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O/T U21 European Championship

Bullet said:
Dear me, that is the threat of letting your star man wind his contract down to nothing - you get zero quid and zero performances for a year.

Another reason to like Levy and his 4+2 deals
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I don't know why clubs do it. Abysmal!

I thought Spain were good tonight when keeping possession, as they always are, but no end product. Going by stats, Rodrigo really should be playing and starting games like he is has been terrible. Morata who is said to have a bright future has come off the bench twice and scored twice, deserves a start next game. It's just boring seeing this tika taka flimflam with no end product, at least at Barca we have Messi or with the international team when I enjoyed Spain they had Villa banging in the goals for fun.

Germany were a big disappointment this tournament. I was looking forward to seeing some of Germanys best young talent in Draxler, Schurlle etc and none were even picked. If this is the future, they won't get far. Disappointing indeed. I honestly think Spain will go to Brazil in 2014 and win the trophy, unless a team just goes against them without fear and attacks them, hopefully Argentina, I so want to see Messi drag Argentina to a final and win it, especially in Brazil, just so he will go down in history as the greatest of all time.
 
Modric THFC said:
Stuart Pearce is a disgrace.
How can an underage coach blame his players?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/22865904

"The players haven't delivered," Pearce, whose future as coach will be discussed by the Football Association in the next two weeks, told BBC Sport.
"I'm really disappointed with my team."
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These guys aren't underage players. Many of them are Premier League players. Either way, if they have done poorly then why not give them a kick up the arse?! Maybe it's exactly what these over-paid kids need. Some realism. Knowing that three defeats and no goals from open play isn't good enough. I support Pearce in this. Maybe, he needs to look at himself too, but his record until this point with U21s has been good.
 
rich said:
These guys aren't underage players. Many of them are Premier League players. Either way, if they have done poorly then why not give them a kick up the arse?! Maybe it's exactly what these over-paid kids need. Some realism. Knowing that three defeats and no goals from open play isn't good enough. I support Pearce in this. Maybe, he needs to look at himself too, but his record until this point with U21s has been good.
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Its underage football ffs. Players are just there for experience.
If winning a underage tournament is important then the FA would have let him call up the likes of Wheelchair and Cleverly.
 
The Israeli U21s were fairly decent but looking at both squads of players, there's no way they should have beaten England tonight.

The blame for the disaster of a tournament must fall on Pearce, although it has to be said that none of the England squad gave a good account of themselves.
 
Modric THFC said:
Its underage football ffs. Players are just there for experience.
If winning a underage tournament is important then the FA would have let him call up the likes of Wheelchair and Cleverly.
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I agree that winning isn't the FA's Top priority. But I bet it was for Pearce and should have been for the players. From what it sounds like they were ignoring simple instructions and playing for themselves and not the team.
 
THFC6061 said:
The blame for the disaster of a tournament must fall on Pearce, although it has to be said that none of the England squad gave a good account of themselves.
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I'm not sure I am in total agreement with you Mr Stats. I don't think Pearce can deflect the blame completely away from himself onto the players as part of his job is motivation and tactics. However, I do think some of these 'youngsters' need to take a good long look at themselves. They 'earn' absolutely stupid amounts of money for kicking a pig's bladder around a field, and many have the ego the size of a small planet. They do not really have to try too hard compared to generations past. If you are on 20K a week, which I suspect the majority of the under 21 squad are, then that is still crazy for someone of that age. I wonder how many of the kids thought "ah, a nice holiday in Israel in June, plus a couple of kickabouts with the lads... job's a good 'un"

Just like the senior team, they displayed a distinct lack of charm, skill, and ability to pass the ball to a team mate more than three times on the trot. If that is the next generation, then I can't see us winning a major tournament in the next 50 years, let alone by the 2020s!
 
Fabulous display from Spain.

I guess we can say that La Liga still is the number one league in Europe. Illarramendi, Isco, Muniain, Thiago..lovely players.
We can only dream of producing such players. Imagine one of them going to Man U. What are they going to learn from David Moyes :-#
 
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We cannot keep shielding our youngsters from the fact that they are utter toss when compared to other youth squads of their generation. Sure, we can make excuses for them if they try hard and show the old 'bulldog' spirit, but now it seems that they're so out of touch that they don't even take representing their own country seriously, preferring to play for themselves and ignoring any concept of teamwork or coordination.

At that stage, it's perfectly acceptable to hang them out to dry. I'm of the opinion that Pearce should have gone further and been like Di Canio, pointing out all their flaws in public. Maybe that will provide the kick up the arse our youth system badly needs.
 
inkpenspur said:
I'm not sure I am in total agreement with you Mr Stats. I don't think Pearce can deflect the blame completely away from himself onto the players as part of his job is motivation and tactics. However, I do think some of these 'youngsters' need to take a good long look at themselves. They 'earn' absolutely stupid amounts of money for kicking a pig's bladder around a field, and many have the ego the size of a small planet. They do not really have to try too hard compared to generations past. If you are on 20K a week, which I suspect the majority of the under 21 squad are, then that is still crazy for someone of that age. I wonder how many of the kids thought "ah, a nice holiday in Israel in June, plus a couple of kickabouts with the lads... job's a good 'un"

Just like the senior team, they displayed a distinct lack of charm, skill, and ability to pass the ball to a team mate more than three times on the trot. If that is the next generation, then I can't see us winning a major tournament in the next 50 years, let alone by the 2020s!
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I know someone who until not very long ago was part of the support team for a couple of the age groups below the U21s.

Obviously I have no idea about the circumstances in Israel, but the stories I've heard about the U17s and U19s is that they are the polar opposite of that description. Extremely polite, humble and show a lot of respect for the coaches and support staff. If anything it sounds like that they lack confidence and get nervous when called up for the young England teams.

It could be that they change by the time they get to the U21s, or are a bit ****y when they're with their regular clubs, or on twitter etc. When on England duty they're completely different.
 
I saw 7 year olds playing on full sized 11 a side pitches. Pathetic.

They shouldn't be going on 11 a side pitches until about 15/16 at least.
 
Sadly that isn't surprising Mumorn. I really don't get why this still occurs. 7 year olds should play with a smaller ball on a smaller pitch with smaller goals and fewer players. I mean why the frig not?



England just emphasise and produce the wrong type of player - we love exciting, dynamic, powerful, risky players that will try a long pass, that will shoot, that will not care about retaining possession because they want to score within 10 seconds of getting the ball.

Our keeper gives it to a defender who sometimes goes to midfield, sometimes tries a long ball to a heavily marked striker, occasionally the defender will knock it square to his mate... fanny about at the back, then fire it long at a heavily marked striker.

Spain etc. are the polar opposite, they have an abundance of tippy tappy players whose first thought is to keep possession, shift it about, don't lose the ball whatever happens, go back and build again, move for a pass but retain possession... keep probing around the box until something happens, perhaps only have a few shots all game.

In the Premiership these two types of player come together nicely, a mix of powerful risk takers and tippy tappy possession players, it is great.

Both systems are flawed really, you need a mix.

But when pitted against each other it seems England just give the ball away WAY too much and thus the likes of Spain dominate and eventually score.

It sounds a bit like Brendan Rogers saying "we won the possession!" but it does eventually pay off to dominate possession in dangerous areas
 
The Premier League has improved massively in terms of play with all the foreign players, but go to any lower league game and you'll find loads of fans shouting "get it up the pitch". There's this massive impatience built into the English game. It's all about getting the ball up the pitch as quickly as possibly to try and cause problems in front of the opposition's goal. Little to no time is spent on actually passing the ball around, you know, playing football.
 
In Holland it is against the law for each town to not provide a professional football coach for the kids of the town!
 
Impressive by Spain again, not least their strength in depth. Both teams changed around a lot, but Spain seemed almost unaffected whilst Holland looked a lot worse. If they meet again in the final I think it will be a lot closer, commentators said that all 4 regular starters at the back for Holland have first team caps whereas none of those that started against Spain do, if I heard that correctly. Maher showed that he's a class above when he came on, I think Strootman can make a real difference too.

Isco is obviously class, but I think Muniain still has a lot of potential. I suppose he's faded a bit compared to what he seemed to promise a few years back, but he's still young (will be eligible for the U21 Euros in two years too) and has some real skills. Will be interesting to see if someone picks him up.

Thiago looks a real talent too, has been linked to some big clubs, I suppose Barca will only sell him with one of their buyback clauses effectively making it a loan if he does step it up big time.

Illlaramendi looks really good too, one of the older players, but also one of the better players in this Spain side. I think he might move this summer after this kind of a display in this tournament. Think he might be a really good buy for someone, wouldn't mind us picking him up :)
 
braineclipse said:
Impressive by Spain again, not least their strength in depth. Both teams changed around a lot, but Spain seemed almost unaffected whilst Holland looked a lot worse. If they meet again in the final I think it will be a lot closer, commentators said that all 4 regular starters at the back for Holland have first team caps whereas none of those that started against Spain do, if I heard that correctly. Maher showed that he's a class above when he came on, I think Strootman can make a real difference too.

Isco is obviously class, but I think Muniain still has a lot of potential. I suppose he's faded a bit compared to what he seemed to promise a few years back, but he's still young (will be eligible for the U21 Euros in two years too) and has some real skills. Will be interesting to see if someone picks him up.

Thiago looks a real talent too, has been linked to some big clubs, I suppose Barca will only sell him with one of their buyback clauses effectively making it a loan if he does step it up big time.

Illlaramendi looks really good too, one of the older players, but also one of the better players in this Spain side. I think he might move this summer after this kind of a display in this tournament. Think he might be a really good buy for someone, wouldn't mind us picking him up :)
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I'm sure he would, but I don't see Sociedad selling their best players considering they qualified for the CL this season...
 
Raoul Duke said:


I'm sure he would, but I don't see Sociedad selling their best players considering they qualified for the CL this season...
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I was under the impression that Sociedad still had financial difficulties. But perhaps they've cleared that up and can at least keep their best players going into their CL campaign. Good on Illaremendi if he stays, I suppose I'm just being cynical...
 
I'd love Illaramendi, but I'd be really surprised if he left. He'd be out of our price range anyways, but this is the type of player we should be looking at. With Spain's financial difficulties, I'm surprised we haven't bought more Spanish players...
 
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