Evening,
With the exit of England out of the World Cup, and the inevitable media and social meltdown in full flow - I am getting the feeling that this moment signifies a end of an era. A time for reflection and a moment to think about what does lie ahead for this country.
Whether we want to admit to it or not, the time for spending, partying and generally not having a care in the world is coming to an shuddering halt. This country has a debt mountain which needs to be curbed and curbed immediately. There is a certain part of the social spectrum who have been spending and spending for probably the best part of a decade.
I should know, I'm one of them!
Now, might be a good time to start thinking about how the fuck we are going to individually get ourselves out of the massive shitheap that we, aided and abetted by the financial institutions - have got ourselves into.
The next few years are going to be long, parlour and fucking painful.
Still, the Olympics are just over two years from now, any excuse to start saving!
Night, Night!
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
27 June 2010
20 Years In The Making...
This embarrassment has been some years in the making - and the reasons behind it have been staring right in our faces for the same period of time.
For as long as I can remember, players in this country have been taught mainly one way to play, that way is to get the ball out of danger by any way and means possible - ala Route One, Crazy Gang style. We put so much pressure on kids when they first play to just win the game that the basics of technique and getting enjoyment out of playing football are forgotten. 
Why is it that the likes of Rooney, Lampard, Gerrard and Barry are all at sea when they play for England - its because the tactically and gifted players that they play with in the Premiership are probably playing for England's opposition.
Until, we change the emphasis to technique for our youngsters, and allow them to express themselves in the way that they want to instead of being shackled, we are not going to get anyway from a international football point of view.
A kid sees one of his heroes doing a fancy step over on the TV and tries to replicate it on the pitch and is immediately told to play the percentage ball, there is one of the fundamental problems. We have to allow them to have the freedom to play how they want, develop their own skills and the tactical side of the game can be developed later when they are playing proper football.
The FA was supposed to be having a 'root and branch review' into youth football, and that was to include a Clairefontaine style National Academy at Burton-upon-Trent but they cancelled that when Wembley came in over budget. Today is the culmination of 20 years of mismanagement.
Money, like everything in our dirty, corrupt game, rules.
26 June 2010
Out Of Date...
Afternoon,
As I have mentioned on twitter, of which feed you can see on the right hand side of the page here, I am getting increasingly agitated and concerned at the ever continuing barracking of our German opponents ahead of the game in Bloemfontein tomorrow afternoon. The front pages of both the Mirror and the S*n shows three lions being overlooked by a bus carrying the German squad, the idea being that the German team faces being mauled by their English counterparts.
The very idea of the England team being able to even consider mauling a dilapidated doll prior to the Slovenia game would have caused much laughter amongst our beloved Fourth estate.
Of course it is not the first time the media have tried to belittle our German friends - and it probably won't be the last.
But surely you would have expected them to have learnt from past mistakes...
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
As I have mentioned on twitter, of which feed you can see on the right hand side of the page here, I am getting increasingly agitated and concerned at the ever continuing barracking of our German opponents ahead of the game in Bloemfontein tomorrow afternoon. The front pages of both the Mirror and the S*n shows three lions being overlooked by a bus carrying the German squad, the idea being that the German team faces being mauled by their English counterparts.
The very idea of the England team being able to even consider mauling a dilapidated doll prior to the Slovenia game would have caused much laughter amongst our beloved Fourth estate.
Of course it is not the first time the media have tried to belittle our German friends - and it probably won't be the last.
But surely you would have expected them to have learnt from past mistakes...
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
24 June 2010
It's The Old Foe...
Evening,
So we are some 65 hours away from the biggest match for English football since the last biggest match. Of course, the fact that it is our cuddly friends that gave you Vorspung Dus Technik probably makes the situation slightly easier for Capello's boys than say Ghana - on the premise that any game against Germany is automatically going to gee the players up 10 times more than a match against the Black Stars.
Inevitably, everything that has been written by the rags in the previous 96 hours before yesterday's afternoon game has been forgotten - England's Brave John Terry is being seen as some kind of hero by the media - yep, the same media who was ridiculing him some 24 hours beforehand. Wonderful.
I do wonder just how far England are going to go in this tournament - Germany are not the experienced team that they have been in previous tournament - perhaps with the likes of Ozil, Khedira and Schweinsteiger they may play without fear. That could be exactly what England would like - playing on Germany's lack of experience - they could quite easily beat them.
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
So we are some 65 hours away from the biggest match for English football since the last biggest match. Of course, the fact that it is our cuddly friends that gave you Vorspung Dus Technik probably makes the situation slightly easier for Capello's boys than say Ghana - on the premise that any game against Germany is automatically going to gee the players up 10 times more than a match against the Black Stars.
Inevitably, everything that has been written by the rags in the previous 96 hours before yesterday's afternoon game has been forgotten - England's Brave John Terry is being seen as some kind of hero by the media - yep, the same media who was ridiculing him some 24 hours beforehand. Wonderful.
I do wonder just how far England are going to go in this tournament - Germany are not the experienced team that they have been in previous tournament - perhaps with the likes of Ozil, Khedira and Schweinsteiger they may play without fear. That could be exactly what England would like - playing on Germany's lack of experience - they could quite easily beat them.
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
21 June 2010
Going Into Labour
Evening,
I have just completed my online form to become a member of the Labour Party.
I have wanted to spend some time thinking since the election about what sort of action I could take to show my disgust at the Liberal Democrats' jumping into bed with the fucking Tories.
That could not go without a response, in fact in the preceding 48 hours after the coalition came into being, some 4,000 Lib Dem supporters changed their allegiance to Labour.
Big business needs to be given a bloody nose in the aftermath of the madness of the credit crunch, which those bastards in the City initiated in their own selfish manner.
The Tories are the party of privilege and of the aristocracy. They need to be bought to account.
Whoever becomes Labour leader needs to do that.
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
I have just completed my online form to become a member of the Labour Party.
I have wanted to spend some time thinking since the election about what sort of action I could take to show my disgust at the Liberal Democrats' jumping into bed with the fucking Tories.
That could not go without a response, in fact in the preceding 48 hours after the coalition came into being, some 4,000 Lib Dem supporters changed their allegiance to Labour.
Big business needs to be given a bloody nose in the aftermath of the madness of the credit crunch, which those bastards in the City initiated in their own selfish manner.
The Tories are the party of privilege and of the aristocracy. They need to be bought to account.
Whoever becomes Labour leader needs to do that.
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
Delusional...
Morning,
I have about twenty minutes to get my thoughts down this morning prior to going out on my bike for the morning prior to the Portugal/DPR Korea showdown at lunchtime. However I have to yet again use my blog to air my latest musings about the on-going comedy down in Rustenburg.
This morning, it seems that the media are split down the middle regarding what the fuck is going on in regards of the players’ rebellion against Signor Capello. They are either praising Terry for having the balls to say what he said in that press conference yesterday, or accusing him of all out treachery. Not the first time he’s been accused of that now...
This whole Terry incident is a complete farce. Who does he think he is? I read somewhere he was quoted as saying 'I was born to do this' (i.e. speak his mind and lead his men). Doesn't he give a fucking fuck about undermining the captain (Gerrard), or the management liaison (Beckham) or Capello himself? Rhetorical question obviously, he is an ignorant ego maniac who's pretending that he's 'doing it for the best fans in the world'. The best fans in the world, wouldn’t be chanting ‘No Surrender to the I.R.A’ – yep I heard that pathetic ditty down the pub on Friday – Cunts...
Given Terry's somewhat stormy history with Capello (losing the armband after inappropriate behaviour), you'd think he'd have the decency to keep his fucking cunt of a mouth shut. Ah, but I forget he still thinks he was 'born to do this'. Are you fuck. Questioning the manager in a press conference puts the whole set up in the fucking shitter. It pours fuel on a minor fire and turns it into a fucking inferno.
It may not have been an 'outburst' or 'meltdown' in the style of the French, but when a player like Terry starts voicing his pathetic, ill-informed opinions to the press when it isn't his place to do so, you know there is something seriously wrong with how English players view their sense of self-importance. I mean for fuck’s sake, telling Capello to pick his mate Joe Cole despite the fact that Cole has done next to nothing this season and is seen as surplus to requirements by his own club! Isn’t that also undermining Mr. Ancelotti?
Capello is demonstrably a good manager, as were Erickson and, yes, even Shteve McLaren, (actually, let’s scrub that last name...). The common denominator over the last decade hasn't been the manager but a group of players, who are tactically and technically naive – who are only made to look good in the Premiership, but the superior qualities of their foreign counterparts – why is it that Messrs Whiskynose, Wenger and Ancelotti are continuously going around the world scouring for talent – it is because they have more superior technical qualities. Jesus fucking Christ. And people are still scratching their heads as to why it isn't working.
You do have to feel for Signor Capello though.
How on earth could he get England to win the World Cup, when the typical England international is just too much of a fucking retard to follow the most basic of instructions on the pitch? Or that the players would feel that being asked to rest in their rooms for a few hours in the afternoon was the equivalent of being waterboarded at Guantanamo? Or that John Terry, a man with less intellectual power than a sack of shit, would feel that he had the gravitas to stage a coup d'état?
England simply can't hack it in a tournament like this, a fact that's obscured by the staggering number of foreign players in the Premiership. Draws with the USA and Algeria aren't an aberration, it's just England's natural level. We should get used to it.
20 June 2010
A Week Off and an Inevitable Cold...
Evening all,
Well here I am again, at home starting my week long sojourn from work and yet again for the second time in a fucking year I have another fucking cold, but alas I am not bitter...
It's going to be a week of Footy heaven, and probably in the case of Wednesday afternoon, Footy hell. My opinion has not changed one bit from last night - however the way that John Terry has tried to get the media onside this morning with his fucking pathetic media conference has made me think whether or not there is a sense of inevitability over where the blame is going to lie if and when England ignominious exit does come about.
It is ridiculous!
Fabio Capello is the only person who should be allowed to air any grievances, mostly because he thought that the players he sent out, with specific instructions and a (no doubt) excellent tactical plan, would be able to execute on the pitch. These players (who he trusted) completely failed in their task.
The fact that they could not carry out the simplest of instructions (play the ball out from defence, press the opposition high up the pitch) means that the fault lies with the players and the players alone. This pathetic attempt to shift blame to a manager who wins everywhere he goes is a disgrace, and for the press to back them like this is sickening.
Now I am beginning to see some seedy signs that the media is beginning to get back onside with the players. The FA have not helped matters this evening by saying that they would expect Capello to resign if England was not able to muster a result against mighty Slovenia in Port Elizabeth on Wednesday.
Yep, that is really going to stop the pandemonium isn't it.
Still could be worse, we could be a certain team from over the Channel. Night, Night.
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
Well here I am again, at home starting my week long sojourn from work and yet again for the second time in a fucking year I have another fucking cold, but alas I am not bitter...
It's going to be a week of Footy heaven, and probably in the case of Wednesday afternoon, Footy hell. My opinion has not changed one bit from last night - however the way that John Terry has tried to get the media onside this morning with his fucking pathetic media conference has made me think whether or not there is a sense of inevitability over where the blame is going to lie if and when England ignominious exit does come about.
It is ridiculous!
Fabio Capello is the only person who should be allowed to air any grievances, mostly because he thought that the players he sent out, with specific instructions and a (no doubt) excellent tactical plan, would be able to execute on the pitch. These players (who he trusted) completely failed in their task.
The fact that they could not carry out the simplest of instructions (play the ball out from defence, press the opposition high up the pitch) means that the fault lies with the players and the players alone. This pathetic attempt to shift blame to a manager who wins everywhere he goes is a disgrace, and for the press to back them like this is sickening.
Now I am beginning to see some seedy signs that the media is beginning to get back onside with the players. The FA have not helped matters this evening by saying that they would expect Capello to resign if England was not able to muster a result against mighty Slovenia in Port Elizabeth on Wednesday.
Yep, that is really going to stop the pandemonium isn't it.
Still could be worse, we could be a certain team from over the Channel. Night, Night.
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
Location:Keyes Pl,Folkestone,United Kingdom
19 June 2010
Just Where Does Fabio Go Now?
Evening all,
I'm in bed listening to FiveLive and the chairman of the PFA has just been on the radio with his thoughts and ramblings over just where Mr Capello is going wrong. Considering he's always been one who has been in favour of a English manager - I suppose that is always was going to be a given, the first sign of discontent in the country with Fabio. A Rent-A-Gob...
There can be no doubt that the formation that Capello has adopted for not just the tournament but pretty much from the outset of him taking over the biggest job in the country is not the formation that allows England to be able to use their two most potent players in their favoured positions. Both Steven Gerrard and especially Wayne Rooney looked lame and nowhere near their world-class ability.
Surely, you would think that any country with players with the potential greatness of those two would work any formation around their two best players. Spain plays it around Messrs Torres and Xavi, with Iniesta being the playmaker who runs the show - ditto with Brazil, allowing Robinho a free role instead of restricting him, which is what would be normally be in Dunga's DNA.
For England to have any chance of progressing any further this time around, Mr Capello has to allow those two, the freedom to play in their preferred position. Let Rooney play on his own up top, and let Gerrard play just behind him and allow him the freedom of the pitch.
If only it was that simple...
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
I'm in bed listening to FiveLive and the chairman of the PFA has just been on the radio with his thoughts and ramblings over just where Mr Capello is going wrong. Considering he's always been one who has been in favour of a English manager - I suppose that is always was going to be a given, the first sign of discontent in the country with Fabio. A Rent-A-Gob...
There can be no doubt that the formation that Capello has adopted for not just the tournament but pretty much from the outset of him taking over the biggest job in the country is not the formation that allows England to be able to use their two most potent players in their favoured positions. Both Steven Gerrard and especially Wayne Rooney looked lame and nowhere near their world-class ability.
Surely, you would think that any country with players with the potential greatness of those two would work any formation around their two best players. Spain plays it around Messrs Torres and Xavi, with Iniesta being the playmaker who runs the show - ditto with Brazil, allowing Robinho a free role instead of restricting him, which is what would be normally be in Dunga's DNA.
For England to have any chance of progressing any further this time around, Mr Capello has to allow those two, the freedom to play in their preferred position. Let Rooney play on his own up top, and let Gerrard play just behind him and allow him the freedom of the pitch.
If only it was that simple...
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
Location:Keyes Pl,Folkestone,United Kingdom
Thoughts...
Afternoon all,
Long time, no read - better change that right now. Am currently under a tree overlooking the Channel on the East Cliff, wind picking up - and the weather probably sums up the mood of a nation. Down, Overcast and the sense of a storm brewing. But that's enough about the Emergency budget on Tuesday!
Seriously, the performance by the English football team last night is down there with some of the very worse performances over the years. The performance that came to mind for me was the shocking performance in Norway in 1993 - where we played a 3-5-2 formation (something that we had never done before) and duly lost. Without even trying!
Of course we are not in that dire a situation yet, for one thing we know that a win on Wednesday will be sufficent enough for us to qualify for the knockout stages - but there has to be a part of us all which want us to be put out of our misery now. Let's say we get through, and get Germany...
You see my point!
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
Long time, no read - better change that right now. Am currently under a tree overlooking the Channel on the East Cliff, wind picking up - and the weather probably sums up the mood of a nation. Down, Overcast and the sense of a storm brewing. But that's enough about the Emergency budget on Tuesday!
Seriously, the performance by the English football team last night is down there with some of the very worse performances over the years. The performance that came to mind for me was the shocking performance in Norway in 1993 - where we played a 3-5-2 formation (something that we had never done before) and duly lost. Without even trying!
Of course we are not in that dire a situation yet, for one thing we know that a win on Wednesday will be sufficent enough for us to qualify for the knockout stages - but there has to be a part of us all which want us to be put out of our misery now. Let's say we get through, and get Germany...
You see my point!
- Posted Straight From The iPhone...
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