Whilst most of the debate concerning the future of this England side concerns the question of who is going to take over as manager, I can’t help but feel that we’ve all got our priorities wrong. All the dialogue seems to concern whether or not Harry Redknapp takes over as manager, but shouldn’t we be more concerned with the players who seem to be running amuck in the Premier League?
Just look at the situation with Chelsea, where the clubs English stars seem to be rallying against Andre Villas-Boas. The likes of Ashley Cole, Frank Lampard and John Terry have not been at their best under Villas-Boas and don’t seem to have offered their manager any support over the past months. Chelsea are really struggling and their biggest players have found it impossible to rally around their manager – something that bodes badly for England’s chances this summer.
After all, it’s always been troublesome getting this group of players to start playing as a team. At the moment Chelsea look like a bunch of individuals of wildly different talent levels and should player power prevail it will only serve to increase their ego.
Then there’s Theo Walcott and Aaron Lennon who are underperforming with their respective clubs, Adam Johnson who doesn’t get enough of a look in at Man City and Andy Carroll who looks is as poor in a Red shirt as he was good in a Newcastle shirt.
The rise of player power in conjunction with the increase of age of many of England’s best players and injuries to the likes of Jack Wilshere put the National side in an awful position. Whoever the manager is, they’re in for a real challenge.
Which brings me to Roy Keane’s quotes. In an interview with Yahoo he said:
“I think the most important factor for the next manager is to get England playing as a team. I think there have certainly been problems over the last few years; I would not say splits in the camp but there is always lots of off-the-field stuff going on. It is difficult for any manager because you are only getting the players for a certain period [of time] over the course of the season. So I think just trying to get that spirit back into the England set-up is important because it seems to be lacking.”
“It is dangerous for us to be second guessing but from ex players who talk about it [England], possibly the best spirit was when Terry Venables was the manager. But we are then going back to 96 and obviously the tournament was in England when England nearly won it. I think it is important for the new manager to get everyone enjoying playing for England. There seems to be a lot of fear factor when squads get together and maybe there does not seem to be that unity amongst the players.”
That’s exactly it. There’s no team spirit amongst our International stars and if England are to be in with a genuine shot this summer that’s something that will have to change.
For more insight from Roy Keane and other leading managers plus exclusive Premier League highlights go to www.yahoo.co.uk/sport
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