England’s Under 21 footballers could scarcely have foreseen the considerable attention that their appearance in this summer’s European Championship tournament would attract.
Even if the nation’s youngsters had returned with the trophy in tow, it is unlikely that achievement would have commanded the column inches and air time that spawned from three performances which began badly and progressed beyond abject.
The blame for their lamentable showing in Israel has been apportioned across a number of different factors.
The chief concern is the lack of technique displayed by a high number of our nation’s players. That deficiency is not only apparent when English players are compared with their revered counterparts from Spain, Holland, and Germany. Stuart Pearce’s team were shown up by Norway, and came up short in terms of ball retention against the hosts.
Player availability has proved another hot topic. Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Phil Jones in particular, have the credentials to be absolutely integral to the fortunes of their country’s football team for years to come. For those two individuals, still only 19 and 21 years old respectively, their absence from this competition is a fantastic opportunity missed.
Oxlade-Chamberlain and Jones would have acted as natural leaders of this group, both on and off the field. Both have experience of Champions League football and, between them, 19 full international caps. Nevertheless, the summer competition was something entirely different.
Participating in a concentrated tournament provides unique challenges – and when it comes to the full national side’s involvement in these jamborees all of England watches on. Regardless of the number of us who prioritise our club team’s fortunes over our country’s there is no greater boon for the game in this land than a successful England team.
The hand-wringing and navel-gazing which follows each sorry biennial spectacle is hastily washed away with the resumption of all-consuming domestic fare. Plaintive cries about limited playing opportunities for emerging English players, lack of coaching hours available to youngsters, and the inability of our footballers to pass the ball to a team-mate, soon give way to a blinkered focus on the cut and thrust of the Premier League. There aren’t many supporters who, when cheering their team on in December, spare a great deal of thought for the fact that their cultured centre-half or prolific striker is of Serbian or Swedish stock.
Every chance for our most promising crop of tyros must be grasped with both hands. Phil Neville, a six-time Premier League and 1999 Champions League winner with Manchester United, and proud possessor of 59 England caps spoke, prior to being part of Stuart Pearce’s backroom staff in Israel, of the ‘incredible experience’ of tournament football, and of the scope for learning in a different environment.
The chance to expedite the advancement of Oxlade-Chamberlain, Jones, Danny Welbeck, and Jack Rodwell, both as footballers and as men, has been casually tossed aside. Meanwhile, Italy field Marco Verratti of Paris Saint-Germain and Napoil’s Lorenzo Insigne. Spain’s squad is bolstered by full-caps, Isco, Iker Muniain, and Thiago Alcantara to name a few. These countries are not the exception when it comes to ensuring the best available pool of talent is in attendance when the continent’s best teams assemble every two years.
After England’s elimination, the F.A.’s soon to be chairman emeritus, David Bernstein, defended the decision to prioritise a full international friendly fixture above the Under-21 competition. Curiously, Bernstein declared that the governing body wouldn’t have expected players to ‘travel, play in a hot climate (in Brazil) and then play here (in Israel).
Given the first class travel to which they are accustomed, the potential inclusion of an individual in both Roy Hodgson’s and Stuart Pearce’s squads should not have been prevented on the grounds of logistics.
Manuel Neuer made his first start in Germany’s goal in a Dubai friendly against the United Arab Emirates on 2nd June 2009. Thirteen days later he took his place for the first match of that year’s Under-21 championship in Sweden. A year after being part of the team which won the 2009 tournament, and in common with colleagues in that achievement, Mesut Ozil, Sami Khedira, and Jerome Boateng, Neuer was part of the German side which embarrassed England on the way to the semi-finals of the South African World Cup.
Furthermore, and this is another subject du jour, these fledgling England players being afforded an extended rest are lightly run. Oxlade-Chamberlain made fifteen domestic starting appearances for his club in the season recently finished, and 15 more from the bench. Jones’ comparable figures are thirteen and 4. Jack Rodwell joined the senior party to Brazil and tasted six minutes of action. His campaign at Manchester City entailed eleven outings from the first whistle.
Bernstein might contest that the clash in Brazil’s Maracana was a ‘very important fixture’, and ‘a dry run for the World Cup’, but whatever the validity of his assertion, there can be no excuse for non-competitive football trampling over the development of England’s sparse, but exceptionally gifted, collection of young talent.
Pearce, whose time as his country’s Under-21 boss is surely up, – for no matter his restricted pool in Israel, the lack of on-pitch cohesion, composure, organisation, and drive was alarming – warned as long ago as February of the folly in taking anything other than the very best players available for the June competition.
The manager had been bitten by that eventuality in 2011 when he was denied the potent mix that would have been offered by Jack Wilshere and Andy Carroll. Wilshere subsequently suffered a debilitating injury playing an Emirates Cup match for Arsenal against New York Red Bulls on July 31st. He wasn’t seen in competitive action until 15 months later on 28 October 2012.
The 2011 winners, Spain, included in their wonderful team Juan Mata and Javi Martinez. Both were members of their country’s victorious World Cup squad 12 months earlier.
Of course, the presence this year of Jones, Welbeck, or Wilshere – who is still eligible for under-21 football – would not have guaranteed Italy, Norway, and Israel being casually swatted aside. Indeed, the two Manchester United players, along with Chris Smalling and Kyle Walker – another fitting the age criteria this time – were part of the team which struggled in Denmark two years ago. Notwithstanding that, the knowledge already harvested by Jones, Welbeck, and Walker, would have offered a new dynamic to the group – even before considering the contribution to their own development.
Herein lies another defect in the Under-21 set-up. There are too many players involved who, in reality, have no chance of completing the transition to full international.
Jason Lowe and Adam Smith, to pick two from the latest team, are honest and committed professionals. Nevertheless, they will not figure in the plans of Roy Hodgson, nor those of any of the England manager’s successors.