Italy’s dominating and ultimately successful defeat of England on penalties last night finalised the semi-finalists for Euro 2012. Joining Portugal, Germany and Spain means the last four in the competition are major European footballing nations for the first time since the Championships in 2000. As many are keen to bang on about, it was the right result as England ultimately fell short but in essence this team had already surprised many, myself included, by not just getting out the group but doing so by winning it. Yes, luck fell on their side, but every side needs some luck, and Roy Hodgson set up the side in a manner that was best for the players he had at his disposal and the time he had to shape them into a side. Let us not forget that he has only been in charge for around five weeks still. His transformation is one that should be lauded, no matter how ‘negative’ you perceived us to be.
If we had gone and won the tournament, or even made the semi-finals, Hodgson would have been praised like no tomorrow; yet one result shifts everything and demonstrates the fickleness of football fans. Similarly, it was proven with the rise in expectation level. Few expected us to do so well in the tournament and even fewer expected us to top the group, yet once that happened, despite not playing magnificent football, the public then expected us to beat the Italians comfortably. One issue that appears to be at the forefront of the critics is Hodgson’s perseverance with the 4-4-2 formation. Now I agree we need to have alternatives, however, I am sceptical whether our current ‘elite’ players can easily transfer and adjust to different systems. We have been so engrossed by the 4-4-2 system, that it is all our players have been brought up with. Now when you repeatedly practice and play the same style time over time, it ends up being what your body automatically plays to, because that has been built up into the muscle memory. Now you may argue, some of the top Premier League teams play different styles (I would suggest it is fewer than you think), but how many of those differing systems are filled with English players, or at least English players in the new role that the formation creates? Is it any wonder then that we are still persisting with the same formation, which eventually will be our downfall when we play the superior international sides?
Furthermore to this, the age old argument of our inability to maintain possession has come to the fore once again. Now I am sorry, but it was only after South Africa that people started noting the class of the Germans and Spaniards in the way they approached games. That was two years ago, and in that time progression has been made because The National Football Centre at Burton is complete. But the change in mindset is not going to happen with this current crop of players we have. They are in essence, the same as whom we have had before. If we are still struggling to maintain possession in the 2028 European Championships then yes, there needs to be serious questions asked, because reality dictates that this change in nature is going to take 15 years to come to the fore. If the work happens now, hopefully in a decade’s time will we begin to see the results and hopefully rewards that they bring.
Let us not detract anything away from the Italians. After the surprisingly open game for the first 30 minutes, the men in blue realised we were both had the same game-plan in soaking up pressure and then counter-attacking. They then began stopping us breaking quickly and with that came the match that unfolded with persistent Italian pressure and opportunities. However, after 120 minutes of football and two days less rest than their semi-final opponents, Germany, you would expect them to not go any further in the Finals. The Germans have looked imperious so far in the tournament, and the strength they have in depth, particularly going forward is a signal of intent from them. Portugal have grown into the tournament, thanks to the majestic rise of Cristiano Ronaldo, who is currently carrying his nation with his past two world-class performances. Another one of those, plus more is going to be needed to beat the Spanish, who I think have faced unfair criticism. I must say I am wary of their decision to play without a recognised striker, however, the famous tika-taka approach has hardly found them wanting so far and I would not be surprised if they have not got out of second gear in some of their games, the quarter-final against France being an obvious example. Why bother, exerting so much energy, when you are more than comfortable with the approach you are adopting? I think if Portugal gets Ronaldo on the ball, then the Spanish defence could face its first stern test of these games, but I still anticipate their attacking prowess to overhaul the distinctly average Portuguese defence and midfield. I still anticipate it will be a Germany-Spain final once again in six days time.
How long will it be until England makes a final? As I have suggested, some time still I imagine, but the wheels are in motion, people just need to accept that changes do not happen overnight. We are for now, a quarter-final team destined to lose on penalties – from our last ten major championships now, we have departed from the spot on six occasions. However, there appears to now be a togetherness that has formed amongst this squad (which may surprise many with controversial figures, such as John Terry involved) and long may that continue. Unless there is a team spirit in the camp, then the results are certainly not going to come – the French are a perfect example of this. More players have left the competition with credit than the group who were in South Africa, and that too can only be a positive. There now appears to be a mix of youth and experience formulating in the squad, and there are still those who were missing because of injury – Walker, Bent and Wilshere. We are still some of the best fans in the world and we know the ups and downs, the rollercoaster ride we will always encounter. But we must keep our realism in-check and ultimately accept that improvement takes time. For the five weeks that Hodgson has been in the job though, hopefully there is now a platform to build upon. Roll on Brazil 2014!
Monday 25 June 2012
Monday 18 June 2012
Un-royal type behaviour at Queens
The scenes at the Aegon Championships at Queen’s Club yesterday ended a week full of shocks, thrills and spills. However, the manner in which the tournament climaxed was both disappointing and a demonstration of pure idiocy by David Nalbandian. By awarding the match to Marin Cilic by default also removed the opportunity for the champion to really experience and take in the accolade of being the winner on the grass court. The display of anger and petulance by Nalbandian though, gave the authorities no choice but to take the action that they did.
For those who are unaware of what occurred, and with the excitement of Euro 2012 and Murray’s early exit from the competition, the coverage of the tournament was certainly less this year, Nalbandian basically kicked an advertising hoarding which was right in front of a line judge, causing him to cut his shin and bleed quite significantly. This morning it has emerged that police have received a complaint of alleged assault regarding the incident which just goes to show the maliciousness of the act. Nalbandian is a notoriously fiery character, but his actions were inexcusable. He could see where the line judge was sat and so common sense should have surely told him that kicking the hoarding like he did was only going to end disastrously. Common sense did not prevail, and disaster did. It was some gash as well that cut the shin and I think the official is probably grateful he has required no more attention than the first aid he was provided with instantly on site. Tennis players are usually warned for loud verbal outbursts or launching their rackets into the ground, so when an individual has performed an action that has led to an injury being sustained to one of the officials, then of course a ‘red card’ or match forfeit is going to be issued. Football players for example have been given lengthy suspensions when they have had an altercation with a referee in the past, the famous example being Paolo Di Canio, so you can certainly understand why the tennis rulebook is written how it is.
Nalbandian further soured events when instead of just apologising to everybody and accepting his mistake, he instead tried to turn the tables on the ATP and the officials by saying that there are too many rules to abide by and that sometimes individuals who break them are not punished accordingly. It seemed like an awful case of bitterness and acting like a sore loser. Nobody told Nalbandian to start aiming kicks at advertising hoardings. In fact, last time I checked, it was a movement that is not required in tennis, so there is no reason for doing it. Yes, he may have been angry and frustrated about how the match was going for him at that particular time but there are appropriate ways to deal with such a situation and ideally they should be channelled back into your game in a way that you can use to your advantage. The fact of the matter is that he appears to have shown little remorse for his actions, and I got a feeling that he only apologised when he did because he knew he had to do so. That is disgraceful behaviour. He seems more concerned with shifting the blame on to others and bringing up other issues that are irrelevant to the case in order to gain sympathy and deflect the news away from him. The fact that an investigation is now going to be opened up against him shows how this approach has failed as well as showing you how vicious the kick was interpreted by many; although it throws up the debate of how footballers like Joey Barton can get away with some of their actions on the field without police involvement...
As mentioned, Andy Murray’s shock early exit from the tournament probably acted as a catalyst for the less coverage the championship subsequently received. The winner of Queens in 2011 was dumped out in 3 sets by Nicholas Mahut in the second round, which having been given a bye in round 1, was Murray’s opening grass court match of the year. It is fair to say then, that preparation ahead of Wimbledon in a week’s time is probably not going ideally then for the British number one. The Scot never really looked like overcoming the Frenchman and I must say I wonder whether his exploits in the French Open are going to curtail his duration on the courts of SW19. He was suffering from a back problem early on at Roland Garros but managed to overcome it on his way to the quarter-finals. However, he clearly has not had a significant amount of rest for the injury to fully heel and I think it may come to haunt him when he faces the burden of the British public to gain his home Grand Slam. In that respect, you could argue that an early exit from Queens was beneficial to Murray as it gave him more time to give his back a break rather than put it under the strain day-after-day in an attempt to retain his Queens title (although I am sure that was his intention at the start of the tournament).
The build-up to Wimbledon is suddenly underway though and you would say more people have come out of Queens with setbacks rather than positive steps forward. Murray exited early; Tsonga and Del Potro were injury affected; whilst Nalbandian caused controversy by managing to get the final concluded earlier than anyone anticipated. For a man of his experience, leading in a final, on one of his favoured surfaces, you can only put down his moment of madness down to a psychological issue that now appears to have even more severe consequences. Going into Wimbledon, it makes you think that the big three of Djokovic, Federer and Nadal will be extremely happy as those competitors who may offer them some discomfort are clearly struggling, making their route to another momentous title much more likely.
For those who are unaware of what occurred, and with the excitement of Euro 2012 and Murray’s early exit from the competition, the coverage of the tournament was certainly less this year, Nalbandian basically kicked an advertising hoarding which was right in front of a line judge, causing him to cut his shin and bleed quite significantly. This morning it has emerged that police have received a complaint of alleged assault regarding the incident which just goes to show the maliciousness of the act. Nalbandian is a notoriously fiery character, but his actions were inexcusable. He could see where the line judge was sat and so common sense should have surely told him that kicking the hoarding like he did was only going to end disastrously. Common sense did not prevail, and disaster did. It was some gash as well that cut the shin and I think the official is probably grateful he has required no more attention than the first aid he was provided with instantly on site. Tennis players are usually warned for loud verbal outbursts or launching their rackets into the ground, so when an individual has performed an action that has led to an injury being sustained to one of the officials, then of course a ‘red card’ or match forfeit is going to be issued. Football players for example have been given lengthy suspensions when they have had an altercation with a referee in the past, the famous example being Paolo Di Canio, so you can certainly understand why the tennis rulebook is written how it is.
Nalbandian further soured events when instead of just apologising to everybody and accepting his mistake, he instead tried to turn the tables on the ATP and the officials by saying that there are too many rules to abide by and that sometimes individuals who break them are not punished accordingly. It seemed like an awful case of bitterness and acting like a sore loser. Nobody told Nalbandian to start aiming kicks at advertising hoardings. In fact, last time I checked, it was a movement that is not required in tennis, so there is no reason for doing it. Yes, he may have been angry and frustrated about how the match was going for him at that particular time but there are appropriate ways to deal with such a situation and ideally they should be channelled back into your game in a way that you can use to your advantage. The fact of the matter is that he appears to have shown little remorse for his actions, and I got a feeling that he only apologised when he did because he knew he had to do so. That is disgraceful behaviour. He seems more concerned with shifting the blame on to others and bringing up other issues that are irrelevant to the case in order to gain sympathy and deflect the news away from him. The fact that an investigation is now going to be opened up against him shows how this approach has failed as well as showing you how vicious the kick was interpreted by many; although it throws up the debate of how footballers like Joey Barton can get away with some of their actions on the field without police involvement...
As mentioned, Andy Murray’s shock early exit from the tournament probably acted as a catalyst for the less coverage the championship subsequently received. The winner of Queens in 2011 was dumped out in 3 sets by Nicholas Mahut in the second round, which having been given a bye in round 1, was Murray’s opening grass court match of the year. It is fair to say then, that preparation ahead of Wimbledon in a week’s time is probably not going ideally then for the British number one. The Scot never really looked like overcoming the Frenchman and I must say I wonder whether his exploits in the French Open are going to curtail his duration on the courts of SW19. He was suffering from a back problem early on at Roland Garros but managed to overcome it on his way to the quarter-finals. However, he clearly has not had a significant amount of rest for the injury to fully heel and I think it may come to haunt him when he faces the burden of the British public to gain his home Grand Slam. In that respect, you could argue that an early exit from Queens was beneficial to Murray as it gave him more time to give his back a break rather than put it under the strain day-after-day in an attempt to retain his Queens title (although I am sure that was his intention at the start of the tournament).
The build-up to Wimbledon is suddenly underway though and you would say more people have come out of Queens with setbacks rather than positive steps forward. Murray exited early; Tsonga and Del Potro were injury affected; whilst Nalbandian caused controversy by managing to get the final concluded earlier than anyone anticipated. For a man of his experience, leading in a final, on one of his favoured surfaces, you can only put down his moment of madness down to a psychological issue that now appears to have even more severe consequences. Going into Wimbledon, it makes you think that the big three of Djokovic, Federer and Nadal will be extremely happy as those competitors who may offer them some discomfort are clearly struggling, making their route to another momentous title much more likely.
Sunday 10 June 2012
GB Taekwondo Cooking Up A Storm
Apologies for the extended break once again readers, but there was a bit of Jubilee partying to be taken care of last week. This week further furore has appeared regarding a British athlete who was expecting to be a big part of London 2012. Taekwondo star, Aaron Cook is the world number one in his division but over the past seven days has been subject to continued rejection from GB Taekwondo, the national governing body who determine the selection criteria and athletes who will participate for the nation this summer. That is right; the world number one is British and not competing in his home Olympics. A genuine medal prospect instead has to watch the event unfold from his living room on television. An astounding decision you probably are all thinking.
So what misdemeanours have led to his omission? Previous drug abuse? A violent past? Constantly bringing the sport into disrepute? No, none of the above. What appears to have got GB Taekwondo’s noses up is that Cook went and searched for his own training platform rather than sticking to the pathway that the NGB had funded and created. So because he believed he could find a better programme that would allow him to reach his potential sooner and to its highest ability, he has been subsequently punished. It seems incredibly petty by GB Taekwondo and you can understand the anger and resentment Cook and his team have regarding the decision. Now other British taekwondo players who have stayed with the GB set-up have also been successful this season, so it proves the system does work. However, one programme is not going to suit every individual perfectly, and thus, if they wish to try and fund their own means of development whilst still representing their country and not quitting the sport; surely this should be applauded rather than castigated?
The decision clearly does not sit too well with the British Olympic Association as well. They have to verify and agree with every athlete selection for an Olympic Games but can only reject a proposal if it has been made without following the governing body’s selection process. So although they kept going back to GB Taekwondo to reconsider their decision, they never had the power to reject the decision made, and they were certainly not in any position to be able to decide the selection of Cook. Having said this, having never rejected a selection before in history this would have set a precedent that in the future could have potentially been abused by disgruntled athletes who were omitted from the Games. Yet with the World Taekwondo Federation having also got involved, concerned that GB Taekwondo have broken their code of ethics and brought the sport into disrepute, then you can see how unravelling and embarrassing the situation has become.
What must be remembered is that another individual has benefitted from GB Taekwondo’s bizarre decision. Now it is not the fault of Lutalo Muhammad that he has been selected by the NGB, and he should feel incredibly proud of being given the opportunity to represent the country in London. However, he has not decided to omit Cook and so the slagging off and hate mail he has received since the story was exposed is completely unjustified and totally out of order. Let’s be honest, he is probably as shocked as we are, but now he needs to prepare himself ready to compete with the world’s best and show that he was the right man to be selected. He is certainly going to have to raise his game to be a medal contender though, as he is currently ranked 59th in the world. Remember Cook is number one...
To sour the story even further, although perhaps understandably, Cook is now seeking legal advice as a means to try and force his way into selection for the Games. If such action did end up occurring it is only going to ruin relations between the athlete and governing body even more than it already is. There is clearly bad blood between the two parties and it will be interesting if the legal action fails how Cook decides to act and perform for the rest of his career. Having already squabbled about whether talks and offers had been made by GB Taekwondo to fund Cook’s new programme, which were denied by the athlete’s camp, there is clearly hostility which cannot be beneficial to the governing body nor to Aaron Cook himself. The verbal slagging has continued ever since the decision was ratified this week and it just looks awful from an outside view looking into the story. There is too much petulance and unprofessionalism from all parties.
So once again, Team GB is dealing with a difficult and tumultuous scenario ahead of the Games, rather than being able to build the positive vibe that is going to be needed. Without that the crowd are going to find it hard to motivate and support our home athletes because of the back-step we feel we are already under in the lead-up to the Olympics. However, I cannot comprehend why the British number one, a man who has defeated 10 of the top 15 athletes in the sport in his most recent fights has been overlooked, without other political connotations being involved. For that reason, GB Taekwondo should be ashamed of themselves as they are not only hampering the development of Cook, the medal prospects of Team GB, but also their own ability to showcase their sport and gain media recognition and exposure which is guaranteed when a British athlete is successful. The fact other leading organisations have expressed their concerns and many other athletes have demonstrated their support towards Cook makes you think the selection is one huge mistake.
So what misdemeanours have led to his omission? Previous drug abuse? A violent past? Constantly bringing the sport into disrepute? No, none of the above. What appears to have got GB Taekwondo’s noses up is that Cook went and searched for his own training platform rather than sticking to the pathway that the NGB had funded and created. So because he believed he could find a better programme that would allow him to reach his potential sooner and to its highest ability, he has been subsequently punished. It seems incredibly petty by GB Taekwondo and you can understand the anger and resentment Cook and his team have regarding the decision. Now other British taekwondo players who have stayed with the GB set-up have also been successful this season, so it proves the system does work. However, one programme is not going to suit every individual perfectly, and thus, if they wish to try and fund their own means of development whilst still representing their country and not quitting the sport; surely this should be applauded rather than castigated?
The decision clearly does not sit too well with the British Olympic Association as well. They have to verify and agree with every athlete selection for an Olympic Games but can only reject a proposal if it has been made without following the governing body’s selection process. So although they kept going back to GB Taekwondo to reconsider their decision, they never had the power to reject the decision made, and they were certainly not in any position to be able to decide the selection of Cook. Having said this, having never rejected a selection before in history this would have set a precedent that in the future could have potentially been abused by disgruntled athletes who were omitted from the Games. Yet with the World Taekwondo Federation having also got involved, concerned that GB Taekwondo have broken their code of ethics and brought the sport into disrepute, then you can see how unravelling and embarrassing the situation has become.
What must be remembered is that another individual has benefitted from GB Taekwondo’s bizarre decision. Now it is not the fault of Lutalo Muhammad that he has been selected by the NGB, and he should feel incredibly proud of being given the opportunity to represent the country in London. However, he has not decided to omit Cook and so the slagging off and hate mail he has received since the story was exposed is completely unjustified and totally out of order. Let’s be honest, he is probably as shocked as we are, but now he needs to prepare himself ready to compete with the world’s best and show that he was the right man to be selected. He is certainly going to have to raise his game to be a medal contender though, as he is currently ranked 59th in the world. Remember Cook is number one...
To sour the story even further, although perhaps understandably, Cook is now seeking legal advice as a means to try and force his way into selection for the Games. If such action did end up occurring it is only going to ruin relations between the athlete and governing body even more than it already is. There is clearly bad blood between the two parties and it will be interesting if the legal action fails how Cook decides to act and perform for the rest of his career. Having already squabbled about whether talks and offers had been made by GB Taekwondo to fund Cook’s new programme, which were denied by the athlete’s camp, there is clearly hostility which cannot be beneficial to the governing body nor to Aaron Cook himself. The verbal slagging has continued ever since the decision was ratified this week and it just looks awful from an outside view looking into the story. There is too much petulance and unprofessionalism from all parties.
So once again, Team GB is dealing with a difficult and tumultuous scenario ahead of the Games, rather than being able to build the positive vibe that is going to be needed. Without that the crowd are going to find it hard to motivate and support our home athletes because of the back-step we feel we are already under in the lead-up to the Olympics. However, I cannot comprehend why the British number one, a man who has defeated 10 of the top 15 athletes in the sport in his most recent fights has been overlooked, without other political connotations being involved. For that reason, GB Taekwondo should be ashamed of themselves as they are not only hampering the development of Cook, the medal prospects of Team GB, but also their own ability to showcase their sport and gain media recognition and exposure which is guaranteed when a British athlete is successful. The fact other leading organisations have expressed their concerns and many other athletes have demonstrated their support towards Cook makes you think the selection is one huge mistake.
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