Okay, this is the rant of a grandad. So be warned
I'm not going to start with "In my day, football was football......" because basically, there are some people who will switch off. But I will say this. When people say "Redknapp is the only man for the job", you really are short sighted. Why is he the only man for the job? Is it because he's English? Is he because he's loveable cuddly 'Arry? Now don't get me wrong. What Redknapp has done this season, is brilliant. And I'm happy to see Spurs amongst the big boys. But come on. It has nothing whatsoever to with nationality of a manager (if i've said this already-sorry).
People say Capello was too negative, he played too much "Italian style" football. Please. Shhhh... Rubbish. It is nothing more than hearsay. He is a world class manager for a reason. Yes-at times his man management left something to be desired, but he got us what we wanted didn't he? I'm sorry, but if Capello won us the world cup playing "boring, negative Italian style football", I would be incredibly happy, compared to getting to the semi's trying to play fancy snazy football that would eventually lead to a major gubbing off somebody.
I've had a go at Fabio in the past, but in hindsight-it was the wrong thing to do. Players retiring because they had a ***** fit as they weren't selected for the national squad. Players being "injured" one day, then next day being fully recovered for an upcoming club fixture depleting the national squad. Was that Fabio's fault? No, didn't think so. And these fans saying the players lack passion and pride when they play. Oh yeah-most of the time they're the one's who apparently don't care about the England squad and prefer to concentrate on their club. Shut up. By all means focus on your club. But if you're going to slag off the national team, when you don't even care-you don't deserve to have an opinion.
When people go on about lack of passion....do me a favour. It's tactics AND players not being able to step up to the plate when the chips were down. In the 86 World Cup, the players were comitted to the cause-every single one including the subs. Even when we knew we could go out if we lost to Poland, not once did we let our heads drop. The whole squad were committed to going through to the knockout rounds and stepped up to the plate. In Italia 90, Lineker played with a cast on his arm for crying out loud. Barring Terry and a couple of others-who else would do that? And also take into account how poor officiating has become in international football that has cost countries games. There are so many factors to take into account that are not the managers fault. Like the club vs country row that club managers get involved with. People have to take into account the bigger picture. Like the press building up a young player-then absolutely slaughtering him when he makes a ****-up. That sure as **** doens't help either. We, the majority of the time, have unrealistic expectations. And all too often, it blows up in our faces.
Right now-football is a totally different beast to what is was in years gone by. It's evolved into something else. It's.....become worse in some aspects but I won't go into that. Our best chance to win a World Cup, or the Euros has gone for now. I'm not being negative-I'm being realistic. It's not just down to the manager though. It's so much more than that. And the sooner people take this into account the better, and just forget all about this nationalistic egoistic rubbish.
Is Harry the only manager for England? No he is not. Anyone who thinks that, is naive.
Apologies if it came across as the ramblings of an old man-was struggling to find the right way to put things seeing as it's 1:40 am lol