Absolutly bl**dy FURIOUS

[Lensmeister]

Pardon me while I rant a little...

Anyone that knows me knows I am passionate about football specially my club Whitby and of course my country - England.

Today I feel ... well there are very few polite words I can use.

Let me go on record and say Northern Ireland did well and congratulations to them for their hard work.

Tonight.

Beckham played extremely well and looked like one of the few players looking to win. Gerrard, Lampard, Ferdinand, Cole Ashley & Joe all looked worn and haggered. Owen having not had much in the way of games for Real Madrid was slow and off the mark.

But to me the biggest problem was Rooney. Hot headed moody, childlike and prefered to throw his toys out of the pram and get his backside in to gear and grow up! He was booked, rightly so. He lead with his arm in a jump for the ball and caught a player on the head. Luckily it wasn't a back knock. Did he accept his booking? Did he show remorse? No he threw a temper and ranted at the ref, the Linesman, and his own team mates. When will this over paid little brat realise that people can lip read, and his foul language can be read. Kids look up to this poor excuse for a human! Pushing your own captain out the way to have another pop at the ref isn't conducive to a happy changing room.

Next on my list of players from hell...... the one ... the only (thank God) Owen Hargreaves. Good God .. if ever there was an award for the most useless player on a pitch making as many mistakes in a short space of time then Hargreaves is the outright winner. Dear God .. on the pitch not more than 5 minutes and he has three touches of the ball ... 1st touch and fouled on the edge of the box ... second touch .. bundles a player over .. both resulting in a freekicks ... seconds later ... passes the ball switly and acuratly to .. yup you guess it .. an N. Ireland player !

As I said before .. England ARE good enough to win the World Cup in Germany next year, they have the kind of players that are world class and in some cases the best in their position in the world.... but what good if they can't play together!

This last sad fact will in all probility cast a dark shadow over the English F.A's roof tonight and will have one or two true England fans like myself questioning the direction of the manager, Eriksson. Maybe the pressure of his well publicised off pitch "games" with other females may have been a stress .. but these were a while ago. Surely a consumate Professional (as the FA has suggested on more than one occassion) can seperate his work life and his home life. I know Joe Public (or John Doe) has to. Can you imagine going to work and after screwing up something try to use the excuse that your love life is a problem.... I think I'd be looking for a new job .. wouldn't you?

Still Austria is the next opponents and then the big one .. Poland away. if England beat Austria then they HAVE to beat Poland to get through automatically.

Well rant over ........

And we return you to your normal viewing pleasures.

 

[kelox]

Ummm...Ahhhhh....what he said. Yeah!!!!!!!

 

[tempra]

it's only a game

 

[Meysha]

wow... long rant. didn't read it at all but I saw it was about soccer... i think.

I love it how people love a sport so much.

 

[Becky]

Go N.I

England win plenty... give us a go! If you could see some of the faces here you'd know how much this has meant to some people...

Although I'm not a big fan personally, good for NI I guess! :blushing:

And yeh... shame on Rooney, what a little tosser... all gone to his head!

 

[Jeff Canes]

Sports brings best out of people

 

[Mitica100]

Ahh... Where are the good ol' days of Bobby Charlton?

 

[Lensmeister]

Couple issues here .....

1. Congrats to Northern Ireland as I have said they did well.

2. "only a game" ...... WHAT?????????? As Bill shankey once said .... it's not life and death ... it's more important!

3. I've not met one person today who hasn't been angry about the 2nd half performance or that hasn't agreed with my quotes above.

4. I think if the positition of England Manager becomes available .. I might just apply for it .....

 

[ferny]

I've never really liked England, we've always been ****e. When was the last time we consistently played as a team? Years and years ago. We've got good players, but they never gel. People go on about there being no tactics blah blah. The real problem is that there is no movement. No-one is running off the ball. An England player will have the ball and be looking to pass it. The only options he has are to either pass it back, pass it to someone marked by three other players or to hoof it up the pitch. I detest the long ball game. Or rather, I can't stand to watch players like Gerrard smash it up the pitch and then cross his fingers hoping it lands on the head of a short Owen or Rooney. We need the people who don't have to ball to show some initiative and get their arses moving. Give the passer options.

Rooney is a spud. The boy is a walking potato and has the brains of one. Beckham should have taken him to one side and made him calm down. Instead he had two words, Rooney told him to go **** himself and Beckham left him to it. You know what though, he'll continue to get away with it because he plays for the Mancs. I've never been a huge Beckham fan, I've always said he was over rated. He really impressed me with his passing last night though. Almost always on target and looking to bring others into play. But, it was a long pass again most of the time. He had very little choice.

I'm not going to jump on the anti-Sven bandwagon, that's big enough. I don't think he's right for the job though. He's always said how he prefers club football. To be honest, when he does leave England I don't think there will be too many clubs looking for his services. I picture him going back to Italy and managing a team who constantly struggle to qualify for the Champions League. He's a good manager, his history shows that, but I think his reputation has nose-dived.
We do need a different manager, I think. We need someone who can inspire and lead the team. Actually, anyone who can make a team out of the squad of 22. Getting the players to work together. But please, not Allardyce. He won't be able to buy ageing foreigners who only have a couple of years left in them if he's England manager...

I think I'll stick up for Hargreaves. He was a waste of space last night, but whose fault was that? How often does he play? And when he does, it's normally the last few minutes of a match. No way could he put in a good performance. That again goes back to Sven and his insistence on pandering to Premiership managers and only playing players for 45 minutes in a friendly. I wonder if that could be a reason for England only ever being good during first halves.

But the biggest shock of all, the one which really made me fall off my chair... Scotland won! :shock:

 

[LaFoto]

...
As I said before .. England ARE good enough to win the World Cup in Germany next year....

WHAT????????







(By the way: the real soccer fans among my fellow countrymen rant about our team in the self same manner..... )

 

[Vmann]

Hey you could live in America and have no soccer... pardon me football at all. At least you get to watch this fascinating sport... I get stuck watching the same overpayed athletes of baseball and basketball.

Ill trade you sports any day of the week.

It is a shame though watching a team you love so much seem to throw it all away over such poor playing and conduct.

 

[bace]

OK. I don't want to read the rants in this thread.

Did England lose Northern Ireland?

 

['Daniel']

Yes. I lost interest in football when I was about 10 (not saying its immature or anything) so It didn't bother me. i can watcha game and watched some of the first half. All I can say is they looked poor. It looked like strategy more than anything. Chances weren't made.

 

[bace]

In Toronto you either have to be up early on a weekend. Or be available at really odd hours during the week to catch good football games.

I love watching the sport, but just not into it enough to catch the games when they're on. I usually end up catching the replays. Which is still fun.

I have friends that keep the stats for me. I try and watch with them, so I know what's going on.