[Archived] England International Games

[SouthAussieRover]

Can't seem to pick up any comm on World Service either.

[USABlue]

Can't seem to pick up any comm on World Service either.

352138[/snapback]

I can get Five Live but it is telling me that due to contractual obligations they can not stream the coverage. Anyone got alternatives. Don't think it has to do with being overseas, used to be the same with the FA Cup matches.

I may have to settle for the useless minute by minute updates

Edited October 8, 2005 by USABlue

[AlanK]

half time

1-0 to england

lampard penalty

[Dan Furness]

Becks sent off

Pretty harsh decision but straight after his first yellow it was obvious the ref was going to give it.

And AGAIN we are not impressing, not by a long way

[sumps]

Shocking performance by England. We should have won comfortably but instead we were hanging on for a win against a mediocre side at best. We've scored 2 goals in the last 3 games against teams who have a handful of decent players between them. SVEN OUT!

[American]

I can get Five Live but it is telling me that due to contractual obligations they can not stream the coverage.  Anyone got alternatives.  Don't think it has to do with being overseas, used to be the same with the FA Cup matches.

I may have to settle for the useless minute by minute updates

352140[/snapback]

I've heard you can find a way to go through a UK proxy server, but I've never tried it.

[bob fleming]

Sven can go after Wednesday for me, regardless of the result. He's clearly lost the dressing room (even though it's well sign posted at O.T.). Sure, the sending off was extremely harsh (and unjust) but we seemed to be totally lacking in direction and purpose even before then. Hansen had it right - we should be looking at scoring x3 / x4 against a team such as Austria.

We're going nowhere under Sven - compare recent performances with those against Germany away and Newcastle at St James' from a few years ago - there's no comparison. He may as well go now and save us all some time.

[krislu]

So you won and are a step closer to playing in the World Cup, still you complain and are asking for the managers head...oh dear, you Englishmen, will you ever be happy? Face it, you just aint that good...

Edited October 8, 2005 by krislu

[modes98]

i am of similar thinking bob. Although i rate sven as a very good manager, various things have destroyed any hopes of us doing well under his stewardship.

The press are relentless in trying to destroy every england player or manager and should take alot of blame for the last 2 or 3 awful performances. Never the less the players, who should be able to turn in performances every game, just can't.

The best player on the pitch today was luke young and considering all the big names we have that says about everything you need to know.

On wednesday, when we qualify i would like to see sven accept defeat and walk away, but i doubt this will happen and the FA are not going to spend out the money on sacking him. So then we are left with a manager who needs to be left alone to work with the players and not attacked all the time, but this won't happen either. We are our own worst enemies!

[greggyk]

We're all going to Germany!!!!

Holland 2-0 up at half time!!

Im watching the game on a streaming. Holland still in 2nd gear, should win by more goals IMO.

[MCMC1875]

Sven can go after Wednesday for me, regardless of the result. He's clearly lost the dressing room (even though it's well sign posted at O.T.). Sure, the sending off was extremely harsh (and unjust) but we seemed to be totally lacking in direction and purpose even before then. Hansen had it right - we should be looking at scoring x3 / x4 against a team such as Austria.

We're going nowhere under Sven - compare recent performances with those against Germany away and Newcastle at St James' from a few years ago - there's no comparison. He may as well go now and save us all some time.

352164[/snapback]

Fine, but who should be next fer th'ot seat?

[1864roverite]

watched 2nd half at work, totally crud, no pride and no effort, the ref was a disgrace, too much money in the game,not a big enough crowd, tickets too expensive, no easy travel to the ground,poor media coverage pre match,not enough effort to entice supporters to the game,poor team,bad manager,poor training regime etc etc etc etc etc

beat jimbo to all excuses

just glad we won

[den]

Well, Wednesdays game doesn't matter now. England have qualified for the world cup finals, due to Holland beating the Czechs 2-0.

[Modi]

In light of today's performance and the result in the Czech Republic, to paraphrase Turnip...

"Do I like orange."

[Exiled_Rover]

The Swede needs to be sacked, he hasn't got a clue

[modes98]

England have qualified for the world cup finals, due to Holland beating the Czechs 2-0.

352224[/snapback]

erm and due to Englands 7 wins, 1 draw and 1 loss of course

Results matter and England have done very well in the campaign to only lose a game(assuming they beat poland).

The problem is the media/public ideal that the team should play to the top of there ability every game and not lose a game or let in a goal!

Hopefully all the bad games are out the way, even though i do fear for wednesday. At the world cup england should turn on the style, living up to the occasion and do well!

At the end fo the day who remembers the qualification, it's the tournament that matters!

[Eddie]

At the end fo the day who remembers the qualification, it's the tournament that matters!   

352250[/snapback]

Absolutely right. Before the last finals Brazil were being talked of as a shell of their former selves and a team who might not even make it through the group stages, while Germany had been hammered by England and were considered too old and slow to go anywhere. A few weeks later we had a Brazil v Germany World Cup Final, and I know that Germany had a fairly lucky and easy ride through to the final, while the tournament also turned up several shock results that meant the knock-out stages weren't contested by all of the "best" nations, but even so they made it to where everyone wanted to be. Now four years on Brazil are once again untouchable, much of this having to do with the simple fact that they go into these finals as the reigning champions, as well as possessing some of the most talented players on earth. England have one of the finest international squads around, certainly one good enough to compete with anyone else, now is the time for them to forget about the press and the public and go out and do their stuff.

You know if, come the end of June, we are all celebrating England being crowned the new World Champions half of the critics will have been saying they had been predicting England as the dark horses. In reality, we would rather look to the likes of Mexico, who because of an easier qualification route and the participation in a joke tournament have suddenly become a team to beat, or to Brazil and the other usual suspects, than expect anything from our own nation.

[American]

How does Mexico have an easier qualification route than England? Who that's any good did England have to play besides Poland? (I'd go by world rankings of those in the final qualifying group, but world rankings are a joke.) The only 2 regions that have really tough qualifying are S. America and Africa (due to only the group champs qualifying). If you're a top team, you're almost always going to qualify. Qualifying for Europe is decided mostly by the draw. Who that saw the England draw didn't think they'd qualify at the time?

[Eddie]

I'd agree with you that England's group wasn't particularly difficult, I was merely saying that there will almost never be a difficult qualification route for the likes of the United States and Mexico, whereas in Europe there will always be one or two tough groups. A perfect example of that would be the Republic of Ireland / France group, which has also thrown up a couple of other contenders, elsewhere some of the bigger boys are struggling. The nature of the qualification does mean that most of the big nations will have an easy ride, but Europe has enough good to very good teams to have one or two tough groups thrown in there.

[Grabbi Graeme]

England always make a meal of qualifying fron the group stages for either the world cup or euro champs, in fact this is the first time we have qualified with a game to go in 20 years.

We need to wait and see how we perforn in the tournament itself as I think we do play better once we are in the final stages.

[American]

I disagree, Eddie. Few of the European minnows are tough away venues like most of the Central American countries. For every Israel, there will be a nation on another continent that suprises, like Panama even getting to the final group. Unlike the European competition, there are actually 3 stages where a suprise can happen and a top country can get knocked out. Four if you finish 4th in stage 3 and have a playoff.

[bob fleming]

So you won and are a step closer to playing in the World Cup, still you complain and are asking for the managers head...oh dear, you Englishmen, will you ever be happy? Face it, you just aint that good...

352173[/snapback]

The players we have at our disposal should be playing better than the dogs dinner that has been served up during the last three international games. They are under achieving big style.

Fine, but who should be next fer th'ot seat?

 

352200[/snapback]

Well first and foremost I'd go for Mike Bassett. A more realistic target would be Mourinho but I doubt he'd leave Chelsea for a smaller club with less money. But really I think we should go for an Englishman again. Alan Curbishley, Big Sam, Harry Redknapp - I'd take any of these guys. My choice would be Harry.

Then again, since my last post Sven has bucked his ideas up and we've qualified. Hopefully they'll be a massive improvement against Poland but I doubt it. He's had his time, we're on the way down, time for a change.

[Paul]

Why does the front page of this site say the games are the 9th and 13th.

Also will 5 live be doing an internet broadcast on this game.

352043[/snapback]

Because I got the dates wrong

[philipl]

Fair points about Germany and Brazil last time round but I simply cannot see Sven turning this round for England. This is four awful tactically-inept performances on the bounce with the best crop of players England have produced since 1970.

How many do you reckon Poland have to beat us by to secure Sven's dismissal?

[Paul]

It's widely written this is the best England squad since 66/70

1966 squad:

Gordon Banks

Ron Springett

Peter Bonetti

George Cohen

Ray Wilson

Jackie Charlton

Bobby Moore

Jimmy Armfield

Gerald Byrne

Ronald Flowers

Norman Hunter

Nobby Stiles

Alan Ball

John Connelly

Martin Peters

Terry Paine

George Eastham

Ian Callaghan

Jimmy Greaves

Bobby Charlton

Geoff Hurst

Roger Hunt

Look at some of the talent that didn't make the team, in bold. I was twelve at the time so my memories of the WC are hardly clear and concise but I don't recall England playing as poorly as they did yesterday, at any stage. We seem to have a talented squad but we don't have a team, if recent performances had been at Ewood what would our reaction be? SGE isn't a suitable person to be England manager, never has been in my view. This side won't get past the quarter-finals, the most unfortunate aspect of it all is we face 9 months of the media, FA, England manager, England squad etc. spouting complete b*llocks about what is going to happen in Germany.

Totally underwhelmed.

Edited October 9, 2005 by Paul