And we all know what the common denominator is between these three. We could just name a 1992 England squad with obviously Mr Turnip in charge. Job done.
You must be joking. Steve Bull is 10 times the player of your Michael Owens and your Alan Shearers. He single-handedly saved England from embarassment against Tunisia, and was the last person to score for England against Scotland at Hampden Park for years.
If we're talking about that actually played together then this side would take some beating (although not on the pitch) ENGLAND: Chris Woods [Sheffield Wednesday] [35/0] Lee Dixon [Arsenal] [13/1] >46' David Bardsley [Queen's Park Rangers] [1/0] >63' Carlton Palmer [Sheffield Wedesday] [8/0] Stuart Pearce [c] [Nottingham Forest] [51/2] Paul Ince [Manchester United] [1/0] Des Walker [Sampdoria-ITA] [48/0] Mark Wright [Liverpool] [43/1] David Platt [Juventus-ITA] [33/11] David White [Manchester City] [1/0] >78' Brian Deane [Sheffield United] [3/0] Alan Shearer [Blackburn Rovers] [4/1] Nigel Clough [Nottingham Forest] [8/0] Andy Sinton [Queen's Park Rangers] [7/0] >78' Paul Merson [Arsenal] [8/1]
This approach is more interesting to me, not that anyone else need care. Any other nominations for actual squads that saw the field?
P Neville deserves a place in that team at left back because at least Powell had a good debut. (Never seen P Nev have a 1 good game for England)
Phil Neville has not been that bad and in all truth is not a left back (despite playing there on numerous occasions). If anyone should come in it should be David Bardsley or Keith Curle or even Earl Barrett.
There was some real shyte in the mid 90's - Carlton Palmer, Andy Sinton, Tony Dorigo, David Batty plus a ton of others who played in friendlies. That era also had some of the biggest flops for England ... Ian Wright (scored about 3 times) Andy Cole (ditto) Les Ferdiinand, Matthew Le'Tissier (never given a proper chance though). In fact had Graham Taylor built his side around Le'Tiss then we might have fared a little better. I'm not sure if Gazza was injured around then but a midfeild with Gazza, Le Tiss and Ince would of been pretty nifty. Matt didnt do himself any favours by staying at Southampton mind you - especially when he could of gone to Spurs Another manager who **********ed up was Ron Greenwood. Had he built the '82 world cup around Glenn Hoddle then we would have won it. Hoddle was one of the best players in Europe around that time
The early 90's were a misleading period in many ways, thanks almost totally to that dipshit of a manager the FA employed. At the time, we had a bunch of quality players. Real quality. Not only was the majority of the side that got to the WC semi-final in 1990 still playing (and in many cases, continuing to excel at club level), but we also had options coming through - players like Rob Jones, Paul Merson, Matt Le Tissier, Alan Shearer, Lee Sharpe and Steve McManaman. In addition, we had solid, if unspectacular, pros like David Batty and Neil Webb. Had Graham Taylor been able to apply a similar degree of perception to his squad selections as he did to his (in retrospect acknowledged as correct) views on athleticism and fitness training, we may not have made such a complete mess of that period of our history. It bears remembering that Terry Venables, almost universally considered a success as England manager, had more or less the same set of players to work with, but just chose not to give Andy fucking Sinton one more try.
There is some good names out there, I would put these players into the equation. They are not in any order. Gary Bailey David James Danny Mills Neil Ruddock Jason Wilcox Barry Venison Keith Curle John Fashanu Paul Bracewell Tony Cottee I am sure there are many more, especially from the Graham Taylor era
Come off it, there were loads worse players than Barnesy who played for England. He was one of my heroes when I was a kid. It used to make me sick when he was booed at Wembley. Mind you, I'm considering turning up to the next Channel 5 game and booing his attempts to be a TV presenter.
Luther Blissett, anyone? A hat-trick against Luxembourg, and no goals in his 13 other caps... better known today as a pseudonym than as a footballer...
There probably are but they didn't get 70 odd caps. One good game in 1982 doesn't qualify for a good england career.
Barnes wasn't bad for England, he just wasn't anywhere near the player he was for Liverpool or Watford, if he had been he would be one of England's greatest ever players.
Maybe I'm a little biased but calling Les Ferdinand an England flop is slightly harsh. His power and pace always caused problems, plus his goals to game ratio wasn't actually that bad. Admittedly he wasn't the second coming of Jimmy Greaves but he did ok for England.
Gotta say kevin phillips disapointed, trevor sinclair never really shown what he can do but did a job. Gareth Barry heavily underperformed