Why didnt England Qualify

[Antony OLBG]

After tonights appauling performance to throw away a second opportunity to qualify for Euro 2008, what do you think is the main reason that England didnt qualify?

(pick the option you think is MOST responsible)

[lazystakes]

All of the above
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[gecko6]

need an option for " a bit of all of these"

[HarryPabla]

All had an effect

Poor Management / Tactics

McClaren was not first choice in first place and his management was poor. Lets drop Beckham our best player in world cup. What a nutter. And he goes hes the reason why Beckham came back with a bang. Negative tactics does not work at international level. May have worked at Boro sit back etc but these players are top class players... Man Utd, Chelsea, Liverpool they do not usually sit back and play negative from back.
No authority from McClaren

Poor Players
England cannot play together. Just keeps on proving this point with the more matches played. World class professionals, but cannot play the tactics.

Poor Attitude
Arrogant. Walk in the park against lower teams. Wrong never ever do that. No managerial authority over them.

The English style of play
Dull, not creative, negative sit back want me to carry on?

Poor development of technical skills
Just shows big players out, backup cant fill in do not have technical ability.

Overall poor management led to all causes

[betking]

Awful manager, awful tactics, underperforming players.
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[deco121]

Several things but from the above the most accurate was "poor attitude"

A quote from myself in the England v Croatia thread - at the very start

[toffee62]

The only consilation is, Mclaren will GO!

I don't like managers who smile everytime they get beat!
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[jeremiah catskill]

For me its all down to the tactics & why Erikson before him came up short

When does Gerrard play in a 5 man midfield? - Never
When does Lampard play in a 5 man midfield? - Never
When does Barry sit in a holding role covering 2 midfielders? - Never
When does Crouch play up front on his own? - Rarely
When is it a good idea to give a 22 yr old keeper his competitive debut in the highest pressure match for 2 years? - never

You're asking half the team to do something & play in the way they never do. No wonder Croatia had oodles of time on the ball!

Pick your system first then fit the players in not as McLaren & Erikson did & choose your best players & cram them into whatever system will accommodate them

The 2 best performances were Israel & Russia where every single player played in the position they play week in week out. They weren't the best 11 players in England but they were a team

[HarryPabla]

What did Eriksson do wrong
Get knocked out by Brazil who went on to win the world cup
Get knocked out by Portugal after our best player was injured and we lost all rhythm and outbreak
Get knocked out by Portugal with 10 men

Were both Portugal games on the lottery of penalties which England have struggled with all their life.

Never get rid of Eriksson

[topnotch]

all of the above options need ticking. but one major factor which has held back english football courage since the early 70's that didn't make the poll was the extreme negativity in the press and minority sections of england fans who get a kick out of kicking people in the teeth, ridiculing anyone who gives them an excuse. mclaren was never the best man for the job but he was under fire before a ball had been kicked. the players read the papers and watch the media coverage and play with fear of failure, the fear inhibits them from trusting their ability. it isn't that they aren't bothered. terrified of being vilified, they resort to safety first which goes against their natural styles in the premier league. lets get real, most of these lads have played in cup finals, big champions league games and decisive league games etc but can still rise to a high level under pressure, however not for england.

i have never been a mclaren fan, and it is obvious he was not the best man to be appointed (was he THAT poor a coach though??) but by then the english media scrutiny had scared off the best candidate available at the time anyway. even so, this aint all his fault. he is gonna get it for a long time after this shambles, but it aint ALL his fault by a long chalk and the sooner people realise this the better. what i fear is that mclaren is going to be the scapegoat, but he is just the tip of the iceberg. the f.a. (appropritate given that is exactly how much balls and nous they have between them - as in sweet) should be all booted and replaced by experienced football men for a start. sure, boot mclaren, but those who appointed him should be packing their bags aswell. 4 years to the next tournament now should be spent getting the u21's primed for the big stage and build a formidable squad without relying on the beckhams and lampards and gerrards to bail us out time and again. the last thing, sure englans were poor in the first half tonight and shipped two sloppy goals (without 3 of the first choice defenders, and a rookie keeper who had to step in as robinson has seemingly cracked under the above mentioned pressure) but the second half performance was full of character coming back to 2-2. well, the third croatia goal was probably a message of fate or whatever giving all those with the knives out exactly what they deserve, a full blown pyrrhic victory. hope they are enjoying it.
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[thetitan]

Mostly down to McClaren for me (and the numpties who hired him). I never saw an ounce of passion from him, even when we were 2-0 down today he never showed any emotion. A fine trait when you're winning, but you want to at least look like you're doing something to the millions of fans watching!

Was apprehensive tonight when I saw 4-5-1, negative teams seem to inevitably to do badly. Bringing in Carson wasnt the worst decision he made, in retrospect it's easy to say he should have picked Robinson, give him credit there, at least it showed some balls, even if it was the wrong decision.

Complacency is probably the keyword which you can apply to most people in and around the team - when you're getting paid 50k+ per week (ie a 100/1 shot @ £500 for us!), it's hard to not take things for granted, but these guys are representing their country. There seemed to be very little drive and pride on the pitch tonight, I'm sorry to say that Frank Lampard probably epitomises this.
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[topnotch]

sorry to disagree titan, but i don't think it was complacency, i think it was stone cold fear. further, if you only need a draw, the 4-5-1 is what all the best coaches deploy, rather than play 4-4-2 and let the croats have extra space in midfield (even the croatia manager bilic said the england tactics didn't count to their failure). the freak early goal changed the game rapidly and even the best managers cannot be held accountable for that, after a very good opening spell. any other formation may have left england even more exposed and it may have been even worse than 2-0 at half time. who knows? giving the largest percentage of blame to just the manager is misguided. people seem to forget england have done nothing on the world stage since 1966, so they hardly have divine rights to qualify no matter how easy a group seems, nor do they have any form pedigree in these major tournaments. despite that they are usually 3rd or fourth favourites for most tournaments. it never fails to surprise how rapidly objectivity goes out of the window.
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top rugby tipster april 2007