Or more to the point stop believing “we have a chance here".
This is for people who don’t historically wish failure on England.
2006 was my turning point. Our supposed youngsters of 1998 all coming together around about what should be close to their peak years. Result? Limped out of quarter final having looked knackered the whole game, had pacey 16 year old on the bench, who predictably did not get a single minute the whole tournament.
Fair enough Walcott shouldn’t have gone in the 1st place. But if you’re gonna take him. And you’re needing a goal and he’s your only ‘UFO’ as such, with bags of pace, Then use him!!
Until then, I believed if things went our way:-
Opposition get star player injured.
Refereeing decisions going our way.
It suddenly comes together for our players.
That anything could happen and I could finally come close to knowing how the people old enough to remember 66’ felt. That and living in Scotland as I did it would have made it all the more sweeter. Especially as they seemed to think our media kept mentioning 66’
I don’t even dare to get my hopes up any more. Not to win it anyway. I have to admit, I did keep waiting against Iceland for the performance in the match to get better. Even by our recent standards, that performance gobsmacked me.
England - When did you stop hoping?
posted on 2/3/17
Aye, we didn't "invent" football but did we give it a set of rules/code
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This is when modern football was invented though.
I'm not aware of any previous version of the game that could reasonably be called football tbh. Sure, people have been playing games involving kicking a ball for thousands of years but that's not the same thing imo.
posted on 2/3/17
2010 for me.
2006 was bad but we went out on penalties. Many very good sides have gone out on penalties before so you could cut them some slack. 2010 was the last chance for the golden gen, and boy did they blow it spectacularly.
Absolutely humiliated by a young German team in the knockouts as well as that embarrassment by Algeria in the group stage.
Rooney shouting at the camera topped it off really. His performance in that game against Algeria was and is still the worst performance I've ever seen from an individual player in any one match.
Current group are hopeless, will make the world cup but be another depressing group stage exit.
posted on 2/3/17
When the domestic game got pumped with the first wave of TV deals, the formation of the Premier League and the subsequent £multi-billion contracts.
No coincidence that this came after Italia '90 and before USA '94.
In a nutshell, a combination of the Premier League, the top six cabal, satellite/cable/on-line platforms and the top 4 qualification for the Champion's League with the potential revenue available all hammered a nail into the coffin of any hope the England national team had of achieving success. Winning anything?
Not a chance in hell now.
posted on 2/3/17
2010 I guess, 2006 was tough but it was at least a creditable performance, with 10 men, taking it to penalties, but 2010 was downright abysmal, after the failure to qualify for Euro 2008 & then struggling to get out of such an easy group & subsequent thrashing by the Germans. It really left me to feel little optimism for the next few tourneys. I hope one day I can feel really positive about are chances of really challenging for major honours, but sadly I don't see it in the not too distant future
posted on 2/3/17
comment by Planète des Singes - "..we will conquer the ball..! "🎬🚀🌎💣🎇🙈🙉🙊🌏🗽 (U4158)
posted 23 seconds ago
When the domestic game got pumped with the first wave of TV deals, the formation of the Premier League and the subsequent £multi-billion contracts.
No coincidence that this came after Italia '90 and before USA '94.
In a nutshell, a combination of the Premier League, the top six cabal, satellite/cable/on-line platforms and the top 4 qualification for the Champion's League with the potential revenue available all hammered a nail into the coffin of any hope the England national team had of achieving success. Winning anything?
Not a chance in hell now.
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Good post, sky's meddling with the league has made the sport much worse for me.
posted on 2/3/17
^
Euro '96 was our last chance. We had a great squad, world class individuals, manager at his peak, home advantage. The moment was there. Great days.
Should've won it but, very sadly, blew it.
No chance now.
posted on 3/3/17
Aren't we targeting winning it in Russia?
posted on 3/3/17
comment by LQ (U6305)
posted 2 hours, 12 minutes ago
Aren't we targeting winning it in Russia?
===========================
May be a target, but there's a catalogue of those being missed by our national team. The FA are inept.
posted on 3/3/17
I stopped hoping a while ago, probably 2010 for the reasons below.
Managers were/are weak thus choosing players who are big names hoping they will perform rather than players who are on form.
Tactically and technically we don't seem to be able to match up to other bigger teams in the tournament. Although the last euro tournament was awful, that wasn't just us.
Media tends to hype the England team up so much that expectations normally becomes unrealistic. The hype after we beat Faroe Islands in a friendly is ridiculous.
I am not sure whether the players lack passion but I do think we have a lack of options in good quality players. We have plenty youths coming through to the youth systems however not many will make it in the EPL because they are not given the chance since the league (it has slightly changed in the last year or so with Poch, Klopp and Wenger) wants instant success and they would prefer to buy "ready-made" players since the financial implications are huge.
The EPL doesn't help our youth or own players because it is probably the most televised league in the world so the money is massive. With the influx of "ready-made" good foreign players coming through, our players wont get as much chances.
With the current top 6, we should be able to put together a decent first XI but I think we lack depth in the squad with injuries, lack of form etc. Our 25 man squad is a bit weak.
posted on 4/3/17
The major issue is the mentality in the players. It's more about that than tactics and selection for me. As hopeless as Hodgson is, you cannot account for experienced players like Rooney not being able to trap a ball, Kane not looking anywhere near like scoring even though he's one of the league's top goalscorers, the whole team not being able to make simple basic passes to one another.
Whoever manages England needs to be able to galvanise that team during a tournament and relax them so they don't have these mental blocks.