If we work on the idea that Redknapp gets the job, we have to bear in mind that he is Harry Redknapp and not Harry Houdini. There are a plethora of unresolved problems for him to sort out when he gets there. Can John Terry and Rio Ferdinand play together? Who is going to be the new captain? What is the best formation 4-4-2, 4-3-3 or 4-5-1? A new manager in any job needs time to acclimatise and Redknapp will have less than a month from the season ending to the Euro’s starting. Let us not forget he will have the same players to choose from as Capello and Rooney will still be suspended; he may fancy Crouch and still favour Johnson over Richards.
It may not be the Redknapp revolution that everyone expects. Redknapp cannot sign Louis Saha on a free for England nor sign Adebayor on loan from Togo. Spurs have played some magical football this season, but England will not be able to have Bale or Modric in the team. However, we do have Walcott and Wilshere and although Walcott is not in the same class as Bale and Wilshere has question marks over his fitness, Redknapps style of quick football with the ball played across the floor can surely open up any defence.
If England were a club team, they would be Chelsea; a strong desire to move on and bring the next generation through while an ever expectant fan base expects wins, not impossible just very difficult. Expectations have been lowered after the shambles of 2010, but you get the feeling they will be raised with a Redknapp appointment. Stuart Pearce is the safe choice, he can do the Di Matteo role, pick who he wants on a one off basis knowing that he is probably not auditioning for the job full time.
Personally, if Stuart Pearce claims that he is “too inexperienced for the full-time job” then he should be nowhere near it now. England needs to stop living in the extremes; the laissez-faire management by Sven and McClaren to the school master rule by Capello, very little gets achieved that way. Too many England managers’ regimes have been tainted and undermined by umbrellas, indexes and Ulrika Johnson. Hopefully Redknapp will bring a sense of normality back to the job, a manager we like to think we could relate to, a suit on top but his tracksuit underneath.
After 2010, the FA were given a golden opportunity to get itself back on its feet, but yet again the English name is on all fours, trousers down being laughed at by the rest of Europe. The FA is slowly running out of time to even parachute a man in, quite soon we will need a full blown care package. English clubs already get a bad name for writing off the Europa League therefore we cannot be as egotistical as to write off Euro 2012 as a transitional tournament. The England job is the most difficult job but it could be the best one, but the FA is slowly making it impossible; as it stands we have no manager, no captain, no Rooney and no chance.
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