I disagree. He has produced the goods consistantly at international level, as in delivering a performance. He is definately not a Mcmanoman (sp), is he?

not good enough my ****

 

The rolleyes were for your statement "I dont rate Gerrard". I dont understand how anyone can say that after the performances he has put in for Liverpool over the years, but I guess by your response you are talking about 'I dont rate' Gerrard for England? Gerrard is probably our best player and I believe he should be given the freedom of the park, but for the reasons below, he wont get that.

You could argue that any of the midfield were not showing against NI. Lampost is dynamic at getting forward for Chelsea, in effect playing the same role/pitch area as Gerrard does for Liverpool. Gerrard looked as if he was asked to play the holding role initially but as NI sat back and defended, he naturally came forward. Obviously Beckham was posted wide right but again as NI sat back, he tend to wander around in the space provided.

The trick with this talented midfield of Lampost, Gerrard, Beckham + A N other is that they all want to dominate the same area of the field. Eriksson has to (rightly or wrongly) say they must play to a particular shape and formation thus, in my opinion, blunting some of their flair play. It would be great to see Gerrard, Lampard and Beckham all firing, but as they are similar its near impossible. The midfield performances in Euro 2004 saw that as they (obviously without Gerrard!) occupied the part of the pitch for most of the game leaving holes for oppo to exploit (France and Portugal spring to mind). For this, I blame Eriksson.

Gerrard's at his best controlling the game in the opponents half, driving the team forward. He wasnt permitted/allowed/whatever against NI. Until he is allowed that freedom we're going to see a 50% Gerrard.

The fact is England would be weaker without Gerrard and Mr Eriksson should be fully using a player thats near his peak.

 

Not sure about that, I'm Scottish, therefore not an England Fan although i don't have a problem with them doing well and I believe they will. I think Rooney is world class, his attitiude is excellent, he's aggressive but that hasn't stopped Roy Keane and Patrick Viera being two of the best players in the premiership for the last decade.

Listen to the experts on tv, the commentators, analysts and managers, Rooney can lead england to success, the backing of fans may help that.

 

Redkop has the Liverpool blinkers on and will never be able to see Rooney for the player he is.

 

Ah yes - but petulant (otherwise great) Man Utd players have cost us dear in the past - when they get too full of their own importance - let's just hope that SAF can keep Rooney's feet on the ground until the Autumn of 2006 .

As for blinkered 'Pool fans - There's nothing new there .

 

Rooney is not Beckham. You can only judge a player on what he's done and so far Rooney has been fantastic for England. His lowest point being in Spain but I think he has leant from that. he has player round him like Beckham who have gone through similar. He looks to get on well with Gerrard plus he has people like SAF and Roy Keane there to bring him into line if he looks to be going of the rails.

I just hope the media in this country (who I personally cant stand!) don't do what they always do and build him up beyond what he is only to knock him back down at the first chance.

 

Yawn... How can the Liverpool blinkers be on? If they are on, surely I would be kissing Owen's ***.....

 

Your hatred for anything 'Manchester United' is far greater than you *** ki55ing an ex player who you where relatively happy to see go at the time. Your comment I responded to was about Rooney. You can't see past the Everton thing or the Manchester United thing. FACT!

 

Triple top

you dont drop world class players because of one game when 'they aren't effectual in midfield',thats what Mgrs are paid for,to get performances from them.

 

True! and beckham had a cracker tonight and poor old Owen was well unlucky..Both are still class players IMO

 

Owen obviously learnt a few tricks from Maradonna, but in Maradonna's case he actually needed to use his hand, what was Owen's excuse?

 

unlucky? Owen is ****.... frickin world class goalscorer my ar$e, people argue about his scoring record, yeah dont get me wrong its great but any half decent striker should bag a hat full of goals with people like becks, gerrard, lampard etc supplying the ***** from midfield.... Owen should have had a hat trick last night, he always needs that EXTRA touch which costs us. had a good chance to pass to joe cole with an empty net but instead he twisted his body and got a shot on target which was good but straight at the keeper... absolute useless.

 

Knee-jerk

 

Beckham was ****e last night, he was supposed to be playing on the right, but every time the ball went out there Neville was having to collect it to cover his mates ***. We got away with it however, as we were only playing 3rd rate opposition
The problem is, he still fancies himself in the Gerrard/Lampard role, but he'll never be up to that job for the simple reason that he cannot make the hard tackle without giving away free kicks

That England team as it stands will NEVER win a major trophy with the current manager, he proved last night that he doesn't have the backbone to make the inflated stars do THEIR jobs

 

its not a knee jerk reaction, Ive been saying for well over 2 years now owen is living on that goal against the argies, most overrated goal in english football...

 

Azer ..what ever!! they played with a goal keeper, 9 defenders, and 1 up front just incase.... they did their job, they prevented a re-occurance of another 8-0 slaughter...it mightnt have been nice to watch, but for them its about pride, and they got that.... by frustrating the hell out of England, and limiting the damage. They deserve some credit.

Personally, i dont think Englands performance last night was crap, but it should highlight some gapping holes ................ok, so we had 70% of the possession, but what did we do with it..??? naff all. Games arent won on possession. Ok, we scored 2, but what about the other 20 that should of gone in. Fair play, their goal keeper did well, even tho, he'd struggle to make a sunday league team.

Everyone is slagging Owen off, but what about Lampard?? he missed a few. Rooney, how many did he screw up ....................... Beckham, i dislike, but you cant deny his quality, still he was far from brilliant. How can anyone be judged as brilliant, when you're playing a side like that. Last night they were all average...in fairness, they all screwed up.

If we'd have won 20-0, we'd be saying how brilliant England are - we've learnt how to keep possession, now we need to learn how to score from all them chances.

i think its true, that if a quality side plays a poor one, then the quality side doesnt perform as well as they would against quality opposition.

if that scoring performance is anything to go by, then NO, we wont win **** all, under Erikkson, or anyone else for that matter.

 

Against that opposition even I would have had a cracker! Beckham even dribbled past someone in the first half
For the amount of chances we had the result was shocking & doesn't bode well for a proper competitve match.

 

owen is great on his day but i think that day was a fair time ago get rooney and defoe up front for a bit...

owen missed too many chances had it have been rooney or defoe that had them opp then think the score line would have been very different..

beckham might not be having great games (by his own standards)at the moment but he still is world class.he can change a game very quickly

but then people said he had a really bad world cup...he did by his standards but he still had more passes and crosses than any other midfielder in the competition....

i think the way we played was encouraging we just need a bit more of the quality in the box

 

Not a bad match last night, could/should of scored a few more goals.Btw i thought becks had a much better match than the NI one.
Owen should of easily got a hatrick also but you could see it wasnt going to be hes night.

 

I diddn't know that any striker could get close to England scoring records at 25 just because England have a midfield creates so many chances with their attacking flair style Clearly Owen and Gerrard are both ****e . Despite being regarded as some of the best players in the world and roundly praised by managers across Europe. Despite being the best players in the 5-1 win in Munich. Despite the thirty million price that Mourhinio will pay for Gerrard in the summer Despite Owen getting no football and still appearing in the Top scorers list for Real Madrid. Despite Owen holding the record for most goals per minutes on the pitch at the start of the Spanish season they are both clearly crap players who don't deserve and England place

 

People, we should not go on slagging off england and sven. Look at the records that they have. They are a good team, and yes i think they will go far in this world cup. What england need are good supporters that will stand there and chant, and follow them right to the end without telling them they are absolute sh**e. The team that we have is good and strong. Probably one of the strongest teams out there, why the hell do you lot think it always takes something bad or abstract to send england home. Be it bad ref decisions, or just plain old bad luck. They always go 3/4 of the way there adn end up with a pen shootout. If you think you can do a better job then why dont you get paid the money that sven does. In actual fact get on the pitch yourself. Thats the prob with england today all mouth and NO go.

 

We have a tactically inept manager and a team that although full of talent is not technically good enough to win the world cup.

PS I can't stand the EN-GER-LAND supporters and before you go on about getting behind the players you only have to look a the treatment these so called fans gave David Beckham our now captain after France 1998.

 

Exactly what i was trying to say about our supporters.