... anyone is daft enough to christen their son 'Come On England.'

in bagging their representative sporting teams

is that English players are finding it increasingly difficult to get a game at all. When Arsenal and Liverpool can field teams with not an Englishman present is it any wonder that that the England manager finds his choices a bit limited?

Funnily enough it's exactly the same reason that the Scottish team is so poor these days. 20 or 30 years ago most of the Scotland team played in England. Now, because of Bosman, English teams can get their players from all over the place, and there's hardly any place for Scots in the Man Utd or Liverpool line-ups, two teams which previously had a rich tradition of signing players from north of the border.

I really think England could be in for a similar spell in the wilderness to that currently being experienced by Scotland.

on that one Fraser. 19 Premier league teams each with a squad of conservatively 25 players. What percentage are British? Well below 50 percent and shrinking. Limit the number of foreigners to say 4 per squad and 2 per playing team and that increases the number of British players which benefits the national teams of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. It wont happen because Man U, Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool and maybe Spurs are controlling the game and want the best foreign imports. The FA should tell them the game is bigger than individual clubs and force the issue. They wont because they are spineless and will not stand up to these teams and to Sky who have effectively driven a wedge between the elite and the also rans. I will give you a scenario that highlights the potential for abuse of the system at the highest level - Birmingham played liverpool in the Carling cup final at the Millennium stadium. The game goes into extra time. Birmingham were outplayed for much of the 90 minutes but scoring a late equaliser they go into extra time with the upper hand and forcing Liverpool onto the back foot. They are denied a stonewall penalty. Is that because the referee didnt see it? Cynics amongst us might think it is because Liverpool in Europe is a much better proposition and a far bigger opportunity to earn some extra revenue.
Big clubs make illegal approaches to the parents of promising youngsters barely out of school trousers offering all manner of inducements. The game is becoming increasingly more corrupt and the decisions in favour of the big clubs should be questioned much more vigorously. They dont care about the national team and until they do we are doomed. Do you think the Bundesliga has the same number of foreign imports? I think not.

I've said this before and I'll say it again. Our players are thick.

You can see this on the field as soon as they hit any form of adversity. The brows furrow, the panic sets in and the red mist descends. Anything that can't be solved by a mad cavalry charge is an insurmountable obstacle. I don't think this is anything to do with their educational background - though it's amazing that we used to have the odd footballer with a university education back in the days when university was an option for only 10% of the population rather than the near 50% of today. I don't think the average overseas player in the Premiership is much better educated than the average home-grown player but by going overseas he has shown his willingness to *learn*. He's learned a new way of playing the game, a language and in the case of outstanding examples a good deal more than that.

Try this: when did you last hear a top English player (or manager) say anything about something he's learned recently? And I'm not talking about the Public Sector Borrowing Requirement or the early life of Lady Gaga. I'm just talking about their trade. In fact they give the impression that they would really prefer not to think about any aspect of what they do on the pitch, for fear that this prevents them from doing it naturally. Listen to people like Alan Shearer, who is the fearful, conservative shop steward of the footballing establishment in this country, and all you'll hear is that Capello didn't understand what motivates the players and that consequently they wouldn't play for him. Now obviously Capello isn't going to please everyone and he's going to have trouble making himself understood but the implication that because he wasn't Bobby Robson or Michael Caine in Escape To Victory this bunch of players were somehow justified in withholding their best efforts takes one's breath away.

Last night Five Live had one of those "what's wrong with our game?" discussions. (They always have thes after tournaments. Why not have the next one before, boys?) Anyway, Chris Waddle and Terry Venables were the usual Ray Winstones, full of spluttering indignation and ancient score settling within the football establishment. Neither of them actually completed a sentence, which meant neither of them expressed a joined-up thought. It was left to Dietmar Hamman to speak better English and talk more sense than either of them.

that Terry Venables had a better World Cup record for England although I take your point that they are thick. I don't think we can ignore the issue of Foreign coaches for the national team. Let's be honest Capello's command of the English language is very poor. Okay my Italian is worse but I am not paid £6 million per year to get the best out of their squad. I dont see how as a nation we have allowed the situation where we are almost bereft of good English coaches with a passion for the game and a natural affinity with the players. Capello doesn't seem to possess the common touch and has an air of authoritarianism that wouldn't sit well with the likes of Rooney,Terry et al. Personally I think it is time to start again - make a decision on an English coach and stick with it and give the team some continuity. I would stick my neck out and suggest Stuart Pearce. Passionate, loved playing for England, tough but a mans man and did well with the England Youth set up. Media choice appears to be Redknapp but I think he is maybe too old now for the long term building that is required.

Somewhere on this site is my prediction for the tournament.
Last 16 with four goals scored.....I just can't believe I thought they'd score four!

First, the facts:
1. England have 'no' world class players.
2. The Beckham generation fail every single time.

The solution is exactly as it was in 2006 and 2008.
Ditch all (that's 'all') the celebs.
Give Ferguson, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool what they've always wanted anyway......namely, don't pick any of their precious players.

Draw up a list of the 80 next eligible players outside the 'Bore Four'.
Interview them all.
Ditch 40.
Interview them all again.
Pick 22 and tell them that eleven of them will be playing in 2008 and 2010.....unless, of course, they sign for Chelsea et al when, of course, they'd be immediately dropped.

In other words, get a team out there that doesn't 'expect' to be out there and England will have a chance.
Pick the same players yet again and you'll get the same result again (1998) and again (2000) and again (2002) and again (2004)......

Anyone here with kids playing FA-accredited local club football knows that they start on 11-a-sides on full size pitches & goals at aged 10 or 11. Most 10 year olds cannot kick the ball very far, so... The stand-out players are either a) the ones that can kick far (generally the biggest kids) or b) the fast runners who can chase the ball kicked by his big mate over the heads of the oppo's defenders.

Apparently, Holland and many other nations do not start 11-a-side until 14 and training is always in smaller groups on small pitches where technique is paramount.

made the other day on the Guardian football podcast, namely that - for no apparent reason - English players seem to have to fit some kind of pre-determined role according to their physique.

They cited the example of Emile Heskey who, as a teenager, was a quick and tricky winger until it was decided he was a bit big for a winger, so let's make him bulk up and become a lumbering target-man. Why can't Heskey score? Because he was never meant to be a centre-forward. But just because he was bigger than the average, it doesn't mean he couldn't be a winger. Not all wingers have to look like Aaron Lennon or Shaun Wright-Phillips.

Everton youngster Jack Rodwell was also mentioned. A promising midfielder who David Moyes has already said will probably end up a centre-back due to his size. Why is this? I can't understand why players can't just play in their best positions rather than this insistence with a one-dimensional view of what certain players should look like which appears to have come from the 1950s.

What made them think that picking a coach with no record of ever having managed a national team, let alone at a tournament, would somehow deliver the goods at a time when we were struggling to even qualify? It was a knee-jerk reaction to the perceived problem of player-power: hire a disciplinarian.

That said, I'd persist with Mr. Capello. How does anyone ever become a national coach capable of winning the World Cup? By doing it, making mistakes, learning and getting on. Mr. Capello has had a very difficult lesson and appears chastened; he's intelligent and I think he can change. I think he realises he needs to blood a generation of new players and treat them like adults. So my view would be to keep him on, quickly ease out the older (28+) players, target the semi's of the European Championship and review it after that.

Blaming Mr. Capello would suit the suits, all right, but I'd prefer to see them display far more mature judgement than hitherto - or consider their own positions first.

Can't help thinking it is Out Of Africa this year; Blame It On Rio in four years time . . .

with the possible exception of Cole, and apparently incapable of playing together as a team.

If you look at the pattern all recent England managers enjoyed a fine honeymoon period of decent results - Capello, Keegan, Ericksson. The problem then is the media start thinking we are World beaters when we are clearly not. Player power comes into it. I remember seeing Trevor Francis at a sportsmans dinner not long after he had been sacked as Birmingham manager. He made a very good point - how can a manager garner the respect of the players when they are earning far more than he is and know that effectively they can get him thrown out on his ear. I truly believe the players had this in mind in the Algeria game - watch the body language. They didn't want to play for Capello and he didn't want to manage them. They patched it up for Slovenia but too little too late. I think in the coming weeks we will hear a lot more about what went on. If Capello stays I think Terry has to go for starters. Probably be better if they both went and possibly Steve Gerrard too.

You see all these kids on various TV shows, doing all this Fancy Dan "soccer skillz" keepie-uppie nonsense; then, as soon as you put them in a professional environment, all of a sudden you find they can't thread a pass, or trap the ball, or control it properly, or shoot straight - hooking and slicing the ball with alarming regularity.

We're breeding performing seals, not footballers: It seems to me that aspiring footballers are wasting their time learning skills that are of no practical use whatsoever on the field of play.

Ardiles in today's Telegraph:

The Premier League is partly to blame. It is win-at-all-costs and it perhaps sacrifices the aesthetics and skills. The very best things about the Premier League - the styles of Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester United - rely on the playmakers being foreigners. Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard are very fine players, but not technical players in the sense that they control the midfield and create chances. They like to arrive in the box, get on the end of crosses, and score.

All true about the foreign playmakers though.

of the Central / South American teams that took part got through the group stages. The only ones knocked out so far have been eliminated by other such teams (I think). Why is this?

because of the regionalisation of the qualification process, there's always going to be 'better' teams excluded from the finals.

English, and by extension, Scots, Welsh and Irish players have a poor first touch and are uncomfortable with the ball, because, as alluded to above, of the rudimentary 'coaching' techniques visited upon young footballers in these islands. Until this is addressed anything else is going to be papering over the cracks.

France qualified at their expense despite a clear handball. I reckon they'd have made a better fist of it than a few European teams, including England.

Glenn Hoddle certainly didn't have a poor first touch but was not an exceptional England player. Gascoigne had a great first touch and was a half decent England player. The difference between the two? Passion.
Difference between Capello and Maradona as managers? Passion. Capello is probably a better manager on a technical level but passion matters. We don't have it.

And don't forget shooting!
From the bits I saw of England there seemed to be a shoot-on-sight policy (and there should be one when they get back to Heathrow!).

Argentina's second goal in the last game came from a defensive lapse but the three touches from the no.9 were sublime.
Touch ball forward, get body in between defender and self, nick ball past keeper, slot in........Rooney, absolutely and categorically, would have taken at least one less touch, probably two, and hit the keeper.

I think, as usual, too many football fans focus on the now. It is unlikely that any group of English players, from 14 years old and up, are going to do anything at the World Cup or the European Championship. The problems are way too deep. We have to change so many elements so profoundly that it will take years. Stop arguing about, Cole, Crouch, Rooney etc. They can’t and never will do it (although I wish they would).

Oh, and as for the too many foreign players in the Premiership – if Fraser is right about the German league and I have no reason to doubt him – that argument holds no water and needs kicking into touch.

One thing I didn’t mention as I forgot. I don’t think the players want it enough and I don’t think I blame them. If I was a player, earning millions (and the only person in my family ever to do so, and ever likely to do so) I think I would want to play for as long as I could. Getting injured cutting my career short would slash my earning potential. If I play until I am nearly 40 I could earn enough to keep myself and my children and my children’s children. Would I risk throwing that away playing in an England team that were falling apart before my eyes? When a game gets nasty and the chips are down. would I run myself ragged and go for every 50/50 ball knowing I would probably get clattered. I may miss a season – I may never fully recover, my currency would diminish and my future security would be at stake.

It is all very well for us to have romantic ideas about playing in a world cup final and wearing 3 lions on our chests but if your family’s financial security could be ruined by a late tackle for a team that probably can’t win the tournament – would you risk it?
I wouldn’t – it would take about 15-20% of my determination away, maybe less but at such a high level that is way too much. Why doesn’t it happen to other teams… maybe they really believe they can win. Of course not all players think like this but I am sure there are enough.

The football analysis on here beats much of that coming from so called pundits and football experts.

Thick yes as in lack of football intelligence, a lack of basic ability as in basic passing shooting movement.

Also we don't play as a team too much emphasis on the individual see the cult of the individual yes you David Beckham and others I saw Gerrard try ridiculous shots when a pass would have built the team play better.

We need to adopt the Dutch model and start producing intelligent footballers again but it's going to take a long time I fear a long time in the wilderness

A top premier league footballer is going to earn £5 million per year excluding perks such as houses etc etc. 2 seasons would look after his family for life. That argument doesnt wash especially as they get paid when they are injured. It is more complex than that - or at least I hope it is. If that is the reason I start to worry about our game.

in the team is almost nil for most of the England team. In cricket since Andy Flower was appointed almost anyone can be replaced and if form dips or someone else demands a place then Flower will change. Wicket keeper Matt Prior has been replaced in the 1 day team by the younger, more attacking Craig Keiswetter. Priors performances in T20 cricket since have been fantastic. England now have two quality wicket keepers who will be vying for a place for years to come. Someone should have done the same with Gerrard and Lampard for example. Imagine the performances we would have got if one played knowing the other was on the bench waiting for his chance. It is best illustrated by the almost grotesque selling of England shirts with a players name and number on the back. The assumption being that Terry IS Englands number 6 or Lampard IS Englands number 8. Strong management is needed to make the best of the small pool of players we have, identifying at least 2 players in each position and making it the surivival of the fittest is an essential step in the right direction.

I coach an Under 9s girls team and we play in a U7s boys league.
As I am sure Leedsboy, Dave Amitri and the handful of others here involved in youth football can attest, the most frequent phrase I hear at U7-U14 football is 'Get Rid, lad'.
If you are conditioned to 'get rid' of the ball, you are probably not moving for the next pass or the one after it and not particularly interested in getting it back.
I suspect this lack of respect for the ball, possession and passing is not fostered in Holland, Argentina, Spain, Germany or Brazil.
Gareth Barry.

I don't agree with any of this detailed analysis and questions about player skill levels and nit picking.

The main reason England can't succeed - PRESSURE. Enormous, unreasonable, counter-productive levels of pressure. Far too much at stake for them, every game on this level they play. Any potential spilt second mistake, becomes a crime that may follow them for the rest of their lives. The unforgiving, humourless British media, like wolves at the door.

More of a psychological game, than anything to do with football for any England Manager. Forced as they are into strategies of isolation, and confidence tricks to try and overcome this.

Then the players have to stand in the starting lineup while their own fans jeer the German anthem before kick off.

Why anyone can't see this is beyond me.

I can't help feeling that the widespread stated belief that footballers are "thick" has, at its core, a wee bit of jealousy.

Believe me, it's the same for people who are extremely good-looking. I pretend to be thick much of the time, so that less attractive people feel more comfortable around me.

from a lot of the points made, and the performance on and off the pitch, is that there is a sense of privilege that the England (and other teams) have, is far in excess of their actual performance. There’s no sense of earning a place in the side, or working to keep it, and any sort of shame at having played so underwhelmingly – they act as if it really isn’t their problem.

I suspect that this ties in with the "players are thick" notion - a certain culture has emerged where over-paid players keep getting money, sex, fame etc thrown at them and seem to feel that they've earned it, rather than simply been lucky enough to have the right skills at the right time. And with all that comes to them, they feel no need to push themselves any further. This doesn't just apply to footballers - or athletes - either, but they seem to be the most public right now. A sense of confidence is one thing, but there’s obviously a line that’s been crossed somewhere.

I don't accept that the British frenetic style of footie is doomed to fail versus the cultured, beautiful, continental brand (the fawning gets a little much). The problem is that England don't seem to be able to reproduce it whereas Spain and Germany are currently good imitations of the Barcelona/Bayern models.

Of course, to provide a counterpoint to that...the two examples I can think of where England have adapted or changed their style/formation were in 1970 in Mexico where the extreme heat made England suddenly play like Brazil (have you seen the Brazil-England match...we were wonderfully relaxed and cultured) and in 1990 when we switched formation and somewhow made our way to a semi.

Not sure there are any conclusions in that.

Huge pressure alright, but no worse than Brazil, Italy, France, Argentina. Have a look at the media coverage in some of those countries!

... a team of old, passionless millionaires? No - a team of decent players who are so scared of fucking up in front of our cuntish tabloid press (who absolutely revel in it when they do), that they can barely muster a decent sideways pass.

... but it seems to me that the Englishmen running about on the big green rectangle didn't make the leathery bag go into the stringy thing as many times as the German men did. Maybe they need to be paid more money. Could it, perhaps, be a vitamin deficiency?
My money is on Villa to win next year's world cup.

Post Deleted: Gentlemen. Please try and avoid repeating libellous rumours, unless you can PROVE that what the story you're repeating is true. Writing "allegedly" makes no difference, nor does hinting at the identity of the party in question when subsequent posts make it precisely clear who's being talked about.

Thanks.

Fraser

Apparently an England player was found with a book & his team mates made him throw it away.

He hadnt even finished colouring it in.

Someone above talked about footballers earning enough to let their children and children's children to live lavishly for all thier lives.

It prompted me to consider the wave of super-rich, privately-educated, no-need-to-work children of the working-class-done-good that are Gerrard, Rooney, Terry, Beckham, Ferdinand et al, and what a rich source of tabloid fun they will be.

David Blaine is said to be absolutely gutted that his record of doing bugger all in a box for 42 days has been broken by Wayne Rooney

Every year the England team is sold to a different media owner. Sky, The Guardian, the Daily Mail, the Sun, the Jewish Chronicle, Nuts, MTV, whoever. They have to find and pay a manager (they may choose to retain a successful one), develop a strategy and see it to success, knowing that if it fails their brand values will go down the plughole with it.

I've had a drink.

that on the same day 23 overated, underachieving, over paid, tossers arrived back from South Africa, another plane landed at RAF Lyneham with 7 men killed in Afghanistan. Just seems to me we have our priorities wrong.

I've had enough of the England team, the Premiership, Sky, overated, overpaid, ignorant, vain Premiership footballers. Bill Shankly was totally wrong. Football isn't more important than life and death. It's just a game. And quite frankly, 46 years after seeing my first match (Bury vs Newcastle in 1964 in case anyone is interested) its goodbye to football from me. No more. Had enough.

How many times do the freak things that happen to England at the World Cup happen to other teams?

1970 - Banksy gets food poisoning, Bonetti goes in goal with disastrous results
1982 - We don't lose a game - still go out
1986 - The hand of the cheating bastard
1990 - The Germans get a freak goal from a free kick and then Waddle hits the inside of the post but the ball defies the laws of physics to come out again. Lose on pens.
1998 - Beckham should never have been sent off for what amounted to a tap, the Argentine who clattered him should have gone as well anyway. Campbell has a winner ruled out which 8/10 refs would have allowed. Lose on pens.
2002 - The jammiest free kick of all time scored by a gust of wind
2006 - The Rooney sending off was very harsh to say the least - Ronaldo should've gone for ungentlemanly conduct. Lose on pens.
2010 - Green makes a schoolboy error he's probably never made in his life before. Lampard scores a goal, everyone in the ground sees it except the three officials. Don't tell me we would've lost anyway - Germany would've been rocked back on their heels after 2 goals in a minute and England would've been back on track.

I don't think any other team has had a run like that. I blame Arsene Wenger.

There isn't one of the arguments above that I can't see at least some merit in - and they're all interesting. That's what keeps it going. There's nothing else remotely like it.

Frank made the interesting point that, in a conversation wiht an FA official, the official kept turning the discussion back to the 2018 bid. Frank's conclusion is that the FA simply don't care about England winning the tournament, as they do about winning the bid: the bid is hugely lucrative.

His solution (have the next World Cup hosted by the winner) would mean that, if you're so commercially driven as to want to host the thing, then at least your target is the same as those who really want to win it.

Six months from now all anyone will remember is that we had the best team in the world on the ropes until we were cruelly denied a perfectly good goal... and the hype will build again.

How good must Terry and Co feel about Germany 4 Argentina 0? It's probably saved their (international) careers.

Germany just gave us a lesson in how to put together a team, play to their strengths, stay cool and trash Argentina. I agree that pro England pundits will use this as a sign that all is not rotten at the heart of English football, but they are wrong, and the comments on this blog, in the main, have proved it.

This blog has mostly argued, and in my opinion rightly so, that what is wrong with the England team is not just a single, easily fixable issue but a myriad of entrenched problems that go to the very heart of every element of our football culture and will take years to put right. If pundits want to brush all of this under the carpet then fine, but we will be experiencing this shambles all over again, very soon. (But I would love to be wrong). Maybe to support England you have to a masochist – Oh it will be different this time, they’ve changed, I know they have and I love them, what can I do?

I think now, finally, meeja pundits would be wary of engaging in the routine optimism which prefaces England's participation in tournament finals.

Steven Gerrard said the 4-1 result against Germany "wasn't a hiding", but I reckon that's just balm for an bruised ego. Deep down surely - surely! - he has to accept your point, Rab, that England were given a football lesson which signifies deeper problems.

I played football at a decent level for 15+ years, and ANYONE who has done anything similar will know that the boost you get coming back from 2 down to level just before half time is an adrenaline rush of some substance which sets the team up on a confident high for the second half. Yep, Engerlund were generally poor throughout the WC, but they had the capability of winning the German game IF it was parity at the half. And no, the meeja pundits will still be bigging up Engerlund come 2012.

Following the great success had by Germany looking to youth (six players from last year's Under 21s) comes the news that Blackburn Rovers and Aston Villa are reluctant to let a player each go to the upcoming U19 European Championships in France......a tournament that mirrors a World Cup more than ten seasons in the 'Champions' League could ever do.

Tottenham apparently have four (at least one of which I know to have been poached from QPR) players they are digging their heels in about.
Apparently pre-season friendlies against Ryman League teams are more important to 'arry.

Time for the FA to really get tough with the Premiership.
Surely there can't be a person in this country who now wouldn't agree with that?

Alex (Sir, my arse) Ferguson:
Rooney's 'not got great experience of playing in the World Cup really.......(but).......you wait, in four years' time you'll see a different player'.

My ghast has never be more flabbered.
You really couldn't make it up.

Joe Cole, with the world at his feet, opts for Liverpool.
James Milner, if the rumours are true, makes the career-defining move of 6th placed Premiership team to 5th placed Premiership team.

If either opted for a Spanish, German or Italian club, they could go to Fabio C. and justly say.....'I've taken on board one of the reasons for my own, and my country's, dire performances in tournament football and I'm going to do something about it'.

But no.
For both of them it will be Harlem Globbtrotters' football versus the likes of Wigan and Bolton.

That is why England are rubbish.

Still there's no reason for us not to make money as well.
Stick a substantial amount on England 'not' qualifying for Euro 2012.

Template for the England team?
Look no further than France.
They have dropped the WHOLE squad!

Brilliant.
Should make it easier for Fabio to drop Beckham, Cashley, James, Ferdinand, Terry, Johnson, Gerrard, Lampard and barn door/banjo Rooney now.

As far as I can see only 4 players from the u17 squad of the last 6 years have been capped at senior level... Rooney, Milner, Lennon, Huddlestone.

Anyone wanting to see just how far in front of the English Youth development system the Spanish are should tune in to Eurosport repeats over the next couple of days.
Spain tonked England 3-1 today in a hugely one sided game - the Spaniards were breath taking in their ability to keep hold of the ball. Their second goal especially was magnificent.
Liverpol fans' appetites should be whet by Daniel Pancheco who had a blinder in the red and yellow.

Dave, the Spaniards must have kept the ball for two minutes for their second goal. Loads of skill and movement.
Got to the English box - nothing doing, so back through the midfield, right back to one of two ball playing centre halfs, back through midfield, loads of pass and go, break at pace down the right, two quick interchanges at right hand edge of the box, back post cross, bottom corner from the boy Pancheco.
It was like that 22 pass move the Dutch did at Wembley going back 20 or so years ago, only better.
Having said that a midfield of Scott Brown and Barry Robson will have Iniesta and Xavi quaking in their Nike T90s, eh Dougie?

Anyone expecting the Premier League's new "home-grown" rule to save the day is in for a nasty shock. Under this rule a home-grown player is defined as a player who "irrespective of his nationality or age, has been registered with any club affiliated to the Football Association or the Welsh Football Association for a period, continuous or not, of three entire seasons or 36 months prior to his 21st birthday (or the end of the season during which he turns 21)."

Every club will have to name a first-team squad of no more than 25, of which a minimum of 8 must be home-grown players.

This means that, taking the current Arsenal squad for next season, the following players, who have all played at full-international level for their country of birth, qualify as "home grown": Denilson (Brazil), Clichy (France), Bendtner (Denmark), Fabregas (Spain), Song (Cameroon), Ramsey (Wales) and Djourou (Switzerland).

In fact, looking at the squad list on the Arsenal website, of their squad of 26* there are 3 English players and 13 who qualify as home grown...

That's not going to solve any problems by 2014.

----------

* In addition to the core 25 players, teams are allowed to add as many U21s to their squad as they wish, which is why the Arsenal squad is 26 strong at present, with room for six more players as seven of the 26 are U21...

Quick note on that England U19s team.....apparently only three of them can expect to play first team football in the Premiership next season.
Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.

I wouldn't mind if we didn't all know the Premiership table as at 1st May 2011 already!