England - Who f**king cares ???

[alpine_saint]

What is the point in the b*ll*cks that has been taking place over the last week-and-a-half (and thereby disrupting our winning run), apart from a marketing exercise for the FA and the sale of a few overpriced polyester shirts ?

 

I am dreading all the jingoism, flag-waving and nauseous Sun headlines that will arrive next summer, made even worse by the fact that we mugged Spain...

[hypochondriac]

You keep going on and on about it. Of course some of us care.

[JRM]

i am going tonight, partly as a) i have nothing better to do, b) it is a night out and a chance to catch up with a few mates, and c) i plan to spend most of the time shouting abuse at John Terry and other players i dislike

[stevegrant]

I'm going tonight solely because I was offered a free ticket by a mate. The joy of the englandfans members club claiming that they will cross-reference members' tickets bought with the barcode scanners at the turnstiles, meaning the ticket has to be used even if the member decides he can't be arsed to go

[Super_Uwe]

I'm quite excited at the prospect of watching old man Anders playing at Wembley!

[skintsaint]

made even worse by the fact that we mugged Spain...

 

Bit harsh...thought we played the game tactically spot on..unless of course you wanted England to attack the Spanish which would of been suicide.

[Smirking_Saint]

Bit harsh...thought we played the game tactically spot on..unless of course you wanted England to attack the Spanish which would of been suicide.

 

To me it looked more like......

 

"Wow.......we nicked a goal....BATTEN DOWN THE HATCHES

 

As for the OP, you obviously care, you keep bleating this same old line, plus it obviously gives you the oppurtunity to be negative about something else.

[Thorpe-le-Saint]

Couldn't care less about England - I even struggle to worked up about them when they're in a major tournament. For me it is Saints and nothing else 99.99999999999% of the time.

[krissyboy31]

Sweden playing in the kit we should have had as our away kit last season!!

[itchen_dan]

Main interest for me Is to keep an eye on the Swedish right back Mikael Lustig. We have been linked with him along with Fulham and have sent scouts to watch him play.

 

http://www.clubcall.com/fulham/fulham-southampton-eye-right-back-1309316.html

[COMEONYOUREDS]

I normally couldn't give a flying one about England, but thought about going tonight when i heard the crowd was so low. Live in North London so not a massive trek. Cheapest ticket i could find was £35 behind the goal, which i refuse to pay to watch what is effectively a nothing game. £20 would have seen it packed out

 

Agree with krissyboy re: the kit!

[S-Clarke]

Main interest for me Is to keep an eye on the Swedish right back Mikael Lustig. We have been linked with him along with Fulham and have sent scouts to watch him play.

 

http://www.clubcall.com/fulham/fulham-southampton-eye-right-back-1309316.html

 

He's a cracking player tbf. Def. premiership potential, and RB is an area I'd have a question mark over for the premiership - so good move if it happens.

[skintsaint]

To me it looked more like......

 

"Wow.......we nicked a goal....BATTEN DOWN THE HATCHES

 

Really? Must of watched a different game to me, Hart had nothing to do most of the game, in fact IIRC the only real chance they had was when Fab cocked it up at the end.

 

Will keep an eye on their right back if we are linked...if signed he would be our 3rd Swede in that position in about 8 years.

[Mattio]

I don't care, I didn't even watch it...

[JackFrost]

Elsewhere Spain losing 2-0 to Costa Rica at HT and Italy losing at home to Uruguay

[stevegrant]

Spain got two late goals to rescue a draw in the end, their results in friendlies have been mixed to say the least in the last year or so. It doesn't help that the Spanish FA are basically whoring them out to the highest bidder and will take them anywhere to play a game in a Harlem Globetrotters-esque situation, which can't do the players much good really. A midweek trip to Costa Rica for a meaningless game is hardly going to be a motivating factor for them.

[Deano6]

Of much more interest is that North Korea are the new Unofficial World Champions after they beat Japan 1-0 tonight!

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unofficial_Football_World_Championships

[sambosa75]

Had the game on whilst cooking dinner, just sort of listening to what was going on, sat down to eat dinner and turned the channel over. I'm a football nut but not interested in the slightest in England. I'll show some interest when our players do.

[anothersaintinsouthsea]

What is the point in the b*ll*cks that has been taking place over the last week-and-a-half (and thereby disrupting our winning run), apart from a marketing exercise for the FA and the sale of a few overpriced polyester shirts ?

 

I am dreading all the jingoism, flag-waving and nauseous Sun headlines that will arrive next summer, made even worse by the fact that we mugged Spain...

 

All that English jingoism and flag-waving must be really annoying in Austria. Likewise it must be hard for you and everyone else living in Austria to put up with the nauseous Sun headlines that you can only see if you especially log on to the internet or seek out the paper from an international stand at a city centre newsagents.

 

England fans, when you contemplate donning an England shirt or going to the pub to watch England this summer in the Euros, just spare a thought for everyone in Austria and try not to offend them.

 

Yes, people do care. So much so that nearly 90,000 turned out to watch England against Spain (was there a higher crowd for any other match in the world this weekend?) and millions will tune to watch each of their 3 matches in the Euros this coming summer.

[Sour Mash]

Had the game on whilst cooking dinner, just sort of listening to what was going on, sat down to eat dinner and turned the channel over. I'm a football nut but not interested in the slightest in England. I'll show some interest when our players do.

I'm not a massive England fan or a fan of a lot of the over-paid Prem "stars" that play for them, but if you'd bothered to watch either game you'd have seen more than enough effort throughout the side considering the games were friendlies played in the middle of the season.

[Frank's cousin]

To be fair, I can understand what Alps means - our tabloid media get a sudden uber rush of 'nationalism' vaguly disguised as 'patriotism' - especially when we meet anyone we ever had a war with... it gets feckin ridiculous. Worse will be if we end up against the Germans again... and they stuffed the Dutch )with van Persie and a couple of others) 3-0 without Schweinsteiger or Lahm... uhm can see the the build up now....

[Frank's cousin]

edit - 'without Van persie and a couple of others'

[Saint_clark]

I'm not a massive England fan or a fan of a lot of the over-paid Prem "stars" that play for them, but if you'd bothered to watch either game you'd have seen more than enough effort throughout the side considering the games were friendlies played in the middle of the season.

 

Agreed, I wasn't expecting much from these two games but was pleasantly surprised.

[hypochondriac]

I'm not a massive England fan or a fan of a lot of the over-paid Prem "stars" that play for them, but if you'd bothered to watch either game you'd have seen more than enough effort throughout the side considering the games were friendlies played in the middle of the season.

 

Yep. And many were youngsters. I think there is a lot of room for optimism over the future (as long as we don't go for redknapp).

[dinger]

This is actually the first time for several years when I have begun to care about the England team. Fabio is finally coming good on his promise to pick players on form; the lazy, perennially defeated old guard have finally lost their places, and exciting young players are being given a chance.

 

These two friendlies have seen an England team finally accepting the truth of it's place in the hierarchy of world football (i.e. not as good as the top sides) and playing to it's strengths. The game vs Spain was the most disciplined I've seen an England side in 20 years. It's not a time for jingoism, it's just a recognition that if England work hard and have the right attitude then they'll have enough to compete relatively well in major tournaments and may even fluke a result against one of the big boys.

[sambosa75]

I'm not a massive England fan or a fan of a lot of the over-paid Prem "stars" that play for them, but if you'd bothered to watch either game you'd have seen more than enough effort throughout the side considering the games were friendlies played in the middle of the season.

 

We beat Spain courtesy of a freak goal and then panicked in possession for the remainder of the match, essentially hoofing the ball aimlessly upfield. I don't doubt there were good levels of effort but it's all in vain when you know the likes of Terry, Ferdinand, Lampard, Barry, Gerrard and Rooney will all walk straight back in the side no questions asked when they are fit. Some say we got our tactics spot on, I say we got very lucky against a side who didn't once get out of 2nd gear.

 

I can't speak for the Sweden game as I didn't watch it but it'll take slightly more than a 1-0 win ground out at home against them with 1 up front before I start getting excited.

[sambosa75]

All that English jingoism and flag-waving must be really annoying in Austria. Likewise it must be hard for you and everyone else living in Austria to put up with the nauseous Sun headlines that you can only see if you especially log on to the internet or seek out the paper from an international stand at a city centre newsagents.

 

England fans, when you contemplate donning an England shirt or going to the pub to watch England this summer in the Euros, just spare a thought for everyone in Austria and try not to offend them.

 

Yes, people do care. So much so that nearly 90,000 turned out to watch England against Spain (was there a higher crowd for any other match in the world this weekend?) and millions will tune to watch each of their 3 matches in the Euros this coming summer.

 

Alps will testify that I am usually bang up for disagreeing with him but in fairness 90,000 turned up on Saturday to watch Spain, not England.

[Sour Mash]

We beat Spain courtesy of a freak goal and then panicked in possession for the remainder of the match, essentially hoofing the ball aimlessly upfield. I don't doubt there were good levels of effort but it's all in vain when you know the likes of Terry, Ferdinand, Lampard, Barry, Gerrard and Rooney will all walk straight back in the side no questions asked when they are fit. Some say we got our tactics spot on, I say we got very lucky against a side who didn't once get out of 2nd gear.

 

I can't speak for the Sweden game as I didn't watch it but it'll take slightly more than a 1-0 win ground out at home against them with 1 up front before I start getting excited.

Right. So your original post was a load of rubbish. Great contribution.

[sambosa75]

Right. So your original post was a load of rubbish. Great contribution.

 

I don't follow...

 

You condone players being paid north of £100k a week and treated like global mega stars defending like they did against Spain? I'm sorry but I could do what the majority of the England players did whilst defending against them, stand in the 18 yard box, get in the way and hoof the ball as far as possible when it falls at your feet. If its in the general direction of Danny Welbeck, even better. People need to wake up and realise playing like that we would be obliterated when it meant something. Instead, we all look at it thinking "we beat them 1-0... theres a lot to be optimistic about..."

[Sour Mash]

I don't follow...

You condone players being paid north of £100k a week and treated like global mega stars defending like they did against Spain? I'm sorry but I could do what the majority of the England players did whilst defending against them, stand in the 18 yard box, get in the way and hoof the ball as far as possible when it falls at your feet. If its in the general direction of Danny Welbeck, even better. People need to wake up and realise playing like that we would be obliterated when it meant something. Instead, we all look at it thinking "we beat them 1-0... theres a lot to be optimistic about..."

I'll help you follow. Your knowledge and understanding of football is poor. You post on football forums your "expert" opinions on games you haven't even been bothered to watch. Pointless.

[sambosa75]

I'll help you follow. Your knowledge and understanding of football is poor. You post on football forums your "expert" opinions on games you haven't even been bothered to watch. Pointless.

 

Take a look at my first post on this thread, I don't recall once passing judgement on the game yesterday. Simply stating through experience it is going to take a lot more than playing one up front at home to Sweden, grinding out a 1-0 win for me to start getting excited about international friendlies again. How you have deduced that my football knowledge and understanding is poor based on some "expert" opinions on yesterdays game that I haven't actually given, I don't know. Looking through your previous posts, perhaps its because you appear to be an ill-educated, boring know-all with a penchant for arguing over the internet. Pointless.

[Sour Mash]

Take a look at my first post on this thread, I don't recall once passing judgement on the game yesterday. Simply stating through experience it is going to take a lot more than playing one up front at home to Sweden, grinding out a 1-0 win for me to start getting excited about international friendlies again. How you have deduced that my football knowledge and understanding is poor based on some "expert" opinions on yesterdays game that I haven't actually given, I don't know. Looking through your previous posts, perhaps its because you appear to be an ill-educated, boring know-all with a penchant for arguing over the internet. Pointless.

For the Spain game - "Had the game on whilst cooking dinner, just sort of listening to what was going on, sat down to eat dinner and turned the channel over." More interested in stuffing your fat face than watching the game, but happy to run onto a forum and give an opinion. Oh and on yesterday's game (that you didn't even watch) "at home to Sweden, grinding out a 1-0 win" you're happy to give an opinion on a game you didn't watch. It certainly wasn't a classic, but England didn't grind out a win, they played decent, attacking football and should have had a few more goals than the 1-0 scoreline reflects.

[sambosa75]

For the Spain game - "Had the game on whilst cooking dinner, just sort of listening to what was going on, sat down to eat dinner and turned the channel over." More interested in stuffing your fat face than watching the game, but happy to run onto a forum and give an opinion. Oh and on yesterday's game (that you didn't even watch) "at home to Sweden, grinding out a 1-0 win" you're happy to give an opinion on a game you didn't watch. It certainly wasn't a classic, but England didn't grind out a win, they played decent, attacking football and should have had a few more goals than the 1-0 scoreline reflects.

 

Given that I wrote that post this morning at 9.35am I think it's pretty clear I was referring to the Sweden game. It seems your desire to go running head-long in to an argument has clouded your ability to get your facts straight.

 

I gave my opinion on how we played against Spain because I watched the game. Correct me if I am wrong but the result was 1-0 yesterday was it not? Considering that we were up against a defence comprised of players from such footballing luminaries as Rosenborg, Olympiakos, Celtic and Blackburn, excuse me if I don't go booking in my 'England: Euro 2012 Champions' tattoo just yet.

[stkev7]

All that English jingoism and flag-waving must be really annoying in Austria. Likewise it must be hard for you and everyone else living in Austria to put up with the nauseous Sun headlines that you can only see if you especially log on to the internet or seek out the paper from an international stand at a city centre newsagents.

 

England fans, when you contemplate donning an England shirt or going to the pub to watch England this summer in the Euros, just spare a thought for everyone in Austria and try not to offend them.

 

Yes, people do care. So much so that nearly 90,000 turned out to watch England against Spain (was there a higher crowd for any other match in the world this weekend?) and millions will tune to watch each of their 3 matches in the Euros this coming summer.

 

Well I'm an Englishman in Austria and I can assure you that I care about my country.

 

I used to be a regular with England home and away however these days I hardly go. Still very passionate about the national team but the FA, Capello and the majority of the players don't give a toss about the shirt and the fans.

 

I'm an Englishman so I support England. Really looking forward to the Euros.

[Barry the Badger]

We beat Spain courtesy of a freak goal and then panicked in possession for the remainder of the match, essentially hoofing the ball aimlessly upfield. I don't doubt there were good levels of effort but it's all in vain when you know the likes of Terry, Ferdinand, Lampard, Barry, Gerrard and Rooney will all walk straight back in the side no questions asked when they are fit. Some say we got our tactics spot on, I say we got very lucky against a side who didn't once get out of 2nd gear.

 

I can't speak for the Sweden game as I didn't watch it but it'll take slightly more than a 1-0 win ground out at home against them with 1 up front before I start getting excited.

 

I would take a bunch of limited players trying bloody hard over a bunch of talented players swanning about for 90 minutes, every single time.

 

That applies to saints or England.

 

And yes, I care about the England national team.

[saintwarwick]

Given that I wrote that post this morning at 9.35am I think it's pretty clear I was referring to the Sweden game. It seems your desire to go running head-long in to an argument has clouded your ability to get your facts straight.

 

I gave my opinion on how we played against Spain because I watched the game. Correct me if I am wrong but the result was 1-0 yesterday was it not? Considering that we were up against a defence comprised of players from such footballing luminaries as Rosenborg, Olympiakos, Celtic and Blackburn, excuse me if I don't go booking in my 'England: Euro 2012 Champions' tattoo just yet.

 

Yep a team we had previously failed to beat in 43 years and this, 3 days after beating the current european and world champions, had we lost either game I'm sure england would of been chastised by the same people who are bemoaning the fact that we actually won both games whether they mean anything or not.

[saintwarwick]

What is the point in the b*ll*cks that has been taking place over the last week-and-a-half (and thereby disrupting our winning run), apart from a marketing exercise for the FA and the sale of a few overpriced polyester shirts ?

 

I am dreading all the jingoism, flag-waving and nauseous Sun headlines that will arrive next summer, made even worse by the fact that we mugged Spain...

 

A win is a win no matter how you win it and that goes for any team including saints, we have won games where we have mugged the opposition just as much as we have lost games through being mugged. One day you will wake up and actually be happy for a change and maybe praise positive results

[hypochondriac]

England fans moan when we lose, so we win against the best team in the world and play pretty well and people still moan.

 

We have our limitations so play to our strengths. That's good enough for me.

[sambosa75]

England fans moan when we lose, so we win against the best team in the world and play pretty well and people still moan.

 

We have our limitations so play to our strengths. That's good enough for me.

 

That's just it. We didn't play well. We sh*t ourselves in possession and hoofed it as far as we could as soon as we went 1-0 up. It's a bit worrying when we play like that against Spain when they stuck in 2nd gear and the worrying reality is if something was actually on the line, they would have absolutely murdered us. Instead, because we scraped a 1-0 win, the cracks are papered over and the media make out that we just might have a chance at the Euros and a lot of the public buy in to it.

[hypochondriac]

That's just it. We didn't play well. We sh*t ourselves in possession and hoofed it as far as we could as soon as we went 1-0 up. It's a bit worrying when we play like that against Spain when they stuck in 2nd gear and the worrying reality is if something was actually on the line, they would have absolutely murdered us. Instead, because we scraped a 1-0 win, the cracks are papered over and the media make out that we just might have a chance at the Euros and a lot of the public buy in to it.

 

We scored and defended really well stopping Spain from getting many serious shots on target. We can speculate about what would happen in a proper game but it is pointless.

 

The fact is we played to our strengths, were disciplined and most importantly won the game. How would you have played differently against Spain considering our limitations and who we were playing? I think Capello got it spot on.

 

It's not about going overboard, I actualy think the press has been very tempered in their reaction. Was nice to see some youngsters being given a chance and I think it was a start, certainly better than the same old faces at the world cup.

[saintwarwick]

That's just it. We didn't play well. We sh*t ourselves in possession and hoofed it as far as we could as soon as we went 1-0 up. It's a bit worrying when we play like that against Spain when they stuck in 2nd gear and the worrying reality is if something was actually on the line, they would have absolutely murdered us. Instead, because we scraped a 1-0 win, the cracks are papered over and the media make out that we just might have a chance at the Euros and a lot of the public buy in to it.

 

Whist spain played quite well and had alot of possession they didn't create a lot of chances and as they say it's the result that counts and we won 1-0. Still lets not get facts in the way of speculation.

[sambosa75]

We scored and defended really well stopping Spain from getting many serious shots on target. We can speculate about what would happen in a proper game but it is pointless.

 

The fact is we played to our strengths, were disciplined and most importantly won the game. How would you have played differently against Spain considering our limitations and who we were playing? I think Capello got it spot on.

 

It's not about going overboard, I actualy think the press has been very tempered in their reaction. Was nice to see some youngsters being given a chance and I think it was a start, certainly better than the same old faces at the world cup.

 

Yes we scored. It was a bit of a freak goal but I'll take it. We are always going to cause them the most amount of bother from set pieces.

 

The fact is we didn't play to our strengths. We played to counteract Spain's strengths. Nothing wrong with that other than people trying to tell me we played well despite Spain having a huge 71% of possession and 23 attempts at goal compared to our 5. I really cant envisage Fabio telling the players "right lads, lets limit them to 71% possession and 23 shots at goal and we'll win this." 999 times out of 1000 those sort of stats will result in heavy defeat.

[belgrave]

To be fair' date=' I can understand what Alps means - our tabloid media get a sudden uber rush of 'nationalism' vaguly disguised as 'patriotism' - especially when we meet anyone we ever had a war with... it gets feckin ridiculous. Worse will be if we end up against the Germans again... and they stuffed the Dutch )with van Persie and a couple of others) 3-0 without Schweinsteiger or Lahm... uhm can see the the build up now....[/quote'] as per "a matter of life and death," who haven't we had a war with ?