[Pagan]

Yep I can see Man U finishing top 4, although I suspect they’d prefer top two, that way they wouldn’t have to go through the play offs…..Pagan?

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[Pagan]

I wouldn’t want to boast if we hadn’t won the league for 30 years either ???

Sorry Mr. Balance, couldn’t resist that…..Pagan

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[Pagan]

Chuckles, Ed, whilst I think grading the cheats (or divers if you think cheat to strong a word) is probably not the best thing to do as it tends to get a bit tribal, calling them out has to happen.

I’ve said before that the only way to stop it is to make it painfully shameful to be seen to do it. If the Premier League wanted to cut it out, as part of the TV deals and membership conditions they could have the “Shame Game” where the lowlights of the weeks footy are shown on Sky, BT, MOTD etc just after the main game, and at half time on the big screens in the stadiums to ridicule the offenders and then show the pundits and managers pathetically try and justify it.

You can ban players, or fine them, but whilst the clubs are rewarded with points it won’t stop, the only ones that can actually stop it are the players themselves….Pagan

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[Pagan]

Personally if Jose was to go to Spurs, it’s a disaster waiting to happen. Jose has always gone to either clubs on the rise or that are already successful, he has then tweaked the teams with some very expensive signings and turned them into winners. Spurs at the moment have plateaued at best and maybe be in regression. Is Jose the man to rebuild the Spurs team? Bearing in mind his usual tenure at a club I don’t think he’d have the time. In building terms he’s ok at prefabs but a bit shakey with bricks and mortar….Pagan

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[Pagan]

Stevo, in a perfect world would we not all be brothers?….Pagan

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[Pagan]

Whilst the behaviour of some of the Bulgarian fans was totally unacceptable, is it really fair to punish the players and proper fans by banning the team? We have to have consistency across football, that applies to both domestic and international teams.

With the technology we have now it would be quite easy to remove the racist fans during the match and deal with them in the courts, that of course means the courts have to set a severe punishment….Pagan

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[Pagan]

Horace Zontal???

Just an anagram for the business of your favourite player who chases the dollar Chuckles

Zlatan Hore Co.

….Pagan

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[Pagan]

As did the Canadian team…..Pagan

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[Pagan]

999, credit has to go to the NZ team whose game was cancelled yesterday due to the typhoon, today they’ve been out helping with the clean up, legends…..Pagan

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[Pagan]

999, I’m not sure if I made it really clear, but I was thinking of the division 1 and 2 teams being encouraged by the FA to embrace new English managers, this would be by bringing in mentorship for them and maybe some financial incentives for the clubs. It’s going to be a long process, but the players you mention are 12 years in the making and that coincides with Romans investment and focus on player development within Chelsea’s own academy…..Pagan

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[Pagan]

Mr. Balance, Liverpool’s first squad of players when they first formed as a club were 75% Scottish and as such were ineligible to play for England, it’s not a modern thing, Scottish or Swedish it matters not one jot when it comes to football, if you’re not English, you’re a foreigner.

If there’s a player that probably doesn’t try as hard as he’s not at a so called bigger club, then probably he doesn’t have the right mentality to be an elite athlete, and that would be the reason he is where he is…..Pagan

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[Pagan]

Mikus, for me the closed shop approach in football has to change, apparently you can’t be a top coach unless you’ve played at the top level, jobs for the boys in effect, it’s a bit like saying a doctor can’t treat a terminal disease unless he’s died himself.

For me we need to bring in fresh ideas from other sports and beyond, in a similar vein to British Cycling using the marginal gains initiative that has brought them so much success.

A players technical skills are developed at club level, an international manager needs to bring the talent together in a blend that works, that’s tactics, mentality and desire, only the tactics is footy specific, the rest is man management, so a charismatic leader supporters by a team with the tactical nouse maybe the way to go….Pagan

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[Pagan]

Mr. Balance, you’ve totally missed the point, Liverpool when they first formed had a squad made up of 75% foreign players, that means it’s been going on to well over 100 years, you could say Liverpool started the trend.

For me the lack of talent has nothing to do with the importing of talent from abroad, it’s more the fact we as a country failed to develop our own, the top players we produced over the last 30 years were not due to the the quality of coaching we have but despite it.

In respect of players coming from only a few clubs, well talented players will always migrate to the clubs they feel will give them the greatest success and the greatest rewards.

Change is slow in this respect as you have to start with the youngest players and develop them. This process starts with the kids who are 6-8 years old, so the process for the players we’re seeing now started 10 to 12 years ago.

Unfortunately at the highest level of any sport there is no “opportunity for everyone” just an opportunity for the most talented….Pagan

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Mr. Balance, building a team around one player is very short term and not really the way to do it, what happens if he’s injured or leaves? In my opinion you should have a club philosophy and you build a team around this, with the club implementing this from top to bottom and only buying in players that also fit…..Pagan

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Mr. Balance, Chelsea went down the route of using overseas players in the 90s as Ken Bates was trying to raise the profile of the club, he did this by buying in players that represented very good value for money, some were big names that had reached their sell by dates, others were just under valued. I was staggered when Gullit came to Chelsea.
We also bought Zola for about £4.5m who was fantastic for Chelsea, at a similar time Alan Shearer went to Newcastle for £15m, which shows the value for money in those days in buying overseas players.

My original point was having non English players though is nothing new, with Liverpool When they first started in the 1890s having a squad that only had 25% of them English. Also worth noting on that point is that London is closer to France than Liverpool is to Scotland.

In summary, playing non nationals is nothing new, and in the past overseas players were far better value for money….Pagan

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[Pagan]

999, I’m an early bird, so tend to get to bed at 10ish, long gone are the 24 hour party person.

It’s difficult as a nation playing catch-up, but at least we’ve started, so hopefully we’ll catch up and push on and not become complacent…..Pagan

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999, Spain have over 6 times the number of UEFA B coaches than England does, that’s because their FA doesn’t charge that much that only the few can afford to do it, hence they have a far bigger pond.

I think Mikus has provided the evidence, all the other major 2nd tiers are 90%+ same nation managers, England is less than 50%, thanks Mikus…Pagan

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Mr. Balance, Liverpool’s first squad of players were 75% Scottish, so having a large contingent of foreign players is nothing new….Pagan

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[Pagan]

999, you seem to be limiting yourself to fishing in a small pond, that’s where we go wrong, we need to be digging a lake. We’ve looked abroad and started to develop players using the methods we’ve seen, we now need to do that with coaches. I can’t be arsed to do the legwork but it would be interesting to see how many managers in the second tiers of the major European leagues are nationals of the said leagues.

Most of the top overseas coaches that come to England have a CV that show a progression through the leagues, we don’t seem to look close to home, believing foreign is best for some unknown reason.

Overseas clubs are now looking at taking the youth we develop abroad, that shows how far we have come with players, we just need to put the same effort into coaching…..Pagan

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999, which is what I said, because like young players they’re not given the chance, so currently we have a plethora of overseas managers, the same old English ones that go from mediocrity to mediocrity, and the odd ex player that’s thrown in at the deep end as a sacrificial lamb.

The FA need to put some sort of career path in for English managers that starts them at the bottom and brings them through, with financial support for mentorship. Having said that the ex players need to understand that they need to start at the bottom and not just walk into a high profile job.

Both Lampard and Gerrard seem to be doing well, but it’s early days for both….Pagan

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