England

Fabio Caphello

By Oli Dinsmore ⋅ March 28, 2008 ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

After a lacklustre display against the French in Paris on Wednesday, the predictable murmurs of media discontent are already beginning to surface.

It seems par for the course to herald the brilliance of each new England manager before embarking on a terminal campaign of suspicion and defamation after the very first bad result. Before the game even began, Ray Wilkins had expressed surprise that Beckham had been picked ahead of the in-form Bentley, and before long, the supremely insightful David Platt was admonishing the Italian for not playing Owen alongside Rooney from the start. How long before the press drag up their famous old picture of Fabio in his pants to use in tandem with a headline that questions the man’s sanity? Or gender?

Stop! Can we not, for once, give a manager a chance before infecting the nation with negative sentiment. Can we not let this guy try and do his job? Can we not give him 20 games to assert his style and authority on the side, before the media generates the overwhelming sense that the whole nation hates him?

I think when we speak of the England manager’s position as a ‘poisoned chalice’, we are not talking so much these days about the arguable lack of depth in the squad, but of how difficult the press make the incumbent’s job. If a manager makes changes to systems, the media screams ‘square pegs and round holes’ and the manager is doomed. If he doesn’t make changes ‘we might as well have kept McClaren.’ It’s a completely thankless task – a seemingly no win situation.

So let’s just deal with fact for a moment. Fabio Capello has the best CV of any manager that the FA has ever employed. He may be inexperienced on the international scene, but this is a man who has rarely known failure. At AC Milan, he put together the best team that The Champions League has seen and last season, at Real Madrid, he turned a headless chicken into a title winner in nine short months.

I’m going to stick my neck out right now and say that Capello IS the answer to England’s problems – if we can only bite the national tongue for long enough to let him do his work.

Apart from the CV, the reason I like Capello is that he has the substance to implement his strong visions, no matter how long that might take (vote hungry politicians should take note). So England lost last night and lacked penetration in the final third. But surely the most important thing is that Capello ordered his team to pass the ball. And how long have we suffered at the top level because we can’t pass the ball to eachother?

Rome wasn’t built in a day and the players obviously aren’t completely comfortable yet with the idea that they aren’t permitted to hoof long balls up the park when they’re trailing the opposition. It must have felt like an itch that the players and fans wanted to scratch at times last night, as we spread the ball, with short passes, around the back four for long periods. But this is exactly the sort of ‘root and branch’ change that English football needs and I heartily applaud Capello for having the eggs to champion such change. He knows we aren’t going to be world-beaters over night. What he does know is that the best teams in the world are the ones that are most comfortable in possession. It’s as simple as that.

In the past, at 1-0 down, England would start pumping the ball up the field in an attempt to overwhelm the opposition. But in Paris, even after 88 minutes we were trying to attack through short passing on the deck, rather than long hoofs and hopeful headers. It may seem frustrating to the Anglo-viewer who is accustomed to ‘passion’ in the last 20 minutes of a match, but sadly ‘passion’ don’t pay the bills. Just because Terry Butcher has a bloodied bandage on his head doesn’t mean we have played well. Or won. Passing does pay the bills. And Capello’s desire for England to become a passing team is seen in this side’s every move.

How many times have you wanted to shoot an England player for giving the ball away time and time, and yes, time again? After the McClaren debacle, the football nation screamed for change. Now we’ve got it, some are looking around scratching their heads.

After a fitful start to his Champions League career Wayne Rooney is reported to have confided in a team mate that ‘I don’t know what it is, The Champions League’. I think, at the moment, some of us just don’t know what ‘this is’. We’re accustomed to seeing England play a long ball game, where the team is exhausted after an hour of trying to ‘out-swashbuckle’ the oppostion. This style of play may seem to more appropriately represent the frustration of the nation but it certainly hasn’t worked for us. Capello sees this. Rather than plugging old holes, the Italian is building a new ship. And it’s going to take time.

Capello knew what he was getting himself into when he took the England job. He took the weight of a nation, starved of success for 40 years, upon his shoulders. But still he’s put his reputation as an elite manager on the line to try and steer this rudderless vessel. For this action alone, he surely deserves our respect and patience.

Tags: England, Fabio Capello, France

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