If
FFP at club level stands for Financial Fair Play, then for England at
International level it surely stands for Fickle Football Press as far as the
media is concerned.
I’m
as frustrated as the next fan at the nil success rates over the years, so
things DO need to improve – but it’s never going to happen overnight is it?
Did
the press not see the last World Cup? We gave it a go, and granted we had no
luck at all, and in truth but we fell well short of any achievement - but what
makes people (and in particular, sections of the English media) think we would
suddenly become brilliant again after one match?
Several
of the England players in the match last week against Norway had under 10 caps
and they will need support and encouragement after poor performances rather
than rants.
Thankfully
this latter approach does appear to happen from within the camp as the
performance in a game that mattered against a very good Switzerland team was
the best we’d seen for a while.
How do the press react? They start looking at venues in France where England might be based if we qualify! Fickle.
I don’t buy for a second that the players and staff
don’t care. Joe Hart exemplifies what it means on the field, and Gary Neville
exudes a huge drive to succeed off the field.
Things are definitely going in the right direction
with these guys on the scene.
The
trouble is a lack of patience.
Much
of the media/press commentary forget (or choose to ignore) that both the
Spanish and Germans had spells like this in the not too distant past, when they
had to retire many of their own so called golden generations and ‘start again’.
Positive
stepping stones are all important.
I often glance at the views of the spuds-flogging,
goatee-trialling, former goal machine king of Twitter Gary Lineker to see what
his measured views on football matters are:
“Judge this group in 4 years time, not after their
first 90 minutes” says King Links.
That’s good enough for me.
