Add in that they had to fit beckham into the system somewhere as well so the team made no sense.
They won champions league with teams that were supplemented with non english players.
They were three very decent attacking centre fielders. You only need one, but managers hadnât the balls to drop one of them although they generally seemed to have no problem leaving scholes out for some reason
Goalie, Iâd argue theyâve struggled for a long time.
Back 4, yeah they were good enough. Probably brilliant.
Midfield. Never had a balance, or someone to control the pace. Thatâs a killer
Up front, Rooney was class, they never had a settled partnership, they tried the heskey and the crouch and everyone with Rooney
No England manager had the balls to pick a team to win rather than the one the all to powerful British press wanted. I agree the players were too club focused at that timr. Ironically it suits southgate to pick spurs reserves etc because theyâll be grateful to be there
Because Scholes was overrated.
He couldnât tackle and outside of the odd screamer, he generally couldnât influence a game
Thatâs going to trigger a few United lads. Iâm out
Do you disagree?
They got beat marginally by the eventual winners Brazil in 2002, then went out on penalties twice in a row in 2004 and 2006 to a good Portugal team. They should have qualified for 2008 but Spain were too good by then
A ronaldinho fluke, rooney getting sent off, Rui Costa.
Brazil totally outplayed them
Euro 2004 was the big chance. Theyâd have hammered Greece if they got over the Dutch
2006, donât think theyâd have beaten France, italy or germany if theyâd beaten Portugal
Nobody would have hammered Greece the way they were defending
They were good at defending against continental teams. Iâd have liked to see them defend against a direct team.
England had Rooney and Owen up front and no wingers, not the most direct team in the world
They always play like eleven strangers
They had no possession based midfielders either. They played more direct than most. The didnât build the game through maintaining possession. It was in the channels wide and in the box.
They didnât have sufficiently âfamousâ holding midfield player. That meant that their centre midfield had to be Gareth Barry plus one from Scholes/Lampard/Gerrard but they didnât have the balls to drop any of Scholes/Lampard/Gerrard (or possibly even Carrick + one other). The FA was probably a lot of the problem and apparently dictates a lot of the team based on fame and marketing. The English football commentariat invented some shit about Barry not being good enough for international football because he was too slow. They werenât a proper football team and got what they deserved.
Gareth Barry did play in 2010 and got completely destroyed by Ozil and co. mind you
They always lacked a top class left winger and a deep lying midfielder, and you could probably argue a goalkeeper.
If roy keane and ryan Giggs played for England theyâd have probably won a major competition.
Youd have had
Neville terry Rio cole
Beckham keane gerrard/scholes/Lampard Giggs
Rooney owen
That would be hard to beat
Remember when Nicky Butt was their best player. 2002.