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San Marino v Englahd


andykeenan

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It's almost as if they played in an era where most international teams were of awful standard...

I don't really like making the comparison, what was back then was different, but............

For a start Charlton and Greaves, and even players in the 80s played, for example, against Yugoslavia. Now you get capped (and the opportunity to score) against Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Macedonia. It would be impossible to make a case that the old Yugoslavia wasn't a stronger side than all those newly constituent parts. 

With Russia it's even worse - now there's a reduced Russia along with a host of utterly useless intemational sides in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus, Armenia, Georgia. Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Ukraine.

Even the Czechs and Romanians have been weakened by independent states at the same time as FIFA/UEFA allow the likes of San Marino, Faroes, Andorra and Gibraltar onto the scene. There were 32 European teams who took part in qualifying for the 1974 World Cup, there's now 54 involved in these Euros. 

Practically all England's competitive matches are now against sub-League 1 standard opposition, and sure enough as soon as they meet a major national side they fail - it's now 13 years and counting since England beat a serious opponent in a competitive game.

As for last night, those match-ups remain a joke. That's not just my opinion, the bookies concur. San Marino were 150/1 to beat England last night. Even Bradford City were only 25/1 to win at Chelsea in last season's mega-cup-shock. If San Marino were in National League North (or whatever it's called today) they'd finish bottom of it.

When I was a kid, and even later in my case, international football was the pinnacle of footballing achievement. Now I can barely raise an eyebrow in interest. This weekend Sky Sports told me that behind the red button I could watch Montenegro v Liechtenstein. Why? I wouldn't even have watched that if it was being played behind my neighbour's fence.

Edited by gordoncharles
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Worth watching for all the moaners to get pissed off for Rooney at least equaling the England record - in the same amount of games as Charlton too.

Charlton wasn't a striker though and Greaves achieved 44 goals in almost half the games Rooney has played.

So . . . ?

If Rooney breaks Sir Bobby's record all that it means is that he has played so many games, many of them against lesser opposition, only one goal in a world cup tournament. I just can't regard him the greatest striker England have ever had. So i really hope he doesn't break it but he will, the same as he will break united all time scoring record but will never be regarded their greatest striker.

Worth watching for all the moaners to get pissed off for Rooney at least equaling the England record - in the same amount of games as Charlton too.

Charlton wasn't a striker though and Greaves achieved 44 goals in almost half the games Rooney has played.

So . . . ?

Worth watching for all the moaners to get pissed off for Rooney at least equaling the England record - in the same amount of games as Charlton too.

Charlton wasn't a striker though and Greaves achieved 44 goals in almost half the games Rooney has played.

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There's more crap today, I don't disagree. But the % of crap is certainly lower and the overall standard is much better. Plus, there's very few of those terrible teams and they're spread out. Barely even 1 per group. There's rarely an easy game in the World Cup Finals or European Championships these days - despite their being more teams. Yet pre-80s there was so much crap getting in, despite the tournaments being smaller.

12 (nearly a quarter) of Bobby's goals came in 5 games v the USA, Mexico and Luxembourg. The combined scoreline in those 5 games? 39-2 to England.

25 (nearly a quarter) of Bobby's games were in the British Championships in which we lost only 3.

Rooney also played well over 1,000 minutes less than Charlton over his career so far with 32 of Charlton's goals being in friendlies.

Charlton obviously has a better World Cup record and has the World Cup win. But the way people are playing down what Rooney has done is a bit weird to me. Though these days it seems very cool to hate certain clubs and dislike their English stars. While money grabbers elsewhere in these lads-favourites nations like Germany, get nothing but plaudits.

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Walcott thinks England can win Euro 2016

Of course he does.

 

Why do people get annoyed when players and managers say stuff like this?

What do people want him to say?
"Nah we've got no chance. Not much point in going really"

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There's more crap today, I don't disagree. But the % of crap is certainly lower and the overall standard is much better. Plus, there's very few of those terrible teams and they're spread out. Barely even 1 per group. There's rarely an easy game in the World Cup Finals or European Championships these days - despite their being more teams. Yet pre-80s there was so much crap getting in, despite the tournaments being smaller.

12 (nearly a quarter) of Bobby's goals came in 5 games v the USA, Mexico and Luxembourg. The combined scoreline in those 5 games? 39-2 to England.

25 (nearly a quarter) of Bobby's games were in the British Championships in which we lost only 3.

Rooney also played well over 1,000 minutes less than Charlton over his career so far with 32 of Charlton's goals being in friendlies.

Charlton obviously has a better World Cup record and has the World Cup win. But the way people are playing down what Rooney has done is a bit weird to me. Though these days it seems very cool to hate certain clubs and dislike their English stars. While money grabbers elsewhere in these lads-favourites nations like Germany, get nothing but plaudits.

In addition, only 14 of Rooney's have come in friendlies, whereas 26 of Lineker's and 22 of Charlton's were in friendlies. 

I don't understand the attitude in this thread. It's not zero-sum - saying that Rooney has done very well over a long period of time for England doesn't mean that you can't also rate Grieves and Lineker and Charlton. There's not a fixed amount of appreciation, and saying 'well done' to Wayne doesn't mean you have to think everybody else is a bit shitter. 

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Walcott thinks England can win Euro 2016

Of course he does.

 

Why do people get annoyed when players and managers say stuff like this?

What do people want him to say?
"Nah we've got no chance. Not much point in going really"

England got zero chance of winning it, so he might aswell keep his mouth shut.

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Walcott thinks England can win Euro 2016

Of course he does.

 

Why do people get annoyed when players and managers say stuff like this?

What do people want him to say?
"Nah we've got no chance. Not much point in going really"

England got zero chance of winning it, so he might aswell keep his mouth shut.

I assume somebody asked him the question in an interview. So what should he do then? 'Keep his mouth shut?' Just enter a silent staring contest with the interviewer?

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Walcott thinks England can win Euro 2016

Of course he does.

 

Why do people get annoyed when players and managers say stuff like this?

What do people want him to say?
"Nah we've got no chance. Not much point in going really"

England got zero chance of winning it, so he might aswell keep his mouth shut.

What's the point in playing if you have no belief that you can win?

 

plus England are only team with a 100% record which is no easy feat in this campaign

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I also don't agree that England have 'zero chance' of winning. In the past 23 years, there have been 6 European Championships, of which 2 (33%) have been won by rank outsiders. Bookies aren't going to price us at 100/1 or higher, which would reflect a real close-to-zero chance, it'll more likely be 16 or 20/1. 

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Theo gets slammed for answering a question. Given that people complain about Jose/Wengers lack of answering questions, I imagine Theo couldn't win regardless of what he said. England have lost 1 game in the past 2 Euros we've qualified for, it's not impossible as you'd imagine our shootout record can't go on forever. Even that loss was a complete freak event against France.

Edited by kurtsimonw
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Walcott thinks England can win Euro 2016

Of course he does.

 

Why do people get annoyed when players and managers say stuff like this?

What do people want him to say?
"Nah we've got no chance. Not much point in going really"

England got zero chance of winning it, so he might aswell keep his mouth shut.

So if you were an england player, and an interviewer asked you if you could win Euro 2016, you'd just sit there silently? Or say "no"?

Course you wouldn't. You'd say something like "if we play well we've got a chance" or "We're good enough to win it if we play our best" or something to that effect, which is what I'm guessing Walcott said.

 

And, to be fair, any team in the competition can win the Euros. It's very unlikely that we'll do it, but Greece have shown before that it's possible. I'd be questioning the players' mentality if they were going into a competition believing they'd already lost.

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Walcott thinks England can win Euro 2016

Of course he does.

 

Why do people get annoyed when players and managers say stuff like this?

What do people want him to say?
"Nah we've got no chance. Not much point in going really"

England got zero chance of winning it, so he might aswell keep his mouth shut.

I assume somebody asked him the question in an interview. So what should he do then? 'Keep his mouth shut?' Just enter a silent staring contest with the interviewer?

Well you shouldnt assume so much, nobody asked him in the interwiev i read, even if they did, he could say something like:There is alot of quality teams in the tournament and we will certainly give it our all.

England always think that they are so much better than they are and it annoys me.

When was the last time you won anything? 1966? and you won that with the help of the ref.

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Well you shouldnt assume so much, nobody asked him in the interwiev i read, even if they did, he could say something like:There is alot of quality teams in the tournament and we will certainly give it our all.

England always think that they are so much better than they are and it annoys me.

When was the last time you won anything? 1966? and you won that with the help of the ref.

:crylaugh:

so because one of the players playing for England said we could win it, that means England think they're better than they are?

Nobody's expecting to win the Euros. Even people who say we could win it (which isn't many) certainly aren't "expecting" it.

Why are you turning into a "my dad's bigger than yours" competition? What does the last time England winning anything have to do with it.

I bet if an Icelandic player or a ROI player (if they qualify) got asked if they could win the tournament, they would say yes. They COULD.

Edited by Stevo985
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Well you shouldnt assume so much, nobody asked him in the interwiev i read, even if they did, he could say something like:There is alot of quality teams in the tournament and we will certainly give it our all.

England always think that they are so much better than they are and it annoys me.

When was the last time you won anything? 1966? and you won that with the help of the ref.

:crylaugh:

so because one of the players playing for England said we could win it, that means England think they're better than they are?

Nobody's expecting to win the Euros. Even people who say we could win it (which isn't many) certainly aren't "expecting" it.

Why are you turning into a "my dad's bigger than yours" competition? What does the last time England winning anything have to do with it.

I bet if an Icelandic player or a ROI player (if they qualify) got asked if they could win the tournament, they would say yes. They COULD.

What a stupid reply, there is no point in debating with someone like you.

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