Question for the English!!!

[Nice One Cyril]

Myabe the English FA could learn from this.


Bundesliga Foundation for Success
GERMANY'S Bundesliga is by no means the best in Europe. It does not have the biggest stars, it does not play the most attractive football and it is certainly not the most talked about.
It comfortably comes fourth in a pecking order which, depending on who you talk to, sees Spain, England and Italy easily rank higher.

But what the Bundesliga, despite not being formed until 1963, does do is provide a system which produces good players for the national team.

The Germans run their league with famed stereotypical efficiency and only a couple of months ago figures for the 2008/09 season showed the Bundesliga had overtaken the Premier League as the most profitable in football.

That has been achieved by keeping excess down to a minimum. Clubs paid 51% of revenue in players' wages - the lowest ratio of the continent's 'big five'.

By doing that they can also keep ticket prices down - with some clubs like Borussia Dortmund charging as little as £13 for admission - and that has resulted in it recording the highest attendances in Europe for the seventh successive season.

On average, nearly 8,000 more people see a match in the Bundesliga (average attendance 41,800) than in the Premier League.

The numbers for its English counterpart, are much higher in comparison with a wages to revenue ratio of 67% and an average ticket price of £39.

No teams in the German top flight are in danger of entering administration - like Portsmouth did this season - and more than half make a profit.

But it is not financial well-being which has helped Germany's national team as much as the long-term planning.

A decade ago the Bundesliga and German Football Association decided that to obtain a licence to play in the league you had to run an academy and, as a result, the two top divisions spend £60million a year on these programmes.

That has helped raise the number of German-qualified players under the age of 23 playing in the Bundesliga from 6% to 15%.

The proportion of Englishmen - of any age - playing in the Premier League ranges between 34% and 38%; the Bundesliga's German representation is 53%.

Germany's success in bringing through talented young players has been highlighted by the performance of their national youth teams.

In the last couple of years Germany have won European titles at under-17, under-19 and under-21 levels and Joachim Low's squad which humiliated England in Bloemfontein was the youngest to go to a World Cup in 76 years, containing six of the under-21 championship-winning side.

It has also helped share the quality around the Bundesliga, which has had three different champions in the last four years, with a similar roll of honour in the German Cup.

England's Under-17s took Germany's European title this season so maybe there is some hope for the future, although that all depends on what chances arise for those potential stars at Premier League clubs.

Those opportunities are becoming increasingly rare in a foreigner-dominated top flight but is a situation which must be addressed if the England team is to avoid further disappointment at elite level.

GERMANY'S GENERATION NEXT

Mesut Ozil: Has already shown he can have a significant impact at the highest level despite having won just 14 caps. The 21-year-old played Champions League football with former club Schalke before moving on to Werder Bremen.

Thomas Muller: Three goals - all at the World Cup - in his first six appearances is a great start to an international career which only began in March. The 20-year-old has been at Bayern Munich since he was 10 but just over 12 months ago was still playing in their reserves.

Holger Badstuber: He only made his Bundesliga debut for Bayern on the opening day of the season, which finished with a Champions League final appearance. His talent was spotted by Germany boss Joachim Low, who selected the 21-year-old for the World Cup before he had even played an international match.

Jerome Boateng: The Manchester City-bound defender impressed during two years at former club Hamburg and is another member of the European Under-21 championship-winning side. Made his international debut in October, a month after his 21st birthday, and has not looked back since.

Marko Marin: Came to national attention when he was called into Germany'sEuro 2008 preliminary squad, although he failed to make the cut, as a second division player with Borussia Monchengladbach. The 21-year-old attacking midfielder has since moved to Werder Bremen.

Very interesting, but do you really think there are no good young footballers in England? There are plenty, BUT most don't get a chance of top level league football until their late teens / early twenties and most don't then get an England call up until their mid twenties. By the time we pick them for England, their German equivalent has 30 caps and is a seasoned international. Instead we plod on with the same old boys. Football is a young man's game and IMO, experience is vastly overrated at top level physical sport.

All very well being able to read the game etc etc but when a young bloke pushes the ball past you and runs - you're fucked! The only experience then is watching his backside disappearing down the line.

[messidona]

The future for England.Saw this somewhere..thought i might share.

England's 2014 World Cup squad? (ages on June 1 2014 in brackets)

Goalkeepers: Joe Hart (27), Ben Foster (31), Scott Loach (26).

Defenders: Glen Johnson (29), Micah Richards (26), Michael Dawson (30), Phil Jagielka (31), Phil Jones (22), Chris Smalling (24), Kieran Gibbs (24), Ashley Cole (33).

Midfielders: James Milner (28), Jack Rodwell (23), Jack Wilshere (22), Tom Huddlestone (27), Theo Walcott (25), Aaron Lennon (27), Adam Johnson (26), Fabian Delph (24), Craig Eastmond (23).

Forwards: Wayne Rooney (28), Connor Wickham (21), Nathan Delfouneso (23).

[Hawkesy]

Myabe the English FA could learn from this.

while that is admirable, can you explain to me what the FA can learn from and act on. None of that is workable in the premier league.

[ozzie owl]

Myabe the English FA could learn from this.

while that is admirable, can you explain to me what the FA can learn from and act on. None of that is workable in the premier league.

Well perhaps run the game for a start not bow the EPL clubs.

[Hawkesy]

Myabe the English FA could learn from this.

while that is admirable, can you explain to me what the FA can learn from and act on. None of that is workable in the premier league.

Well perhaps run the game for a start not bow the EPL clubs.

the FA cannot control the top league anymore, not without a lot of help from uefa and that just won't happen. They sold their souls years ago and the devil won't sell them back.

[ozzie owl]

England: The Lehman Brothers of football
Post categories: World Cup 2010
Paul Mason | 17:46 UK time, Sunday, 27 June 2010
Germany 4 - England 1. Why were England so poor?

It all goes back to the basic truth of modern tournament football: the well-coached sides win things. Now everybody can defend you have to be able to defend, break, find space but above all - in a tournament - adapt to new conditions like a team. You have to be a learning organism.

This is what Capello tried to teach England: to play like a squad, adapt like a squad. But all that happened was that some of the players attempted a rebellion against his system. That is no surprise because it is exactly what happened with France as well. Italy too went home because they could not or would not play the system the manager wanted to play.

Having tried and failed to impose their own system on Capello, the players then lost morale, self-belief and skill.

In the case of England and France this dissent and player power reflects the huge problem of trying to make millionaire club stars play to a system they don't like. In the case of Italy, the "terror in the legs" phenomenon was probably the result of a similar issue. It's not a problem in club football because players get bought by managers with an exact idea of their skills and on-pitch role, so they rarely have to involuntarily adapt.

Maybe in this World Cup we've seen the first real triumph of the economics of modern football over skill and organisation: the triumph of a club-first, nation-last mentality and individualism over teamwork.

Capello did his best to kill the player power culture that was evident last time: the self-selecting team, the WAGs, etc. But it simply resurfaced in the form of failing motivation and failing skill. This in turn reflects England's weak domestic skills base that's resulted from the unrestricted use of foreign money and foreign players.

If you look at the teams that had very little talent but were well coached eventually they too fell apart against teams that had both: Ghana beat the USA for this reason, and for the same reason the next three games are a cert. Argentina, Holland and Brazil should go through. So Capello was not wrong to try to impart system and team discipline to England. Even if he chose the wrong system (4-4-2) we will never know, because England never won themselves the breathing space to try 4-4-1-1 in a competitive game.

The whole English FA now looks very exposed as a result of this poor showing. They failed miserably to keep control of Sven or the players in 2006. Their remedy was to appoint a disciplinarian who could at least control the players and who seemed to get the best out of them until they faced world class opposition.

But if you look at what's wrong with English football it starts with the junior game, where there's a horrendously physical and low-skill philosophy preached; then, for some reason, all the clever people get weeded out by the club system so that the words "intelligent, inventive England player" are impossible to write; finally the money pouring into the English premiership in the form of leveraged club buyouts allows club managers to buy their way out of having to train and develop English talent and we only find out once every four years what is wrong.

England's outstanding badness in World Cup 2010 must be a symptom of something bigger: the fact that we've got the most expensive, highest leveraged club system - and that none of our players play outside it - must have contributed to the weakening of commitment to the national colours, the evisceration of upcoming talent, the creation of an unmanageable team of frightened individuals, each of whom will now be dictating a valedictory ghost-written column to their chosen tabloid newspaper before getting on with life as a millionaire.

Like failed bankers they will pay no penalty for failure other than public opprobium and, as everybody in high finance knows, you can live with that as long as you own a Lamborghini.

Basically, we've just seen the Lehman Brothers of football and it was not pretty.

[Hawkesy]

don't know whether to pull apart his knowledge of English football or the banking system first.

Let's start with bankers not paying the price I'd love to tell my mates who lost their jobs at LB, I'd love to tell the 50 people at my place who were made redundant. I'd love to tell the traders and brokers who lost clients, money and bonuses.

Many bankers/brokers/traders have lost shit loads. I know some who lost their job 7 months ago and haven't worked since.

[COLOSSUS]

don't know whether to pull apart his knowledge of English football or the banking system first.

Let's start with bankers not paying the price I'd love to tell my mates who lost their jobs at LB, I'd love to tell the 50 people at my place who were made redundant. I'd love to tell the traders and brokers who lost clients, money and bonuses.

Many bankers/brokers/traders have lost cabernet loads. I know some who lost their job 7 months ago and haven't worked since.

Your missing the point Hawkesy, and the point is, these highly paid players of yours dont give a fuck about the national team guernsey or the national team, they are too caught up in their egos to worry about anything else, and your national team will continue to underachieve and your fans suffer if this mentality of the English players continues. There is nothing more prestigious than having won the World Cup, the only Cup in the world that professional footballers dont get paid a ridiculous fortune to play in and its in these sorts of tournaments that their true worth and true colours is revealed. That article is a fantastic one and couldnt be any closer to the truth

[Hawkesy]

what you have said is spot on but i didn't read that in that article. I read a load of shit that was wrong on both of it's comparisons.

[PhilDunphy]

The future for England.Saw this somewhere..thought i might share.

England's 2014 World Cup squad? (ages on June 1 2014 in brackets)

Goalkeepers: Joe Hart (27), Ben Foster (31), Scott Loach (26).

Defenders: Glen Johnson (29), Micah Richards (26), Michael Dawson (30), Phil Jagielka (31), Phil Jones (22), Chris Smalling (24), Kieran Gibbs (24), Ashley Cole (33).

Midfielders: James Milner (28), Jack Rodwell (23), Jack Wilshere (22), Tom Huddlestone (27), Theo Walcott (25), Aaron Lennon (27), Adam Johnson (26), Fabian Delph (24), Craig Eastmond (23).

Forwards: Wayne Rooney (28), Connor Wickham (21), Nathan Delfouneso (23).

england had better pray that 3rd times the charm for wayne rooney, no goals from 2 world cups and some pretty sub-par perfromances

don't know why some of the players here who made it in the 2010 squad weren't utilised better (lennon, should have taken johnson to wc)

[MegaBonus]

can someone please 'copy and paste' this in both the junior and coaching sections so that im not accused of 'england' bashing by btoomer (anyone seen him lately)

But if you look at what's wrong with English football it starts with the junior game, where there's a horrendously physical and low-skill philosophy preached; then, for some reason, all the clever people get weeded out by the club system so that the words "intelligent, inventive England player" are impossible to write;

ditto for australia. until our youth are taught to master the ball as well as comprehend that the game is about time and space....aghhhh forget it....its been said before......

[ozzie owl]

can someone please 'copy and paste' this in both the junior and coaching sections so that im not accused of 'england' bashing by btoomer (anyone seen him lately)

But if you look at what's wrong with English football it starts with the junior game, where there's a horrendously physical and low-skill philosophy preached; then, for some reason, all the clever people get weeded out by the club system so that the words "intelligent, inventive England player" are impossible to write;

ditto for australia. until our youth are taught to master the ball as well as comprehend that the game is about time and space....aghhhh forget it....its been said before......

Australian authorities have recognized the problem brought about by the past emphasis on Anglo style coaching. This is been corrected by the FFA and been corrected. Sadly such programs take a good ten years to bring about change at higher levels.

[Steve#4]

don't know whether to pull apart his knowledge of English football or the banking system first.

Let's start with bankers not paying the price I'd love to tell my mates who lost their jobs at LB, I'd love to tell the 50 people at my place who were made redundant. I'd love to tell the traders and brokers who lost clients, money and bonuses.

Many bankers/brokers/traders have lost cabernet loads. I know some who lost their job 7 months ago and haven't worked since.

Your missing the point Hawkesy, and the point is, these highly paid players of yours dont give a shiraz about the national team guernsey or the national team, they are too caught up in their egos to worry about anything else, and your national team will continue to underachieve and your fans suffer if this mentality of the English players continues. There is nothing more prestigious than having won the World Cup, the only Cup in the world that professional footballers dont get paid a ridiculous fortune to play in and its in these sorts of tournaments that their true worth and true colours is revealed. That article is a fantastic one and couldnt be any closer to the truth

Wow.........Col, excellent post and exactly what I was thinking after reading it.

See you can be lucid when you want to

[ozzie owl]

Here the thoughts of Howard Wilkinson on how the FA have done FA.

Former Football Association technical director Howard Wilkinson fears England's fortunes could get worse following their dismal World Cup exit.

Wilkinson had thought that the current crop of England players should have been genuine title contenders during the finals in South Africa.

But they were humiliated 4-1 by Germany in the last 16 on Sunday.

"I don't see us bringing together players of this quality in the same numbers," he told BBC Radio 5 live.

"Undoubtedly, the pool of players from whom we will be choosing in four years will be smaller than the pool now, and that will continue."

He added: "We genuinely identified this group between 1998 and 2000 as the group that could go on to achieve success in 2006 - maybe semi-finals - and be serious contenders in 2010."

Wilkinson was the FA's technical director from 1997 to 2002, so was responsible for targeting and nurturing the country's talented youngsters.

But his fears were recently tempered by the FA's director of development Sir Trevor Brooking, who pointed to the recent success of England's Under-17s who won the European Championship in May.

That triumph was England's first age-group title since 1993 and Brooking, who has also championed the deployment of skills coaches for 5 to 11 year olds, said the team were "the best group we've had in six or seven years".

During Wilkinson's spell in charge, he produced his Charter for Quality, which was designed to provide a structure for the development of young players at club academies that would go on and compete for England.

Key to the Charter for Quality was the idea that player development would focus on technique rather than results, with youngsters trained by gifted coaches.

But Wilkinson believes the powerful influence of the Premier League coupled with infighting at the FA diluted his blueprint's effectiveness - and meant that England failed to make the most of the so-called "golden generation".

"The Charter was chipped away at, eroded through politics, through change," commented Wilkinson, who was not replaced when he left his FA post eight years ago.

Wilkinson, who is now chairman of the League Managers' Association, also blames a lack of stability at the top of the FA for the failure to bring more youngsters through in greater numbers.

QUALIFIED COACHES IN ENGLAND
FA Level Five (Uefa Pro): 115
FA Level Four (Uefa A): 895
FA Level Three (Uefa B): 1759
FA Level Two: 6,957
FA Level One: 26,273
"The FA's record for chief executives is as bad as football's record for managers," continued Wilkinson, who took caretaker charge of England for a 2-0 defeat by France in February 1999 and again in October 2000 for a World Cup qualifier against Finland.

The delay in building the National Football Centre at Burton, which was first put forward in February 2001 and has still to be built, is also a factor, added Wilkinson.

Burton, which will cost £100m and cover a 330-acre site in east Staffordshire, is intended to provide world-class coaching and training facilities for England teams but is not due to open until mid-2012.

But it is the diminishing talent pool of young English players to succeed the likes of John Terry, Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard that has been concerning Wilkinson most.

"My fear is that we had genuinely identified a group of players in 1998 and 2000 that could go on and achieve success in 2006 by reaching the semi-finals and be serious final contenders in 2010," he stated.

"Undoubtedly, as we progress through the years, the pool of players we will be choosing in four years' time will be smaller."

Wilkinson, who is the last English manager to have won the league title with a top-flight club after guiding Leeds to success in 1992, also revealed that, while his plans became bogged down in FA bureaucracy, others were only too happy to embrace them.

Chief among them were Sir Clive Woodward, who went on to guide England to success at the rugby union World Cup in 2003, and, ironically, the Germany Football Association.

"Clive Woodward came to see me and used some of the thinking for international success with regard to how he took on managing England in the World Cup in 2003," said Wilkinson.

Parts of what we were doing gave the Germans a germ of a thought that they needed to be more proactive about the development of young players

Howard Wilkinson
"Parts of what we were doing gave the Germans a germ of a thought that they needed to be more proactive about the development of young players."

England have been urged to look to the next generation of players as they attempt to recover from their premature exit in South Africa.

But former England manager Terry Venables has cautioned against dumping experienced players like Terry, Lampard and Gerrard.

"Why would you do that?" said Venables, who guided England to the semi-finals at Euro 96. "I think young people going into international sides need the experience around them."

While fans debate England's poor showing in South Africa and the FA considers Fabio Capello's future as England manager, MPs are demanding major changes in the way in which football is run in this country.

The Conservative David Amess has called for "an urgent inquiry into the state of our national game" following the 4-1 mauling by Germany, England's heaviest defeat at a World Cup.

He has tabled a Commons motion, branding the defeat as "pathetic" and describing many Premier League players as "grossly overpaid and under-performing".

Fellow Tory MP Robert Halfon has called on the FA board to resign immediately and has accused the last three managers of the national team - Sven-Goran Eriksson, Steve McClaren and Capello - of producing "nothing but failure" after being given "hugely expensive contracts with little result".

Halfon said it was "amazing" that Capello's contract was renewed before the World Cup and claimed England have punched "well below their weight for years" because of "ineffective management".

In his motion, Halfon has called for a "footballing revolution" at the FA, with fans "having more input in decision making".

[COLOSSUS]

don't know whether to pull apart his knowledge of English football or the banking system first.

Let's start with bankers not paying the price I'd love to tell my mates who lost their jobs at LB, I'd love to tell the 50 people at my place who were made redundant. I'd love to tell the traders and brokers who lost clients, money and bonuses.

Many bankers/brokers/traders have lost cabernet loads. I know some who lost their job 7 months ago and haven't worked since.

Your missing the point Hawkesy, and the point is, these highly paid players of yours dont give a shiraz about the national team guernsey or the national team, they are too caught up in their egos to worry about anything else, and your national team will continue to underachieve and your fans suffer if this mentality of the English players continues. There is nothing more prestigious than having won the World Cup, the only Cup in the world that professional footballers dont get paid a ridiculous fortune to play in and its in these sorts of tournaments that their true worth and true colours is revealed. That article is a fantastic one and couldnt be any closer to the truth

Wow.........Col, excellent post and exactly what I was thinking after reading it.

See you can be lucid when you want to

Franco, i dont beat around the bush buddy, everything i say is simple and easily comprehensible, you just need to take it as its read because i mean it as i say it. Dont try and read too much into something not there