Back from his undeserved holiday, England manager Fabio Capello faces the FA board on his return to work (assuming he decides to attend – he doesn’t have to, but he damn well should), expected to hand in his report on what happened in South Africa during the World Cup.
Smacks of the failed school child filling in his end of term report, doesn’t it. I can imagine Capello and his ‘gang’ – Franco Baldini et al – staring at their shoes, looking sheepish, in front of a long table occupied by the FA board members as they peruse his broken English report.
It’s almost demeaning.
Yet should he expect anything else? I don’t for a second lay all the blame for England’s poor tournament performance at his door. They players MUST shoulder the majority of the blame, they didn’t do themselves or their country justice. However, several of Capello’s decisions in the run up to and during the World Cup were questionable.
What I’m wondering now is what does he do between now and England’s friendly against Hungary in August?
Capello talked about freshening up the England squad with youth and exuberance. He has the chance to run the rule over our Under-19s from the 18th-30th July during the European Championships, yet reports suggest he won’t be attending. One can only assume he is sending Baldini – or should I say one hopes?
I can’t see that he has anything else to do for those 12 days, so why isn’t he going? This is England’s future and he has two years left on his contract, by which time at least some of these players could and should be pushing for a senior place. This is the ideal time to earmark those he feels will make it and follow their progress in the run up to the Euros in 2012.
It will be baffling if he doesn’t take that opportunity.
Of course, he has that tricky board meeting this afternoon first. Sky Sports are reporting that the World Cup is NOT an item on the agenda, however. Nothing like sweeping things under the carpet, eh, lads. They should be sitting down and picking apart EVERYTHING that went wrong, no matter how uncomfortable it is.
We’ve all read the reports of dressing room unrest and players falling out with one another. Surely decisions need to be taken on who was at fault for this and banish them from the squad for good, freeing up those places for youth. No matter who they are…
I laid out my blueprint for England’s future a couple of weeks ago and I stand by it. Radical action needs to be taken to start getting England back to the pinnacle of world football and it seems to me it isn’t going to happen…again.
The FA have always been stuck in the past but I thought Capello was dynamic enough to start changing that, respected enough to be allowed to do so. Seems I was wrong and he has been ground down by the sheer idiocy and resistance to change from his bosses. That’s why change is needed at the very top, not at manager level.
In the meantime, we may as well resign ourselves to overall mediocrity and the boom and bust mood England’s performances (and the media reporting of it) will create in the country.
The new season isn’t far away and Sporting Fare is inviting you to join our Fantasy Football League on Sky Sports. There’s a £25,000 prize for the overall winner on the site (NOT the Sporting Fare League – though if I can work out a prize I’ll let you all know) and it’s free to enter so there’s a good incentive!
