God Help Us

NEXT ENGLAND MANAGER ODDS

Gareth Southgate 6/1

Gary Neville 8/1

Alan Pardew 10/1

Brendan Rodgers 16/1

Sam Allardyce 20/1

Eddie Howe 20/1

Arsene Wenger 20/1

Stewart Baxter 25/1

Jose Mourinho 25/1

David Moyes 25/1

Alan Shearer 28/1 

What is Terry Venables doing these days?

Redcanuck wrote:

What is Terry Venables doing these days?

He runs a small Hotel in Spain. Saw it a few weeks ago during a TV show when they looked back on Euro 96. He looks well, but has been out of football for over a decade.

Means he will be up to date with Roy's tactics

Thats a pretty frightening list.

I read a whole piece about Alan Shearer putting himself forward on TV yesterday in the post match. Shearer was a good player, but man is he a complete tool of an analyst.

Out of the list I would go for Mourinho...

Milt wrote:

Thats a pretty frightening list.

I read a whole piece about Alan Shearer putting himself forward on TV yesterday in the post match. Shearer was a good player, but man is he a complete tool of an analyst.

He isnt as bad as he once was, but I fully understand what you are getting at.

No, he isnt top job material, but as a number two or a pair of number two's, we could do worse.

As long as I can remember we have been looking for that Special one.... and we always come up with the wrong guy.

So the last bloke most people would want to see in the Job should get it..... Big Sam.

How the F*** could he do any worse and he might just surprise a few.

Radio is throwing up Hoddle's name over n over again as bandits ring in, & maybe disabled people who are being punished by god to remind what he said all those years ago.

Tactically I dont think he has many infront of him. Communicating with public players and lone Newspaper men who get him subjects that dont involve people, he is pants.

I still aint got past his old favourite of, "The Professional Eye" when explaining something to the millions of onlookers.

"The Professional Eye" = You joe public know nothing about football, you are just the mugs who pay our wages.

F****** W*****

Oh by the way, many are taking offence about Roy having his resignation speech all ready for straight after the game.

Well I am sure Roy can see the light as well the next man. When it was leaked Dickhead Brendan Rodgers had been sounded out by the FA as many as 6 months ago, id say Roy had that speech sorted out there and then.

FFS RODGERS..... I couldnt believe it when I heard it myself.

It can't be Rodgers at this point. Makes no sense and would Celtic even allow it this close to preseason?

I may be one of the few that don't really think a national team manager has much to do. They don't have to deal with injuries like a club manager. They don't have to deal with a philosophy (there's no real time) and they don't have to manage tactics all that much game to game. If anything, the latter is the EASIEST thing they have to do.

They're basically just maintaining a game plan for the team in training and managing the proper selection. That's it.

Italy can seemingly make changes with a "shit team" and still roll over the likes of Spain. Is that Conte? No. It's not. It's the players playing the game they've always played. Same for Germany. Is Low really painting a masterpiece with his tactics and such? He isn't. The players are playing to the best of their ability and they're playing for each other. How about France? Same story (although I don't see them being all that much of a challenge to the previous two).

My point here is that the finger needs to clearly be pointed at the players. My feeling is that the players don't (and haven't since the 96-98 generation) get along. There's cliques and certain guys talk and certain guys couldn't give a fuck about a group of others. It's pretty clear to see when guys are looking for an easy pass only for it to be denied by someone else. You don't see this in Spain, or Germany, and Spain specifically has a lot of these cultural/club team cliques. This was their problem in the early 00's and it was only when they put it aside for the country that they started to do well. Maybe it's the manager's job to break this type of thing down, by either not selecting problem players (aka Benzema with France - but that's an obvious choice), or picking 11 guys that get on.

There's really no excuse for a team like England (or Germany or Spain or Italy or Belgium) to not do well in this tournament with their rosters. The standard of football is surprisingly lower to what they see week in week out domestically and in UEFA club contests.

It's been the same story from Hodgson, Capello, Erikson, McLaren, and Keegan. The only guys that got close to having a cohesive team have been Hoddle (initially) and Venables.

Yellow Strip SSN

Senior England players lost faith in Roy Hodgsons decision making during Euro 16

Senior England players also questioned selection of Raheem Sterling against Iceland

Sky jumping up n down about this before the 4pm Hodgson and Glenn presser

Marcelo Bielsa is a thought. Has the experience with Argentina and Chile. He is tactical astute, well studied, attention to detail. He does not stand for any nonesense and his squads are always well prepared.  Pochettino and Guardiola learned a lot from him and see him as a mentor.

Not sure about his command of the language and doubt very much the FA will go for it, but I would think about.

I disagree that tactics aren't a big thing for International managers. In fact I think they are by some margin the most important part of the job.
Not saying that team conhesion isn't important, it is, but a little bit of success and all the players will get on like a house on fire.

Where Roy royally fucked up was ruining the good work that was done during qualification by ripping up his team sheet to try and shoe horn players in, either at all like Kane and Vardy, or in the wrong position like Rooney.

Players don't know where they stand when they are dropped over players who played only a small part of the set up previously. Then you change the entire playing plan and nobody has a bloody clue what they are supposed to do.

I told you all Hodgson was incapable at this level, and when he qualified with such ease I thought I was wrong, but he reverted to type as soon as he picked the team for the first game.

Busby wrote:

I may be one of the few that don't really think a national team manager has much to do.  They don't have to deal with injuries like a club manager.  They don't have to deal with a philosophy (there's no real time) and they don't have to manage tactics all that much game to game.  If anything, the latter is the EASIEST thing they have to do.  

They're basically just maintaining a game plan for the team in training and managing the proper selection.  That's it.
 

I think there is a lot more to the job than that.

To reach the finals of the Euros or the World Cup, you have to play 7 games against teams that could play different styles of football. You have to be more tactically aware than a Hodgson to adapt to different types of opponents.

A manager needs to be able change things around when plan A is not working. England always seem to try to rely on the individual skill of a few of it's top players, they don't perform well as a team. When they struggle, there is no plan B. I can't remember the last England manager who had the abilty to change tactics on the fly or one who can get them playing as a cohesive unit.

You also need a manager who has a strong enough personalty to get the selection process right, not just somebody who is a yes man for FA. Too many times players get picked for England on reputation, even if they are no longer the player they once were or even if they are healthy.

We need to start picking players who are in the best form and players that can fit together to make our best team. Just because on paper you may have the best players, it doesn't mean you have the best team.

This is where it becomes difficult and there is a lot of work involved to get it right and that is why I think the job is harder than you seem to think it is Busby.

I think the England manager job is extremely hard because of one thing.

The players are not as good as their reputations.

Case in point United young player who came on late and ran past Icelandic players who were knackard. Those few mins he was on the pitch has morons claiming the 2nd coming of Giggs.

Almost all the England managers I can remember have all been guilty of playing players in their wrong positions.

Case in point last night no natural wide right player and Rooney who in my opinion our best forward played in Midfield.

We should all realise by now that are players are not as good as their reputations. However, we are capable of performing better than we have done since Euro 96. We should be able to reach the last eight, anymore than that is punching above our weight. Not making it through the group stages or getting knocked out by football minnions is not good enough.

TickTok wrote:

I think the England manager job is extremely hard because of one thing.

The players are not as good as their reputations.

Case in point United young player who came on late and ran past Icelandic players who were knackard. Those few mins he was on the pitch has morons claiming the 2nd coming of Giggs.

Almost all the England managers I can remember have all been guilty of playing players in their wrong positions.

Case in point last night no natural wide right player and Rooney who in my opinion our best forward played in Midfield.

Because they're knackered? Do you understand the level of fitness players have at this level...especially compared to 50 years ago? That's an obvious excuse. The fact Vardy didn't also do this being "fresh" is case and point.

I think you guys are confusing tactics with player selection. These are two totally different things. Tactically, Hodgson was fine. Played a very attack minded 4-3-3 with oodles of possession. Everything any manager could ask for, except the end product. He persisted with players that showed no form and no attacking luck/skill/drive, whatever.

At one point, Kane had a 41 meter free kick yesterday, that was begging for a chip into the box for a knock down and he fancies himself a Ronaldo (est. 2008) Special. A fucking whack on the ball valve to do what exactly? Harry fucking Kane hasn't hit a free kick like that in his life. And where was Rooney? He should have been pulling rank and getting one in the box. Instead we witnessed a hilariously horrible shot 25 yards to the right of goal. Brilliant.

Same goes for Sterling, and it could be said, Rooney in midfield too. He was poor yesterday. But like every tournament with England, they stick with these guys on poor form. You get one game IMO and if you're utterly hopeless (kane, vardy, ali, rose) you don't see the pitch again unless all the other options have sucked too. There's plenty of talent that you can't make the claim that one guy is better than the other.

Who's a better striker than Vardy, Sturridge, Kane, Rashford? The real answer is: Who knows. Depends who's playing a good game.

That's the issue here. That's always been the issue with England and will continue to be the problem.

Germany as an example, have a guy in Podolski who's been very prolific for them. But....there's guys ahead of him who are actually playing well. So he doesn't get time. Simple as that.

The tactics at this level are irrelevant when you have the top quality (based on club football) players. No one is looking for mid game adjustments and 4-3-3- to a 4-5-1 or any of that chat. It's about getting a set of players in the team who work as a cohesive bunch, and that's that. It's why the majority of the German team plays for one club (or grew up there, or wants to eventually end up there). It's also the reason Benzema isn't in the France squad. He's the best French striker around, but they dropped him because he's a twat. End of story. Nothing tactical about any of this. No talk of a right and left footed central defender on their dominant side, no talk of wing backs and a double pivot...none of that dross. Just a best 11 playing football. Simple.

You may be the lone wolf on this one Busby. All I have heard today for example is how Conte got his "tactics" bang on to beat Spain.

Formation, style of play and tactics are not the same. Using your free-kick example, tactically Roy should be saying, "within x distance, have a shot", "outside of that its a chip into the box". Even more granular can be practicing a specific type of free kick like a flick on.

Iceland had a clear tactic on long throw ins for example. They also had a clear tactic on how to slow England down in the transition and how to set-up behind the ball. Every player had a clear role, depending on where the ball was. I don't think you get that from just picking your best players.

What I saw with England was the players making it up as they went along, and players not being on the same page. If you want to break between the defensive lines, you need triangles for example, and the number of times Rooney, Sturridge and Walker were falling over each other. I saw at one point the three of them pointing at each other trying to figure out who should make a run and where. It was comical.

Funny thing yesterday was that Iceland did not park the bus. They actually committed numbers forward when they had the ball and tried to attack even at 2-1 up. That should have been perfect for England to have an open team to go at, but they were very slow in transition and they did not have a tactical approach to the out ball.

Looks like you picked the winner again TT. At 20-1 Big Sam is being interviewed by the FA as we speak.
Its possible of course that they are asking him if he knows anyone who might be a good England coach, but that seems unlikely!!

I don't know whether to laugh or cry. The last time the FA decided to go for a typical English coach who had produced gritty teams, we had Graham Taylor, and "do I not like that idea"!

Big Sam does seem to be first through the door for an interview. I am sure he wont be the last, but I stand firm with my choice. I havent heard of anyone that would change my mind.

I find it very interesting that Gary Neville is being touted as staying in his same position. Makes one wonder if Gary had been successful at Valencia he may well have found the top job himself.

I like Allardyce for the simple fact he won't put up with any ego or bullshit.

He has enough tactical nous to make the team successful. I think Portugal proved that tactics aren't really all that critical for international matches.

Allardyce to be appointed in the next 24 hours.

God help us.

Can't be any worse than Hodgson eh?

The remarks from Skrtel this week were something else.

One is not counting his chickens, or his winnings until its made true, but from what the media outlets are saying and the way he was grinning like a cheshire cat on the sidelines tonight during Sunderlands Friendly, it looks as thou its a done thing.

I got 16/1 to a nice sized wager. Fingers Crossed

Sounds a done deal?  Suggestions are that Sam got the job only after Arsene declined .  
David Moyes to replace Sam at Sunderland?  The chosen one, once again.

How much did you win this time, TT?  Man, I never win anything.

I had £40 at 16's

Obviously I dont always win, just in the middle (I hope its still the middle) of a very good run, although, the biggest amount I wagered during this run, I lost on Swansea to be relegated.

For a guy like me that doesn't gamble...what does that mean?

Is it 40 x16? So you're payout is 640?