England does this all the time

[Alothi]

England sit, sit, and sit on a lead. Why. How many times will it take for the England players to learn that sitting does not win games. You did it against Brazil and lost...against Portugal and lost...TWICE. Notice today when England tied the game, it was the other team that started with all possesion.

One thing though, when England attack and look for goal, they are the best country in the world. They looked damn good getting two goals. It's just I hate them sitting on leads....they don't know how to do it.

[CherryBomb]

Obviously you smelled failure and got all nostalgic for your youth.

Thanks for the advice though!

[Extremely Frustrated]

We avoid closing down like the plague, that's part of the problem.

[Mac_Howard]

You can't overestimate the influence the manager has over the performance of the players.

I watch the Australian team as much as the English and I watched Hiddink take a ragbag of players, none of whom would ever make it into the England squad and many of whom would struggle in the Championship, and come within a bad refereeing decision of knocking Italy, the eventual World Cup Champions, out of the competition. He did it by devising a system that maximised the effectiveness of the players' skills and tactics that exploited the weakness of the opposition - a repeat of what he did with South Korea 4 years earlier and which he's beginning to do again with Russia.

England have simply not had a manager for some time now that has come even close to doing that with the much superior England players - and McClaren certainly hasn't.

I'm not a fan of Lampard and Gerrard in the England team but I don't believe they're not quality players in the right circumstances. But they have never had the opportunity to play their club roles in the England setup. Indeed, in playing the two together they never could. And there's the rub.

[bête noire]

You can't overestimate the influence the manager has over the performance of the players.

I watch the Australian team as much as the English and I watched Hiddink take a ragbag of players, none of whom would ever make it into the England squad and many of whom would struggle in the Championship, and come within a bad refereeing decision of knocking Italy, the eventual World Cup Champions, out of the competition. He did it by devising a system that maximised the effectiveness of the players' skills and tactics that exploited the weakness of the opposition - a repeat of what he did with South Korea 4 years earlier and which he's beginning to do again with Russia. ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah