under the messiah Roy.
A rather standard response that every is great and we can forget the past after another poor performance sees England beat a hopeless Swiss side in what should be their toughest Euro qualifier.
UEFA have made it very easy for the so called bigger teams to make it to the next Euro finals, even if that means England should end up there. With two qualifying by right from the group and the group they’re in even Roy should manage this.
Three points in what on paper should be the toughest game makes it even more probable.
Tough on paper, not quite so on grass as the laws of the FIFA rankings again are proved that the higher the rankings the more a lot of teams look to be out of their depth. Yes they got through their World Cup group, took, eventual finalists, Argentina almost all the way but for the most part in Brazil they looked dull and poor and in this Euro 2016 opener they looked that as well as looking equally matched with England.
Prannying about in midfield the odd decent ball, inept up front and seconds from calamity at the back, generally dull and lifeless. England or Switzerland?
Ah but Roy went all exciting playing Delph instead of who ever was left from the rest. Yeah, OK, give the kids a go but it didn’t half show up the rest of Roy’s thinking as Delph did everything he could to sent off early on. What was required was a captain, with a bit of nowse, putting his arm around the new boy and saying, well, calm down calm down seems apt. Unfortunately Roy has gone with a dolt, who left Delph to get on with it himself.
The other problem it created was the shift to a diamond 4-4-2 formation. Now while Delph and Baines worked on the left of this the right was non-existent. It wasn’t until he was seen celebrating with Welbeck after the opening goal, nearly an hour in, that I remembered Henderson was actually playing. Henderson was nowhere as the right-back Stones tentatively ventured forward only to panic once crossing the halfway line and pass the ball back. The Swiss left-back, Rodriguez, was there for the taking as he looked even more panicked than Stones.
This also happened on the left as well. Needless passing back. Lost count the number of times Baines tried a one-two, did the one, bombed forward into a good crossing area only for the two to be a ball back into England’s half. So while everyone is talking up Delph’s passing percentage, how many of this balls actually did anything?
Rooney was running about doing nothing, which seems to be his role in the new England. Sterling ran about in that weird style of his and is looking more and more predictable. Yes he’s doing OK but he always has to stop. Why? He’s got the ball, running at defences and this defence included Djourou for god sake, keep on running and he’s either brought down, or straight past the last defender and through on goal. But he stops has a think and there’s where it all falls apart. Thinking. He’s a footballer that does, not one that thinks.
Apparently now that Roy is the greatest England manager of all time, Welbeck is the greatest striker. I wonder how many were saying that when he’s cross that should have brought the opening goal was so poor it couldn’t find either of the two England players open in the box. It was funny reading one well thought of journo saying that the opening goal was lovely delayed side-footing
. A little later Welbeck’s shinner wasn’t talked about on the paper’s web site in such glowing terms. Much like Lambert’s role in the second wasn’t mentioned at all.
The Swiss had Djourou at the back, England had Jones. Jones pulls better funny faces but at their worst they’re equals. Accidents waiting to happen. While England had Rooney, Welbeck and Sterling giving up easy chances with inept first touches and passes the Swiss had Seferovic and Mehmedi providing the same level of ineptness. Though it did take a good save from Hart and a block from Cahill to keep the clean sheet, while Jones’s goal bound header from a corner was brilliantly saved by the Swiss ‘keeper.
Was this really any better than the Norway game? Nah, not really, just two goals were scored and one of them was in the dying moments. Plenty of England players went missing, plenty did exactly what they did in the friendly – Wilshere still ran forward a few yards, lost the ball and fell over, Jones is one step from calamity, Rooney adds nothing.
Are England lucky? Yes. Is there a better team than Switzerland in the group who will test Roy and his bold choices
more than this dullard outfit? Possibly Are England just Switzerland, dull, uninspiring qualifiers to tournaments that they don’t grace just with the flag colours swapped round?
Can they get better? Yes. Can they do so under dull delusional Roy, when he’s just like the media and some of the fans who think one win over a very mediocre side means England are contenders? …