If Wishes were Horses

another world cup, another over hyped english side.

Every world cup its the now familiar story of all hype and no play. This world cup promises more of the same. It was really only in 1986 when england were coached by the great sir bobby robson and had such brilliant players like bryan robson, gary linekar,glenn hoddle among others that they had any chance of lifting the cup. that was ended by argentina and the now infamous hand of god goal in the semis. Since that time england has put out teams wrapped in mediocrity raised by the never say die british hype resulting in a string of failures at the major tournaments. This world cup promised to be different.

Indeed I beleived so......

The current england team has one of the best defences in this world cup with both terry and ferdinand partnering a composed central defense with the dependable neville and cole completing the back four. They have one of the most recognisable midfields in the tournament. David beckham is coming on the back of what has been his best season with Madrid, one of the few galacticos to have actually justified his pay check. Lampard and cole have had outstanding seasons with chelsea constantly improving under jose. Gerrard has had another good season with liverpool and three of the four that make up the midfield have laid their hands on some silverware this season and the four should have no trouble performing in the crunch matches. The attack is depleted without the presence of rooney although crouch and owen seem to be in good touch with theo walcott the unknown quantity.

Despite these things going for them, england will not win the world cup.....

here's why :

1. In sven Goran Erikson england have a coach who has had his grounding and success in the Italian Seria A creating in him a defensive approach which has indeed characterised english play for over 4 years now. The inability of the coach to be innovative and resourcefull especially when england fall behind means that england will lose out to the more attacking teams like argentina,brazil,etc.
2. The fact that england hardly score from open play.
3. Lampard and Gerrard are too similar and do not play well together with one of the two having to curb his natural attacking instincts.
4. The absense of rooney though reports suggest the striker may be back sooner rather than later.
5.The strategy of scoring the first goal then falling back and letting the opposition come at you.
6. The inability of the coach to ring in the proper substitutions indeed sven's ability to read the game itself is under some doubt after Owen was replaced by Downing thereby ' downing ' england's hopes of a second goal.
7. To win the world cup england will have to play brazil in the semis and i do not think they will win assuming of course that both teams make it that far.

So will end another world cup with the whole ountry down in the dumps and then the country will be back in 2007 over hyping the chances of their cricket team at the world cup.