Mata and Silva leading the premiership's Spanish revolution

The conjecture that England aren’t currently good enough to win a major championship is primarily borne out of Spain’s recent emergence as the new purveyors of Total Football.  Technical, quick, sharp and clinical, Spain’s approach in fact the ‘Spanish approach’, to football has reborn and renergised the notion that football can be a beautiful game.  My observations in this assessment, in short, aren’t based on any startling statistics that Spain have devoted more money and resources into coaching and talent identification and development.  In fact I would hazard a guess that in England far more money is spent on attempting to develop the English national team than it is in Spain.

The beautiful game is synonymous of countries with flair.  Brazil, Holland, and now Spain have all ticked the numerous boxes to be considered a great footballing side.  In the last two decades Italy with players like Baggio, Del Piero and Totti could be considered to enter that bracket.  So too could France; Zidane Henry and Ribery to name a few examples. Both these sides have won world cups and whilst neither would be considered beautiful in their approach nor could be classed in Spain’s current fluent bracket, their robust style was intertwined with players who a) performed on the big stage and b) could create a moment of genius.  Maradonna and the Argentinian sides of ’86 and ’90 fall into this catergory too.  The Dutch team that were a Robben one on one away from glory had an abundance of Van der playmakers and the German side that ripped England apart, did so with guile and Ozil orchestarated class.  Even England’s bogey side Portugal had Ronaldo and Deco et al.

The point is there is more than one way to skin the Jules Rimet cat however a player or players of creative flair and even genius are often the heartbeat of their success.   Think back through England’s catalogue of misery…The names that spring to mind are obviously Gazza probably Beardsley and maybe more recently Rooney.  My contention is that the absence of personnel coupled with an overinflated opinion of the impact the English players have in their club’s successes is a major contributing factor to our lack of even a sniff of major honours since 1990 and beyond.  Put in simple terms; this season Juan Mata and David Silva have been two of the most impressive players in the premiership, certainly the most technically gifted, and they can’t get in their national teams, such is the strength in quality of Spain’s first eleven, how are England placed to combat this.  My argument is they are at least 10 years too late and counting.

Paul Hayward of the Guradian concurs that Mata and Silva are among the most exciting talents in the premiership, tweeting “Mata, Modric, Silva and Aguero (plus Wilshere) could make this the year of the little wizard – good news for small, skillful English boys.  He is right, it is exciting however if parents, teachers and coaches can’t get the self obsessed indulgence of winning out of their psyche we will continue to breed players that can’t cut it technically at the top level.  In schools the obsession of some teachers to play a winning style as oppose to a developmental one is an easy trap to fall into. The quick 11 year old who is almost six foot is ideal!  Pump the long balls and get him to chase.  He scores 5 a game and the school are all conquering, until they turn 15 or 16 when the rest have caught up physically.  Curtis is no longer the best player and is let go by the local club because his reliable attributes of strength speed and power are possessed by 90% of the talented youngsters in the academy.  Had he focussed more on his technical development in year 7 things may have been different.  When I played county football the selection programmes relied upon physical size, length of throw and speed.  Everything else seemed inconsequential.  Mind you, in a half an hour trial what else can they look for?  We hear that in Holland and Spain they play small sided games and the focus isn’t on winning but development. I’m sure this is true  and it is the mindset that is key.  The mentality of “winning is everything” is not just prevalent it is overpowering in England which causes regression not progression in our nations game.

Parents are worse than teachers and coaches and carry more responsibility in my opinion.  Their influence on their offspring is critical in their development both physically and mentally.  It is the mental side which is all important; instilling values that will ensure a drive or desire to achieve. Quite frankly the attitude and behaviour of some parents at football matches is infantile at best and an embarrassment to their children.  Role models start at home and the it isn’t the responsibility of premiership footballers to be the moral compass of a teenager.

We have to be careful what we wish for as Chelsea showed at Old Trafford on Sunday;  a free flowing, technically sound and open style that was great to watch, but yielded a resounding beating against the best side in the country.  There has to be a balance and on the weekend when Arsenal again fielded a side with no English players in it, it is my belief that just because our domestic clubs are successful, what good does that do the national team.  How influential are the English players in their club’s success?  The first picture a lot of people will get is of Steven Gerrard heroically leading Liverpool to many memorable European nights.  Gerrard is without doubt a crucial cog in Liverpool’s wheel as Lampard has been for Chelsea.  But remember this article focuses on depth;  The Silva and Mata paradigm.

Below is a list of statistics (courtesy of www.statbunker.com) that illustrates England’s inability to establish strength in depth into European and ultimately world football.  The stats show the amount of players that have played in the Champions league from respective world countries.

2011/12 – England 10th ( 34 behind Brazil)

2010/11 – England 8th (46 behind Brazil)

2006/07  - 7th (49 behind Brazil)

2000/01 – 7th (1 behind Brazil)

In the past 10 seasons England has never been in the top 5 most represented countries in the Champions League.  France, Spain, Italy and Brazil are in almost every top 5 and regularly have 40 more players than England competing at Club football’s elite level. It is therefore no surprise that excluding Greece all the major tournaments since 1998 have been won by these 4 nations.  10 years ago Brazil had just one more player involved in the champions league than England.  Since then England have only improved on this figure by 3 players (maxing at 43 in 02/03).  England have always had big clubs, paid good wages and this may ironically be the reason for a lack of English talent (too many foreigners), however it seems inexcusable that we have plateaued for 10 years whilst the likes of Brazil have doubled the amount of players performing in the Champions League.  England, their FA and the Premier League have been lying asleep in their beds of money for too long and it is going to be a long road to redress the balance.

This season Barcelona are again the pacesetters destroying Osasuna 8-0 at the weekend.  Manchester United as I have commented on previous posts look set to try and combat them in a more open way this year illustrated by their destruction of Arsenal. Barring Rooney and possibly Young neither side possesses any English attacking threats.  Chelsea have Mata, Drogba, Torres, Meireles, Lukaku and Anelka with only Lampard and Sturridge flying the flag for England and Man City have no English influence bar Adam Johnson’s bench warming as Aguero, Dzeko and Silva take top billing.  It is in my opinion a crucial time for English clubs and the FA regarding the national team and its longevity.  There are lots of youngsters with potential, but regularly they are shipped off on loan and never seen again, never getting a go at the highest level to prove themselves.  More Englishman should be brave, like Joe Cole, and take a wage cut to play Champions League football in a different country and I commend Cole for this.  He has put his England ambitions first.  Josh Mceachran looked a great talent for Chelsea and now he doesn’t make the squad.  The list of good English players on loan is too long and clubs should take more responsibility for the national teams development.  But then again with only 5 English managers in the premier league why would they!

SL