merse
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Post by merse on Jul 21, 2010 14:06:25 GMT
I'm thoroughly enjoying following this tournament which is being played in Brittany and Normandy and is covered live on Eurosport this week. Spain are currently playing Portugal as I post and their youths play in exactly the same pass, pass, pass way as their big brothers as you would expect. Portugal meanwhile tend to take three touches where two will do, two where one would suffice; and hence struggle to make space and retain possession. England V Holland is the offering at 5 pm if you get the chance to watch it and the Dutch got hammered 4-1 by the French in their opening game. Make the effort to either watch it or record it....................it's good stuff!
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Rags
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Post by Rags on Jul 22, 2010 10:36:45 GMT
So I watched England v Holland and was depressed by the similarities with our First XI (England's that is, not Torquay's). While Reece Brown shouldn't be blamed if his midfield aren't showing for a pass, or his front men aren't making the sort of runs to get into space for the ball, I really don't expect a Man Utd defender to be so poorly coached that he resorts to hopeful hoofs of the ball up the right hand wing, giving possession right back to the opposition. This happened countless times in both halves so either the England coaching team hadn't noticed or nobody paid any attention to what was said to them at half time. For the Dutch goal, Stephen Caulker was sucked right out of the penalty area by the run of a Dutch forward who had obviously watched the Germany v England World Cup game, or Caulker is such a fan of John Terry that he closely models his game on the disgraced English ex-captain (I've always wanted to write that . Poor marking in the middle gave a free header to the Dutch striker who scored a good goal. There was a free-kick in the second half where the Dutch defender Bruno Martins Indi managed to move from the edge of the penalty area to the edge of the 6-yard box completely unmarked to get his head to a cross/shot which raises questions about our defending/marking. The lack of any effective movement up front, any short triangular passing in midfield, any effective running into space and any accurate crossing also mirrored the seniors which adds fuel to Merse's regular reports of the low standard of junior coaching in this country; which I am delighted to see by his reports of Anthony Merse's team is being rectified at the very young age-range which bodes well for World Cup 2026. The saving grace for me is that these young players are getting valuable experience and lessons in how to play "tournament football" and that by the time Brown and Caulker are regulars in the England senior team (which I hope they will be within the next 5 years), they will have learnt the value of possession and distribution which too many European teams have already mastered at under-19 level. Next up is France who have scored 9 goals in 2 games; ow, that might hurt!
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merse
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Post by merse on Jul 22, 2010 11:54:56 GMT
So I watched England v Holland and was depressed by the similarities with our First XI (England's that is, not Torquay's).
While Reece Brown shouldn't be blamed if his midfield aren't showing for a pass, or his front men aren't making the sort of runs to get into space for the ball, I really don't expect a Man Utd defender to be so poorly coached that he resorts to hopeful hoofs of the ball up the right hand wing, giving possession right back to the opposition. I would echo Rags' observations to the rafters! That game offered a chilling example of the difference between the very best and England I'm afraid. Could this be the reason that some of our leading clubs are so truculant when releasing players to play in this set up? Is England U19's manager Noel Blake on the same wavelength as Liam Brady at Arsenal and Alex Inglethorpe at Spurs in the sort of football he promotes? Would Noel Blake even get a top youth development job at a leading English club? Judging by the sort of crap I saw being purveyed yesterday, I wouldn't want him near my son; full stop. How can players who spend all their time learning to play "The Arsenal Way" or "The Tottenham Way" suddenly be expected to play the Blake way? Utter rubbish and indicative of the massive sorting out that Fabio Capello and Sir Trevor Brooking need to undertake pronto! It was the same with the England U19 Schools side I saw play under the tutorship of Phil Nardiello...............another side of jumbo sized, flat footed defenders who belted the ball into the channels all night. Brooking is right, we have to write off the age groups above the age of 11 and concentrate on cultivating true world Class from those younger. My son played in a pre-season game at Brentford FC on Monday evening in a team of very talented North London lads and they absolutley mullered the club's existing CoE players. All of them were two footed whereas a lot of the Brentford lads weren't. All had a perfect first touch and the discipline to play the ball backwards if a forward or sideways ball wasn't on. All of them were confident enough to show for, and receive a ball under pressure, there was no launching of the ball into channels and although they all have the ability to take on and beat a man or turn and beat a man; they retained the discipline to take a touch and move the ball to a team mate, or take two or three at most before moving it on. This maximises the chances of retaining possession and is the stark difference between watching a Spanish National side and an English one in my opinion. Watch Barcelona, Spain, or Arsenal and you will see this practiced all the time. Watch England and it's gone out of the window at the first sign of pressure because so many players can be made to become tense in possession when closed down and start giving the ball away. We are years away from best practice in our football to an acceptable standard at international level in my opinion. As a footnote, may I add that virtually the entire coaching set up at Brentford as it relates to the youngest age groups has been dispensed with and replaced this summer. From what I have seen there in the past three weeks, it's no bloody wonder!
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merse
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Post by merse on Jul 22, 2010 13:14:29 GMT
The saving grace for me is that these young players are getting valuable experience and lessons in how to play tournament football and that by the time Brown and Caulker are regulars in the England senior team (which I hope they will be within the next 5 years), they will have learnt the value of possession and distribution which too many European teams have already mastered at under-19 level. Next up is France who have scored 9 goals in 2 games; ow, that might hurt! To that I might ask the question are we merely "pot hunting" at these youth tournaments or are we making a genuine attempt to develope a world class England team fit to compete at World Cup Finals level? To me it seems it is the former when surely it should be the latter? ..............and yes, that date with France U19s comes at 5pm (BST) on Saturday and again it's on Eurosport live.
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Post by ospelgull on Jul 22, 2010 18:41:44 GMT
Did the Dutch play the game in an aggressive and like thugs as you folks have seen in recent games or did they play the 'proper' way ?
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Post by chrish on Jul 22, 2010 18:51:10 GMT
Did the Dutch play the game in an aggressive and like thugs as you folks have seen in recent games or did they play the 'proper' way ? Hou je mond Meneer!
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merse
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Post by merse on Jul 22, 2010 18:52:42 GMT
Did the Dutch play the game in an aggressive and like thugs as you folks have seen in recent games or did they play the 'proper' way ? No, this Dutch representative team played the game in the manner which maximises their strengths and technical expertise. Although I felt they got lucky with a scandalously disallowed England goal for a "handball" that simply never occurred, a draw would have been a travesty for them and they fully deserved to win.
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Post by ospelgull on Jul 22, 2010 19:08:56 GMT
Did the Dutch play the game in an aggressive and like thugs as you folks have seen in recent games or did they play the 'proper' way ? Hou je mond Meneer! Hij zei 'Meneer' tegen me! A famous Dutch sentence from an old Mc Donalds TV commercial overhere.
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Post by chrish on Jul 22, 2010 20:12:21 GMT
Hou je mond Meneer! Hij zei 'Meneer' tegen me! A famous Dutch sentence from an old Mc Donalds TV commercial overhere. I had to send an email in Dutch today to a software supplier. My dutch worked because I got the licence codes back in about 2 minutes. But I was addressed as Mefrouw Hayes instead of Meneer!
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merse
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Post by merse on Jul 25, 2010 9:46:13 GMT
Is England U19's manager Noel Blake on the same wavelength as Liam Brady at Arsenal and Alex Inglethorpe at Spurs in the sort of football he promotes? Would Noel Blake even get a top youth development job at a leading English club? Well I did a little research on the former Exeter City joint manager (when they were really crap) and immediately prior to his Football Association appointment three years ago he was the Academy Director for Stoke City.....................which judging by their neanderthal style of play in the Premiership says it all really doesn't it? For the life of me I just can't see how that sits comfortably with their Director of Football John Rudge; but there we are. England got out of gaol yesterday with a time added on equaliser to square the game with the French at 1-1 when Wycombe Wanderers' Matt Smith EDIT: Phillips ~ senility kicking in! squeezed in a fumbled loose ball and so they progress to the semi final on Tuesday against the Spanish at the expense of Holland. France rested five players for last night's game who were risking a second yellow card a, but England played Dean Parrett who was on the same precipice and he duly fell off..................a second yellow and out of the semi ~ nice one! We still looked well adrift of the fluidity and passing accuracy of the other side however, it doesn't seem to matter who we come up against it always looks embarassing and bodes ill for the immediate future. It will be interesting who the FA (and Capello presumably) choose as the English coach to work under his wing with a view to going down the German road of promoting from within when the Italian eventually moves on. I hope there's no-one in this U19 set up with eyes on the job, and would be good in my opinion if that very person in charge of such an age group were to regard it as the pinnacle of their career rather than a stepping stone......................a very good well accepted former club coach/manager with extensive experience of youth development springs to mind. Now who could anyone on here think of. A job for Leroy perhaps?
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Post by chrish on Jul 25, 2010 14:42:51 GMT
Is England U19's manager Noel Blake on the same wavelength as Liam Brady at Arsenal and Alex Inglethorpe at Spurs in the sort of football he promotes? Would Noel Blake even get a top youth development job at a leading English club? Well I did a little research on the former Exeter City joint manager (when they were really crap) and immediately prior to his Football Association appointment three years ago he was the Academy Director for Stoke City.....................which judging by their neanderthal style of play in the Premiership says it all really doesn't it? For the life of me I just can't see how that sits comfortably with their Director of Football John Rudge; but there we are. England got out of gaol yesterday with a time added on equaliser to square the game with the French at 1-1 when Wycombe Wanderers' Matt Smith EDIT: Phillips ~ senility kicking in! squeezed in a fumbled loose ball and so they progress to the semi final on Tuesday against the Spanish at the expense of Holland. France rested five players for last night's game who were risking a second yellow card a, but England played Dean Parrett who was on the same precipice and he duly fell off..................a second yellow and out of the semi ~ nice one! We still looked well adrift of the fluidity and passing accuracy of the other side however, it doesn't seem to matter who we come up against it always looks embarassing and bodes ill for the immediate future. It will be interesting who the FA (and Capello presumably) choose as the English coach to work under his wing with a view to going down the German road of promoting from within when the Italian eventually moves on. I hope there's no-one in this U19 set up with eyes on the job, and would be good in my opinion if that very person in charge of such an age group were to regard it as the pinnacle of their career rather than a stepping stone......................a very good well accepted former club coach/manager with extensive experience of youth development springs to mind. Now who could anyone on here think of. A job for Leroy perhaps? You can tell you live a bit too close to Ashburton Grove to fully understanding the need for teams like Stoke to compete with more established and richer teams in the Premiership I think Tony Pulis has done an excellent job at the Britannia but his tactics have got under the nose of certain managers who think football should only be played by smurfs, weaklings and shirkers who can't tackle but can pass, pass and pass! You never heard a moan from Man United and Chelsea when they played them. Just like an FA Cup tie against lower league opposition, you match them physically and then let the extra quality and class shine through. Having said that, they're Academy and youth setup seems to be coached entirely by ex-defenders (Earl Barrett, Adrian Pennock and Hednesford Town defender Richard Walker who was coach under our very own Dean Edwards, he works for Stoke on a part time basis and coaches there under-11s) and by Ronnie Sinclair who played in goal for Stoke and Bristol City. Maybe this is where we're going wrong in this country. I was stood next to a bloke at Canvey yesterday who's lad was on the bench for them and he remarked halfway through the second half that he thought the FC Twente side had probably never trained without the ball at their feet. You could see yesterday how well a young side coached by Rene Hake and ex Ipswich player Frans Thijssen kept the ball, were patient in possession, had two disciplined wingers who hugged the touchline and created space time and time again with incisive one touch passing. There's an interesting article about Rene Hake here.. www.daytondailynews.com/dayton-sports/dayton-soccer-academy-takes-pointers-from-dutch-champions-721425.html?cxtype=ybuzzBut it's quite a good point to make that although Premiership clubs have been spending huge amounts on foreign players and or pinching players from overseas academies they don't seem to have brought in the best coaching from overseas either. I think you also make a good point about coaches treating youth and under 19 football as a stepping stone to supposedly greater things. If you have a look at Ajax's youth team set up, the head is Bryan Roy and he has ex Ajax Goalkeeper Fred Grim as goalkeeping coach with ex Dutch international Dick Schoenaker to help him. At PSV Eindhoven there's a similar story. Jelle Goes is the academy director (he's only 40 years old and he's coached the Estonian national team, coached for the KNVB at Under 14, under 15 and under 23 level, and was the academy director at CSKA Moscow. His assistants at PSV are Marco Roelofson (who was head coach at 2nd Division FC Zwolle) and ex-internationals Wim Kieft and Patrick Kluivert, who of course have both been developed as players at academies and who probably understand how important they are. At Chelsea you've got a bloke called Steve Holland who only got his UEFA Pro licence a few years ago but did work under Dario Gradi at Crewe. Here's a link to the number of UEFA Pro Licenced coaches. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_managers_and_coaches_who_have_qualified_for_the_UEFA_Pro_Licence#Coaching_diplomasThere's quite a number who've failed as managers. All Noel Blake did yesterday was to conjure up a bit of the old never say die spirit which still isn't a huge part of foreign football. If Arsenal players, managers and supporters showed a tiny bit of Stoke's enthusiam then they would be much more successful rather than turn up at "The Emirates", sit in their ultra comfy seats and expect to be entertained and then howl with derision like spoilt children when the smaller team don't lay down and die. If we could somehow find a way to coach our young players to compete on a technical basis and yet still have room to install some fight and passion into them. My own personal opinion on this is that at the moment club's academies are full of fantastically skillful players but those who are just happy to sit on reasonably fat contracts. EDIT - I just found this article from Steve McClaren on the very subject. Quite interesting. news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/8830170.stm
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merse
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Post by merse on Jul 25, 2010 16:14:21 GMT
I think Tony Pulis has done an excellent job at the Britannia but his tactics have got under the nose of certain managers who think football should only be played by smurfs, weaklings and shirkers who can't tackle but can pass, pass and pass! You never heard a moan from Man United and Chelsea when they played them. Just like an FA Cup tie against lower league opposition, you match them physically and then let the extra quality and class shine through. But that's precisely the problem Chris, they are producing "lower league" standard techniques and the "lower leagues" in the leading football nations of the world simply don't have this ernormous contrast in the type of football played. I've no truck with whingeing Wenger though.....................of course his teams have to match such opponents tackle for tackle, challenge for challenge before they can even contemplate imposing their superior technique ~ and at least at my son's A Class FC they have a Director of Football who emphasises that all the time. It is also the reason I have been delighted to have him play at that club last season and should he be destined not to re-sign for them next season I shall be keeping a particular eye that he retain those core disciplines that stood him in such good stead when playing against a Football League CoE side last Monday!
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Post by chrish on Jul 25, 2010 18:01:34 GMT
I think Tony Pulis has done an excellent job at the Britannia but his tactics have got under the nose of certain managers who think football should only be played by smurfs, weaklings and shirkers who can't tackle but can pass, pass and pass! You never heard a moan from Man United and Chelsea when they played them. Just like an FA Cup tie against lower league opposition, you match them physically and then let the extra quality and class shine through. But that's precisely the problem Chris, they are producing "lower league" standard techniques and the "lower leagues" in the leading football nations of the world simply don't have this ernormous contrast in the type of football played. True enough. The problem is though that clubs like Stoke City, Bolton, Hull City, Burnley and West Brom are all trying to develop homegrown and in most cases English talent. Out of the top 8 teams (Man United, Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool, Man City, Aston Villa, Spurs and Everton) you can see that only half of them have a decent amount of English players in their starting match day squads. Chelsea and Man City just go out and buy, Man United and Arsenal do make a concerted effort to blood youngsters, Spurs and Villa have pretty much bought their English players, although they both have young english players on the cusp of the first team squad and Everton have had to develop youngsters out of financial necessity and have benefited from Benitez's complete lack of interest in developing young players from the Liverpool area. After Roy Hodgson's work at Fulham I would imagine that Liverpool's academy might get a bit more attention. We'll see how Pulis will develop the style of play. Tuncay, Matthew Etherington and Glenn Whelan are decent players with flair. I guess you have two options available to you when you get promoted from the Championship to the Premiership. You either compete and develop a style which makes you hard to beat or you just take the money, get relegated and pocket the parachute payment as well. Stoke (a bit like Bolton before them) have been quite sensible, have invested wisely and have quite comfortably stayed in the division. West Brom and Burnley both played lovely football but went straight down. Hull City on the other hand played without fear for half a season and then invested heavily in expensive waged players for the other season and a half and now they're in a panic to get rid of Jimmy Bullard and his £30,000 grand a week wages. It'll be interesting to see how Ian Holloway and Blackpool approach this season. I don't think they'll be able throw their fullbacks forward with quite so much wanton abandon this season. Christ alone knows what the answer is. Anything to do with salary capping and enforcing a given number of homegrown English players will have to get UEFA, FIFA and EU approval. Maybe we should do a Norway and opt out of the EU completely! It might be a bit drastic but it'll stop this johnny foreigner purchasing.
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merse
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Post by merse on Jul 25, 2010 18:46:59 GMT
I'll give you further examples of how at the Arsenal Academy, young English lads who have been in their system for several years are then pushed out to accomodate young talent from other countries who are in their late teens when they are brought in.......................and two of those such imports were playing against England for France U 19s last night. Gilles Sunu joined Arsenal as a sixteen year old from Chateauroux three years ago and Francis Cocquelin came in as a seventeen year old from Laval a year later. Even when my son played up at the Academy the other week they included a young Swede in their side who (at the age of 9) was simply out of this world.........................who knows what the arrangement is here. Does he just come over in the school holidays, or has his family moved to London to accomodate his future? I always maintain that clubs like Arsenal and Chelsea are developing as many future internationals for other countries (maybe in Chelsea's case even more) than they are for England. Don't forget too, that there are many youngsters in these clubs as young as well under ten who are the first generation of recently arrived immigrants who might well (and indeed some have already) opted not to play for England but for the countries of their parents; and some of those have parents from two different countries anyway to say nothing of grandparents. If Anthony was good enough, he could choose under those circumstances another nation from Rwanda, Congo, Portugal or France; apart from England!
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Post by chrish on Jul 26, 2010 9:26:12 GMT
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