OK, WHAT NOW?

My first World Cup as an England fan was France '98. Glenn Hoddle was the gaffer and after a solid group win over Tunisia we lost a game vs Romania that we shouldn't have done and that cost us top spot in the group. Cue an earlier than expected rumble with the Argies in the 2nd round, cue a penalty shootout defeat. Then came '02 with Sven Goran Erriccsson in charge, an iffy start vs Sweden followed by a great win over the Argies and another iffy draw led to us outclassing Denmark before an honourable defeat to Brazil. '06...well, the results were good but the performance anything but.

2010 was meant to make all of us forget all that under the guidence of Fabio Capello. Qualifying form, where we can be hit and miss was nothing short of electric. The quality of the individual players was unquestionable. Some morons thought we could win the whole thing, well some morons always think we can win the whole thing. However people were really taking us seriously.

And then what hapened? Failiure to win our first two group games forced us to redeem ourselves with a decent performance vs Slovenia just to reach the knockout stages where we faced an on form Germany and in our biggest match for four years, our defence just didn't show up! A 4-1 hammering made what should have been England's best World Cup in my memory into the worst? Why?

Well, the first instinct of a lot of people was to blame Fabio. The FA, being smarter than these people thought otherwise. Let's face it, Fabio does what he does. He did it during qualifying and we were awesome. He simply continued doing that in the World Cup given that unlike '98 with Michael Owen there were no new awesome players burning up the Premiership last season. So, relatively blameless, he'll continue for the Euro 2012 qualifiers. Let's face it, who was going to replace him?

So, unlike in '98, I can't blame the gaffer for the FUBAR. Therefore, you have to wonder what was up with the players. Some would say that they were never good enough. That would be ignoring their record in the Premiership and in a lot of cases, the Champions League. OK, some, particularly those from the other side of the Channel, do just that claiming that Premiership form is invalid because we don't know what real football is. However that is called snobbery and should be ignored.

Some would say they can't play as a team! Hello...qualifying campaign. With the same manager. That argument doesn't hold water.

So, something clearly went wrong in the camp itself. Yes our quality of play in the last two friendlies prior to the tournament was iffy but I never complain about England wins. It's draws and defeats where I pick bones. Some say, the players were under too much expectation. Well expectation is the occupational hazard of the England footballer - as I said earlier, there are always morons who think we'll win the whole thing and given our qualifying form, this time some degree of expectation was natural, it should have been anticipated by the players. If it wasn't, well the FA need to prepare both them and future squads for this.

Another theory was that there was unrest in the camp, evidenced by John Terry's statement after the Algeria game. As much as I dislike the scumbag, I have to credit his openness in confirming that something was going wrong - otherwise it would have been like the elephant in the room. Yet the suggestion is that he was the cause of the trouble, the ex-captain still holding a grudge against Fabio for taking his armband away.

If that's the case well, Terry is a moron. To be honest I do suspect that Fabio saw the incident between Terry and Wayne Bridge as a non-issue and didn't want it to affect his football team. However the media weren't leaving him alone over the matter - he had to do something otherwise the entire squad would have been lynched. The Chelsea captain should have counted himself lucky that there were only a few months before the World Cup - otherwise Fabio would have surely felt safe in booting him from the Three Lions squad altogether. Back when the Terry-Bridge story first broke, I backed Fabio's decision to keep Terry around and maintain it was the right thing to do from a short-term football perspective. In the long term though, he is clearly more trouble than it's worth.

Another player to focus on is the most paradoxical one of the bunch. How can Wayne Rooney, our deadliest assasin and on United form this season one of the deadliest assasins in the world have such an awful World Cup. Again some continentals would say that he simply isn't a good player - these are largely the same morons that think Berbatov is a better player than him! Some say he doesn't want to play for England - it hasn't looked that way in prior tournaments when he's been fit.

Two more plausible theories - one that came from someone else, the other a Matt G original. The first one is that Wayne never recovered from the injury he picked up for United against Bayern in the Champions League, never allowed himself to recover because he didn't want to miss out on any matches. This would have been reckless but it definately rings true to the Rooney I know. The other relates to a comment made by a ref just prior to the World Cup that Rooney's aggression would get him sent off during the tournament. Is it impossible that this comment scared Rooney into playing within himself?

Anyway, that's all in the past, the important thing is what do we do now. Well Fabio already has plans to boot multiple players from the Three Lions for good. Terry is surely top of that list. Ashley Cole? Well he clearly has no loyalty to the Three Lions but credit where credit's due put in a reasonable effort in South Africa. 50/50. Goalkeeping, we need some fresh blood. Rooney is irreplacable assuming he's on form.

First things first, we have a friendly vs Hungary coming up in the next couple of months. I'd like to see what happens if we put no one who saw action in South Africa into the starting XI. Fabio seems to have a similar idea last I checked. Maybe something along the lines of:

Joe Hart: Third choice goalie in South Africa but despite decent friendly form, would have been a gamble to give him game time. Now is his time though.

Michah Richards: Seemed to be a pretty reasonable right back and younger than Gary Neville. Worth another go?

Rio Ferdinand(captain): Would have captained the team in South Africa had he not been injured. Credibility unquestioned.

Michael Dawson: Uncapped but was Rio's late replacement in South Africa, produced decent club form, worth a try.

Wayne Bridge: I'm pretty sure Terry's history, therefore this guy can come back.

Theo Walcott: Should have been in the 23.

Michael Carrick: On form he's very classy.

Tom Huddlestone: Was in the 30 and wouldn't have complained had he made the 23.

Adam Johnston: City boy who got hyped in the last few months of the season. Fabio put him in the 30 and even that was a gamble. Now let's see what he can do.

Darren Bent: Appears to know where the net is at club level, can he do it for England.

Gabriel Agbonlahor: Has his uses for Villa.

In the medium term, a few of these players(particularly Hart)have to be fitted into the regular England lineup for the Euro 2012 qualifiers - though the new blood can be no excuse for not qualifying for the Euros for what would be the 2nd time in a row.

Long term, that is the tricky one. How to consistently get the best out of the Three Lions.

Part of the issue may well be that not just England but the whole of the British Isles have a different atitude to football than an increasing part of the rest of the world.

In Brtain, we see football as a fast and physical game. Elsewhere it's seen as a skillful game. In Britain skills are seen as all well and good, but can be counteracted with a physical aproach. Elsewhere that attitude is seen as...out of order.

Instinctively, I go with the British aproach. It holds true at every level of the English game up to the Premiership. The likes of Arsene Wenger may say "your thugs are hurting my classy players - how dare you" and the likes of Sam Allardyce would reply with "my men have a football match to win - behave yourself".

The continentals say that the Allardyce approach kills technique though, that Premiership football is just too fast and physical to allow the truly great players to express themselves and if we watched more La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga etc we'd see that. They cite the likes of Diego Forlan and Arjen Robben, players that were mediocre at best in the Premiership were able to become stars elsewhere. In the meantime, we take the mick out of Serie A for being too slow.

This fact is though the the smooth passing style promoted by the continentals can be very boring. The classic case was the '08 friendly between France and England, the 2nd match of the Capello era. First impression? A dull looking England team beaten 1-0 by an off-form France side. Looking back, though yes our passing and technique was very good but still...we were boring. It looked like a training session rather than a football match.

The continentals would suggest that maybe that's the problem, we need to learn how to appreciate the same things they do. Well I do appreciate them it's just that even in this World Cup we've seen games where the classier side lost and when your team loses no whining about the opposition's supposed thuggery can change that. Still, the big problem may be that our guys are so used to a fast paced game that when the opposition slow things down and physicality is not allowed, we're not sure what to do.

So what to do about it? Some say it needs to start at school. The Dads brigade needs to be replaced by UEFA qualified professionals who develop kids for the international game. Slight problem, school sports aren't taken all that seriously over here, after all hardly any of these kids will make it as a professional so just let them play football and have fun why don't you? Professionalise school coaching and half the kids will be withdrawn from the team by parents that believe their little ones are being thrown in the deep end.

However the proponents of professional school coaching say that kids are being thrown in the deep end by playing full 11 a side matches from an early age - they should be focusing more on technique instead and again not encourage a more physical style of play. Slight problem, for most kids, football is 11 vs 11, technique is secondary. Focus on technique and they'll quit the teams. Yes the classy players will remain but they won't have many teammates. The proponents of professional schools coaching are not being realistic.

The next theory is that the Premiership is the root of the Three Lions problems. The line that always comes up is that England should field a Championship XI instead of relying on 'overpaid' players from the top flight. Sooner or later I'll find that joke in a Christmas cracker! I'm sure a Championship XI would give their all...I'm equally sure Scotland give their all...it generally doesn't amount to much in qualifiers though, let alone major tournaments!

The next line is that the Premiership clubs have to relearn how to serve the national team! OK, how? By enforcing the new 6+5 rule or go further? The problem is that the same people who propose that idea also want to completely overhaul the current Three Lions squad and not think about us seriously competing in international competition for 5-10 years. This would also potentially hamstring Premiership teams performance in Europe for a few years. Effectively you'd have the national team structure trying to slave-whip the 'greedy' Premiership.

That might work...if you weren't already getting Premiership fans, particularly those of the "big 4" deserting the Three Lions. I first noticed that trend during the McLaren era and Fabio didn't bring them back. Why? They look at what their club does, they look at what the Three Lions do, and the Three Lions are found wanting in some way, maybe in playing style, maybe in attitudes towards their favoured players(I've heard "stand up if you hate Man U" during an England match at Wembley). As an MUFC fans, I will still stick with the Three Lions but the attitude from a lot of fans will be "why is our team being held back to prop up England?", particularly if it's seen as a failing team. If England are going through transition at that point, they will lose more fans. In short, the Premiership will win that war.

The best solution I've heard of actually comes from my Dad. The theory is that we have the players and actually have a solid youth system already, it's just that it's run by the Premiership clubs. The Premiership clubs only care about money? Fine. Pay them whenever their players play for England, pay them bonuses if their players perform well. This encourages them to bring through English kids and maybe even English kids suited to the international game. Everyone's happy.

One way or another though, the FA has to do some tightrope waking.