England - a Team Full of Landon Donovans…
Interesting recent quote from Fabio Capello, concerning Frank Lampard’s on-off (most likely off) move from Chelsea to Inter Milan:
“As England coach I would prefer it if Lampard remained in England. He would have less travelling to do that way,” he told the Sun.
“I’m worse off than (Italy coach) Marcello Lippi, than everyone. I have Welsh players, Scottish, Irish,” he said.
“In the Premier League only 35 per cent of the players are English. In Italy it’s about 72 per cent.”
True enough. And despite the huge of recent imports to the Premier League, I’ve always felt that the England team (but not the English league) has suffered by playing host to the majority of the Welsh, Irish and Northern Irish national teams, as well as about half the Scottish national team.
But while keeping Frank Lampard in England might help keep that low low percentage of England based England players from dropping even lower, it’s not exactly a long term solution is it?
I’d argue that if you can’t beat ‘em then join ‘em. One way to deal with the lack of England internationals in the Premier League is to get more of them playing outside of the Premier League. Right now there’s juts David Beckham. And with all due respect to LA Galaxy, it’s at least one full step below the top European leagues (though Galaxy did recently recognize the abundant rubbishness of Abel Xavier and get rid of him, so at least there’s that).
Speaking of Galaxy, the England team is basically a bunch of Landon Donovans. And I don’t mean they’re short and prematurely balding.
I mean they’re scared to go and play some soccer outside the motherland. Frank Lampard moving to Inter would have been a great start, especially if he’d succeeded in Serie A. So though I’m loving Fabio Capello’s England tenure so far, I think it’s a shame that he’s publicly discouraging England players from playing abroad.
It’s not just about growing some balls and learning another language, it’s also about learning and adapting to new styles of play, which if enough players did it would be a huge boon to the England team as a whole.
Because right now the England only knows how to play the Premier League way. And without all the expensive foreigners, the Premier League way doesn’t work.
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one problem is our best players not playing enough 1st team football due to foreign imports, just look before Defoe was forced to leave Spurs, he and Bent were playing second fiddle to an irish player and a bulgarian. The only way to improve it is only allow 5 non english player per game but that will open a massive debate about EU working rules.




Why should they play if they aren’t the best on the team? A quota base on nationality? I don’t watch the game to see an Englishmen, i watch to see a team. Why can’t the English do like everyone else and go abroad as well? The Brazil and Argentina teams don’t even play in their own country. they leave. English could leave as well and fight for spots in Spain, Italy, Germany etc. but they don’t. they want a spot but don’t want to have to be the best to get it. How does that make them better? Just playing doesn’t make you better. The teams are full of Englishmen that play every week and aren’t any better. Paul Robinson plays and he’s crap. Nobody’s keeping him out. what’s his excuse.
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and if you limit it to five foriegners how good is the league gonna be when all the foriegners go to Spain, and Italy, Germany or even Holland or portugal? England will go back to being the mediocre league it was in the 70s and not the current Global force it is. England was full of just Englishmen for decades and that didn’t help them win a world cup.
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Nice Blog!Very Good Blog!
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