England vs. Montenegro, World Cup Qual.: Friday 11/10/13, 20:00 Wembley Stadium, England [R]

Hodgson seems determined not to play and talk about Carrick, if anyone has naked pictures of him with goats it must be MC. We looked so much better when he came on.

 

Having Sturridge in the team as the spearhead makes Rooney more effective. Before this we had no outlet and just passed the ball to nowhere. Townsend looks more effective than walcott already with his better crossing and movement.

 

We looked better before then, tbh, culminating in them putting the ball into their own net. We looked quite relaxed and were knocking the ball around quite nicely.

Unfortunately we looked TOO relaxed. They showed the build up to their goal on the chin-wag after the game where the ball gets knocked from behind their own 18 yard line right up to where the guy shoots and NOBODY gets anywhere near any of their fellas to make a tackle. We were back to the old England 'soft centre' we've suffered from for years.

Against a good side we'd have suffered there.

 

Lampard is a brilliant player when he used further up the field in a more attacking role, playing the sitting role as he did last night he isn't as good as Carrick, I would play Carrick over him in that role.

 

Townsend offered something other than just push and run, definitely. That strike fooled everybody including, I'm sure, the goalkeeper who expected him to shift the ball onto his left foot. I hadn't seen much of him before but one of my workmates, a Spurs season ticket holder. claims he is already better than Lennon at that age.

 

I suppose it depends what you want. I don't think either of them can be used as a defensive 'shield' which was why I thought playing both Frank and Stevie together with 3 guys who can be thought of as natural 'centre forwards', (Sturridge, Rooney and Welbeck), was being, if anything TOO attacking. I think you can play any two of the three of Frank, Stevie or Carrick together if you've got someone else to run around and 'bulk up' the midfield, preferably a younger guy who gets his foot in but can also get forward on occasion. The obvious one is Wilshere.

IOW a 4-3-3 set-up.

Last night Woy seems to have gone for a narrow pairing in midfield and the fullbacks bombing on to give the width but, against a better side, that can leave us with the 'soft centre' problem we had under Sven and McSven where better sides simply played through us with, (often), quite basic passing and movement.

The point about Townsend was that, unlike Milner and guys like Young, he didn't KEEP cutting back when he got level with his defender, he KEPT running forwards and attacking, trying to either get wide or cut inside and create something. Of course, Walcott CAN do that but too often he's like fecking Bambie, all legs which aren't bolted together properly and usually makes dreadful decisions on the ball.

I thought Baines was a bright spot as well, particularly against a weaker side. Still not entirely convinced about him going the other way but it's swings and roundabouts I suppose. Mind you, he can also take a terrific free kick. That has to count for something in the choice between him and Ash.

Not sure what we're gong to do with Walker out. I don't like the look of Jones as fullback. He's got the look of a penalty or red card waiting to happen that guy. Smalling looks a better bet to me but I haven't seen a lot of either of them to be fair, so...

My idea of a set-up against Poland, (who I suspect will create more problems than Montenegro, tbh), would be...

- - - - - - - - - - - Hart
Smalling - Cahill - Jagielka - Baines
- Wilshere - Carrick - Gerrard
Townsend - Rooney - Sturridge

As I said, I think you could swap out Frank for Stevie, (in particular), and it wouldn't make a fat lot of difference but I accept others may disagree. That's fine TBH I think BOTH of them are becoming liabilities in one way or another as they get older. BOTH give the ball away and Frank doesn't tackle much but then, he doesn't give away silly free kicks in disastrous areas either, so...

As I keep saying, we need to start bringing in the young lads more and more but it looks like Woy has some sort of religious reason for not wanting to do that. His idea of 'yoof' is James fecking Milner who runs up and down quickly so he must be young

 

Quite possibly the most hilarious thing Woy has ever said.

 

So it looks like 'attacking flair = runs up and down a lot'. Yeah, that makes sense

 

Sterling comes in for Cleverley. At least it makes it more likely (I hope) that Zaha gets a start for the u21s.

 

Hopefully Townsend won't be spending too much time "in thought" between now and Tuesday. He should just feel the glow and the force.

May the force stay with him. May some of the others discover it.

 

I just don't sense the mediclorions in James Milner.... and Ravel needs to be midful of turning into a Sith.

 

Carrick came on when the score was 2-0. Obviously the opposition had to change the way they played due to the scoreline. They could no longer park the bus, which is why the team had so many chances to score in the second half.

 

Barry made a good post about Gerrard and Lampard CMs earlier in the thread which i cant seem to find.

Re Carrick changing the game, it had already changed. Montenegro started putting more bodies further up the pitch and it was fair less congested down the middle - it became easier to pass between the lines and there were more opportunities to make interceptions. That said, Carrick looked calm and confident.

Even at their peaks i was always against Lampard and Gerrard in a 2, or even having one of the 2 playing in a deeper role. Not a lot has changed really. However, given the paucity of other options, the critical nature of the games, and their tactical experience (both are aware of their limitations these days) I understand why Roy went with them and probably will against Poland too.

Carrick has never proven to be someone you would want next to you in the trenches, at least for England. I wouldn't play him against Poland, and then assuming we qualify,would set about finding a balanced midfield without either Gerrard or Lampard in the run up to Brazil.

Cleverly is much derided on here, but I feel he should still very much be in the reckoning come the World Cup. His strengths are exactly those lacked by English players position wide and he gives the team balance.

 

England miss-used scholes to accommodate lampard and gerrard and scholes was vastly superior, as a cm, to those 2

 

I would say that every manager and coach misused Scholes to a certain extent - he should have been earmarked as a deep lying player far earlier than he was. Pretty sure he would have been had he grown up in Spain Italy. The revisionism regarding Scholes is so tiresome.

As it was, Scholes was competing as an attack minded CM for 1 of 2 CM positions in a 442 for England - essentially a box to box role. In this context he was never vastly superior to Lampard or Gerrard as an option for England.

 

Certainly was to Lampard, who never was suited to a 2 man CM role.

His best form always came from the AM slot in front of 2 mids, where he could get more goals.

Gerrard is more debatable as he had somewhat more all round game and adaptability. But one of Gerrard and Lampard should have been playing AM ahead of Scholes anyway with a proper DM behind both.

Problem was Rooney emerged on the scene and they didn't want to use him as the lead the line striker, so instead of balancing the team accommodated all the players in roles unsuited to them.

Scholes then retired from international football and started playing less Box to box, while dictating play from deeper for United and possibly had his best years. Whether he could or should have done it earlier is debateable actually but don't think either Xavi or Pirlo had the all round game that Scholes did to play a 2 man box to box CM in his earlier days.

Particularly his finishing and long range shooting abilities needed to be utilized as well. And that role suited the System United wanted to play with 2 strikers.

 

The best form of his life came ahead of 2 CMs in the AM slot? Are you referring to his time under Hoddle?

I'd say England missed a trick not having Scholes dictating play from deep long ago (and Manu) with a battling Ince or Hargreaves plugging the gaps and an attacking box to box player with license to roam alongside him.

As an attacking CM in a 2 for an England side with an inability to keep possession, Gerrard + Lampard's ability to cover ground and pace made them better options for a box to box role over Scholes.

Scholes simply lacked the speed and mobility to be box to box for a side that easily coughed up possession and played on the counter.

 

That was in reference to Lampard. He was never suited to a 2 man CM role, and still isn't. He can do a job there but his best output always came ahead of 2 CM's.

United did pretty well with Keane and Scholes playing Box to box tbh with Beckham and Giggs wide. At the top level Scholes playing from the deep in big games required 1 more runner ahead of him like a Pirlo had with Juve and Italy.

For example when he played deeper later on in a 2 man midfield, United brought in a runner like Fletcher for big games making it a 3 or partnered him with a Fletcher in a 2 man midfield from time to time. Also when United played that 2 man midfield it required Rooney/Tevez dropping deep and filling in the gap between the midfield and striker.

While after the period with Cantona United played a more straightforward 4-4-2 with 2 strikers. And also playing him deep meant lessening his goalscoring ability from Midfield which was a asset with his finishing skills to the team.

United weren't ever a possession based team either and Scholes did decently in a box to box role partnered with Keane. He was a better athlete than you are giving him credit for though not Gerrard level and also pretty good positionally. With him in the team possession retention would have improved somewhat automatically.

Besides, England never had great wide player on the left or any consistently good 2 strikers/Support strikers for a sustainable period together so should have gone with a 3 man midfield to begin with.


Something like this -


---------------------------Gerrard/Lampard-----------------------------------

-----------------------Scholes -----------------------------------------

-----------------------------------Hargreaves/DM---------------------------

 

Yes that would have been a great midfield although I would have let Hargreaves off the leash and used Scholes at the base (with the benefit of hindsight!)

Unfortunately the problem was a soon to be knighted David Beckham (however I still rate his performances centrally for England under Hoddle as his best).

It's controversial of me to say it perhaps, but I think that both prime Lampard and certainly Gerrard would have been better fits for the 99 United side than Scholes. Not saying I think they are better players.