African football teams play well for little rewards and FIFA meddles with our game

So, many more games and many more African defeats. I have to say, one of the features of this world cup has been of African teams playing extremely well yet still not managing to win. They play football with the right attitude by passing the ball quickly and to feet and with swift counter attacks. Their only problem being that these counter attacks are far from decisive. It does seem to be a feature of their play that they find themselves in excellent positions to shoot or cross and do neither. They seem to lose there concentration in those vital moments that make or break a game. Of course, this can only be put down to lack of experience at the highest level but you have to wonder if African teams will ever get this experience under the corrupt footballing bodies in their home states. These bodies ruin the fantastic talents that their players have and mean that no European clubs are willing to get involved in scouting in Africa becasue of the political minefield that it is. Pele once predicted that by 2002 an African team would have one the World Cup. You can see why this is true, the players are all extremely fit, powerful and skilful but until they can test themselves at the highest level, they will never win the Cup, which is a crying shame when you consider the next world cup is in 2010 in South Africa, lets hope they can get it together by then.
One of the African teams that does have players that have played at the highest level is the Ivory Coast. They play glorious attacking football and I expect some of their "un heard" of players to move on to bigger and better things just like Eboue, Toure and Drogba have done. Infact it is Toure's younger brother, Yaya, that really caught my eye. He plays some outstanding through balls and long passes but is also able to keep the pace of the game moving along, something like a cross between Beckham and Lampard. It is a cruel twist of fate that they are in the a group containing Holland, Argentina and Serbia and Monetenegro because I feel any of those teams could have gone on to the later stages of the tournament and really done well. I think FIFA need to really think about how they draw the groups next time as having a group such as that is damaging to the Cup.

In my next blog I'm going to follow up my last point with my opinions on what FIFA has told the referees to do. IM also going to looks at the pundits that have really impressed me and those that haven't really been up to scratch. I'll also obviously be looking at Brazil and England and identifying the teams that are threats to us. So keep reading.

Steve

England Kick Off and Eriksson blames the weather.

So England get their world cup off to a...sort of...forward motion. Despite what the pundits said about us having a "great first half" we didn't. The way David Beckham is playing we're only going to score goals from set pieces because we are so toothless in attack without Wayne Rooney. As has been repeated frequently, it's the three points that matter and "England will ease themselves into it." Sorry to appear such a killjoy but isn't that what the WARM UP games were for. The most games we will play this World Cup is 7, and we need to be firing on all cylinders for every game. I appreciate that the day was incredibly hot and we will never have to play a game at that time of day again, but there is something fundamentally wrong with a team containing Owen, Lampard, Gerrard, Beckham and Crouch that can only manage one own goal. Eriksson needs to seriously think about his tactics and formations because for 5 million a year we should be reaching at least the semi finals of the world cup. Without Rooney, Gerrard is England's key player and so needs to be given free reign to lift the team and take scrappy games by the scruff of the neck. But neither Lampard or Gerrard seem to know what they are supposed to do. If Gerrard is to have a free role then there needs to be someone protecting the defence, i would say Carrick because his distribution is so much better than any of the other options we have available.
As I write it is being rumoured that Rooney will play some part in the Trinidad game which can only be good as he needs to be fit for the knockout stages. However this brings up another question as to who will partner him? Crouch is in form and he is a possibility considering he is a very different player from Rooney, however when you look at any recent knockout stage games Owen is always first on the score sheet and every successful team needs a goal poacher. In Owen England have a really world class goal poacher but he needs to be really fit and score his goals and this is clearly not the case at the moment. This then begs the question as to why Eriksson did not bring Defoe and stuck with three defensive midfielders, one who is frequently, if unfairly, booed at by England fans making donkey noises. It all smacks of extreme caution on Eriksson's part, and this after seeming to abandon any sense of caution when including Walcott in his 23 man squad. Walcott must have been as bemused as any of us when Owen was replaced after less than an hour by Stuart Downing. Eriksson brought 1 fit, regular playing striker in Crouch and 2 injured strikers and Walcott. It seems to me that if Walcott is not going to play then what's the point in bringing him. I DO see the sense in bringing him but when England have several other fit, prolific strikers to choose from, most notably Defoe, a carbon copy of Michael Owen, then why aren't any of them brought, not in place of Walcott, but in place of Jenas or Hargreaves, as surely both are not needed?
I'm sure things will get better in the coming days with Rooney's imminent return and the fact we will be playing at cooler times of day but Eriksson really needs to do something about our attacking weaknesses and fast as the only way we are going to beat Brazil is by scoring a lot of goals as they don't get beaten 1-0.
Apart from that all credit to the team as they battled bravely in the hot temperature and ground out that all too rare opening game result. Well done to, for putting up with a seemingly inept Manager obsessed with defence despite the wealth of attacking options available to us. I hope he proves us wrong and, as a fan, i still hope we will win but Lord knows it will be tough.

About this blog, football in General and Refereeing

I've realised now that if you want to read detailed match reports you can just look on the BBC or something, (they are of course the best) so what i intend to do with this blog is concentrate on my rants and thoughts from refereeing in and around North London. Of course as it is World Cup season i will publish my thoughts on many games but they will be MY thoughts and not match reports as such, just to give a difference of opinion from the main news sites. I will also report on O's matches as there arent many reviews on O's games or much anlysis to speak of on the web so i will keep you informed on them.

Happy reading

First Day of the World Cup

The long wait is over. After months of waiting on broken bones and torn ligaments finally the greatest show on earth has begun. The opening ceromony was done with all true German efficiency and now it was time for the football to finally take centre stage.
First up, came Germany against Costa Rica. Surely this would be a win for the Germans I had thought, but after seeing the Germans concede some very soft goals againt Japan and Italy in the pre match build up I was not so sure. The game kicked off and Germany gor off to the perfect start. Philip Lahm picked the ball up after Danny Fonseca's slip, and, almost without looking, unleashed a stunning curling strike from distance to get the games underway. No goalkeeper in the world could have saved it and it looked as though we were in for a rout. However just 6 minutes later Paolo Wanchope, formerly of Manchester City, collected a through ball from Ronald Gomez and calmly sidefooted past Jens Lehman in the German goal. Wanchope had at first appeared to be offside yet replays showed that Wanchope had timed his to perfection.
These first few opening exchanges showed that, if nothing else these two teams lacked any kind of defensive solidarity. It will be interesting to see how Germany do in this world cup as they have a habit of always doing well with an unfancied team yet, they dont seem nearly as organised as past German teams and I fancy Englands chances against them.
Eventually the game ended 4-2 to Germany but i think the main thing to come out of this game is how much the ball moves. It swerves this way and that and really looks like a goalkeepers nightmare.

Steve

First Post

This will be my blog from now on and (i hope) will lead onto some very interesting football related rants. we shall see.