putting British savers money at risk?

If Spanish banks goes under will a Tory/Lib Govt bail out British savers in the UK subsidaries?

These questions, a worry to many millions of British savers when the Icelandic banks went under and Eire looked in danger of following, have but all now been forgotten. But the rumours are circulating online of people and charities getting their money quietly out of Spanish banks - should British savers be worried?

Interesting to see Fabio Capello's one-on-one interviews with ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ and ITV today. A number of points:

1/ He chose this approach rather than a press conference bear garden, allowing his response to be low key and developed (ie in coherent sentences, rather than chopped up by a gaggle of journalists trying to look good). He did, however, give equal access to both broadcasters.

2/ His core messages related to what should be public, what should be private, and what it means to be part of a team. These would seem uncontroversial, but need reiterating far beyond the World Cup Squad. Inter alia, if your are going to treat all your "employees" with appropriate respect, discussions of their performance (relative to each other) should be dealt with in private.

3/ He did this against a background where his own managers (the FA) have already floated the idea of another round of "kick-ass and go shopping" to come should the team fail to reach the playoffs. This would ensure that everything he (FC) learned during his first period as a major tournament manager was transferred to our competitors, while we start all over again, again.

4/ Underlying the situation is the suggestion (which we've also heard for previous underperforming squads) that the "boredom" of a whole week in a luxury conference hotel has allowed grievances and anxieties to grow. Should educated adults not be capable of using their time constructively?

@21 dinosaur "Should educated adults not be capable of using their time constructively?"
Open University courses on Greed Management perhaps?

Apparently Rooney considers he is 'educated enough'.
We will see

sven always said the problem for england players was not skill or fitness but psychological which is why they will not get to final rounds of a competition and win.

#20 tawse57

"Is the smart money quietly moving money out of Spanish banks?"

Now this was part of my broader vision #9.

When Spain lost to Switzerland 0-1. It was somehow a metaphor for the the wider world.

Shame in this parallel existence China aren't playing. It would have been interesting to see by how many goals they won the final by.

#24

They'd lose 2 -0 to the US but with newly improved Chinese goal exchange rate they'd win 3 - 2.

Interesting that Italy are going home now along with France. Last tournaments finalists. Here is a major oscillation in teams performance. From the top to the bottom of the sine wave of form.

In the North West there has been so little rain hosepipe bans may come into force. The Environment Agency are being approached to consider movement of water from the Lake District. Last year was wet and flooding was prevalent.

Again major short wavelength oscillations in a systems characteristics.

So we had Governments pouring £billions into banks and trying to stimulate growth and spending with measures such as QE. Now we have cuts 12 months later.