England’s problem is not coaching it is boredom « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News, supporting the club, the players and the manager

By Tony Attwood

We’ve published a lot of articles on Untold over the years but a few stand out – not least one a couple of years back on the question of why England was so poor as an international football team.

I like that one because I didn’t know the answer when I started writing it, but the research gave me an answer.  We had far fewer coaches per player than any other major country.

At least I thought that was the answer until now.  For in today’s press it seems that there is a different answer.  For our lads can’t cope with hotels – or rather with being stuck in hotels between matches.

It seems they get bored in a way that those cheating continentals don’t.  While your average Frenchman, German, Dutchman or whoever will settle down with a newspaper, a book, and a laptop, the Englishman can’t hack it.

For this information we are indebted to Roy Keane, who is reported as saying,

“I think Wayne will have a big problem with the boredom, mentally trying to build up for a game,” said Keane. “English and Irish players are the same, I don’t think we are good at hanging around hotels and training camps in the middle of nowhere. As you get older you might be married and have kids, you might appreciate the peace and quiet, but Wayne is still young, he’s pretty active, mentally.

“It doesn’t suit England being stuck in hotels. That was a problem at the last World Cup. I think they need breathing space. There is a lot of media intrusion with England, but you have to give players a little bit of freedom. Of course you have to careful, you can’t be giving the lads licence to do what they want, then you are back to Gazza and the dentist chair [pre-Euro 1996, in Hong Kong].

“The last World Cup they were holed up somewhere [the Austrian Alps] for two or three weeks beforehand and the players were pissed off with that. That’s where Roy Hodgson has come in and said: ‘What do we need to make us a better team, and what can we knock on the head?’ Cancelling the trip to Spain [originally planned for this week] was good management. Players don’t need training camps at this time of year.”

Of course Mr Rooney is suspended for the openers, but that should be all to the good under this theory since he can zoom off to Las Vagas for a while, visit some of the talent around and about, and be back in time for the end of the group stages.

The ex-hardman, ex-manager, admirer of Mr Wenger’s coaching skills also said,

“Every tournament there seems to be something going on with England. In 2006 it was the Wags, they were staying next door and they were getting photographed. At the last World Cup you had David Beckham on the bench. I thought that was ridiculous. Gary [Neville] is actually part of the staff, Becks was still a player.”

So, we can forget coaching, and instead worry about entertainment, and managing the media.

Personally I just want our lads to come back without any broken bones.

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