The Guardian is reporting (with a remarkable degree of certainty) that José Mourinho wants the England job and will accept if the FA offer it. Read it here. He’s apparently also interested in the top jobs at Real Madrid and Barcelona, either of which might become available before the new year, so if the story [...]

In today’s Times, Tony Cascarino condemns Steve McClaren in terms so damning it’s a wonder the man isn’t the latest incarnation of Satan. He defends England’s players, the English youth coaching system, foreign players in the Premier League, and lays the blame for England’s failure to qualify, in its entirity, at McClaren’s feet. He makes [...]

I’m feeling a bit better about things now after a horrible day of blind fury. So let’s step back and try to assess, rationally, what went wrong. And what went right. And to be positive, I’ll start with that. The Good:
Peter Crouch: Literally the only man on the pitch for the whole 90 minutes who [...]

First up: Croatia.
Croatia:
Goalkeeper: Stipe Pletikosa, a regular in the Croatian national team and the first-choice goalkeeper since the 2002 World Cup (although he was injured for much of Euro 2004). Hasn’t made many mistakes since his Under-21s days.
Defence: On the right, Manchester City’s summer signing Vedran Corluka will turn out for Croatia. He’s 6′4″, athletic [...]

This is only going here because it’s one of my personal axes, but Martin Samuel in The Times has written a brilliant article explaining why English players aren’t as good as their European and South American counterparts. I’ve written about this before on TheOffside.com (check it out here) but Martin Samuel makes a particular persuasive [...]

Steve McClaren still won’t reveal his starting 11 for tomorrow’s match against Croatia, but that isn’t going to stop me speculating.
Goalkeeper: The Times is reporting that Paul Robinson has performed abysmally in training, which probably means Scott Carson will get his first competitive start for England. The Guardian has the same story, but goes further [...]

Football365.com columnist John Nicholson thinks that the FA should create a new Championship team - England FC - made up entirely of young English players, to serve as a means of training young players outside of the usual system. Is it genius or just batshit?

Hello all - I’m the new guy. My name is Matthew and I’ll be taking over the England coverage here on WorldCupBlog.org. I’m a soon-to-be postgrad at England’s University of Sheffield, although I’m currently in Perú and will be in Belgium for much of December. Elsewhere on the Web, I’m the Leeds United blogger over [...]

Steve McClaren’s having a rough week. As if all the injuries aren’t bad enough, he’s got the likes of Tony Adams comparing him to Graham Taylor in certain newspapers. But if he gets six points from the next two games (Israel on Saturday, Russia on Wednesday) then things will look a lot brighter and failed [...]

Best manager in the world!