Five steps to mending English football

The build up to this summer’s world cup was the first time that I can remember there being a complete absence of hope or expectation of success for England’s football team, as years of underperformance at the highest level finally took their toll on weary English fans. And yet, remarkably, the England team somehow still managed to perform below expectations, with three uninspiring performances against teams that did not make it much further in the tournament themselves. What is even more remarkable is that there has been very little soul searching following this dismal tournament, indicating that there is an acceptance that this is just the way things are, and we are not likely to be able to change it for the better. This blogger disagrees and the following article sets out five simple steps to restore some pride to the English national team.

1)     A captain to set the tone

First things first, the England team is now without a captain, and this provides an ideal opportunity for a implement a short-term fix and set the tone for the future development of the team. Candidates for the role are thin on the ground, but two names have been mentioned in particular - Wayne Rooney and Joe Hart. While Wayne Rooney has the experience and star player status, his well publicised inability to perform at the highest level should surely count against him. And one would assume his ability to be an inspirational leader is limited to leading through his performances on the pitch, the ability of the captain to enhance the performance of the team would be held hostage to Rooney's form and confidence. He is also too closely linked to the poor performances of the team over recent years, and overlooking him should be a key symbol that players will no longer be able to expect selection as a right, regardless of their performances for the team.

Joe Hart represents a much surer choice. Although, as goalkeeper, he is distanced from his teammates on the pitch, he is the one player who seemed to demonstrate any passion for playing for England - simply having the captain belting out the national anthem (he was the only player to do so with any kind of gusto at the world cup), sets the tone for the other, younger, players to really relish having the opportunity to represent their country. Also, as a relatively new member of the squad, he is protected from links to the perennially underachieving 'golden generation' - breaking from the past should be a critical aim for the future development of the team.

But most importantly, because of the consistently lacklustre performances by a team full of multi-millionaire players who are brought up expecting success, returning passion and motivation to the England team should be a key goal for the England team. This is why Joe Hart gets my vote for Captain.

2)     Actions, not words – start training coaches

After the French team flourished 15 years ago, much was made of the success that stemmed from their national training centre which allowed the national team members to train together, with the best possible facilities, from a young age – creating a group of technically sound players who knew each other well and could play as a team.

And now with Germany's re-emergence as a dominant force in world football, there has been much written and spoken about the number of qualified coaches that they have across the country, serving not only the elite footballers, but right across all levels of grass roots football (Germany - 34,970, Italy - 29,420, Spain - 23,995, France - 17,588, England - a paltry 2,769). This creates greater competition in all parts of the game and improves the chance that we will have more Englishmen managing top teams in the country. And if two minds are better than one, what better than having tens of thousands of trained coaches in the country to create new ideas of training players to higher and higher standards.

The FA has the resources, it has the facilities (especially now St George's park has finally arrived), and it should now make a bold statement of exceeding all other countries in training new coaches. And once we have reached parity in this field, we should stop being the country chasing the pack and start leading the field by creating our own higher level diploma of coaching - the PhD equivalent of football coaching, so we become the envy of the world when it comes to coaching knowledge and expertise.

3)     Expand coverage on free-to-view television

I'm not naive enough to suggest that we should return all domestic football to free-to-view television is the best route forward - the financial meltdown of the premier league is in no-one's interest - but there has to be some benefits to increasing access to watching the highest quality football in the country. And there are benefits for the  broadcaster brave enough to be innovative in this area, particularly given the now competitive environment of football broadcasting, following BT's entry into the market. For example, if BT sport were to combine with ITV to co-host the opening fixture of the year, they would increase goodwill whilst simultaneously advertising their product at the start of the season when the fight for new customers is at its most intense.

Another area that should be targeted is giving the terrestrial coverage a bit more scope to improve their coverage. With Match of the Day fast becoming an irrelevant side show, providing a bit more time (maybe later in the week) to go into greater depth of high quality analysis of the games would help improve understanding of the game to a wider audience.

4)     Reconnect clubs with ordinary fans

If you want to go and watch premier league football as a family day out - you're going to struggle. First you've got to get hold of the tickets, which is no walk in the park, in one of the most popular leagues in the world, particularly at the big clubs. And then you've got to have the financial firepower to be able to buy four tickets at exorbitant prices. Requiring clubs to make all but the most expensive tickets available at affordable prices would help strengthen ties of the clubs with their fans, regardless of their wealth. Surely the riches being offered by television money means that the clubs can be a bit more benevolent when it comes to ticket prices (and they can continue to try to make as much money as possible from corporate and in-stadium activities as they want)?

5)     Create more rounded footballers

Professional footballers increasingly have to sacrifice so much in the pursuit of success that they are disconnected from the rest of the world. Exposing the players to other parts of society and life is good for the well being of the players who don't make it to the top, but also to those who eventually commit to football full-time. Requiring young players to have 6 month exchanges at clubs' academies abroad, where they stay with a host family and are required to learn the local language is just one way where they can learn a skill whilst also furthering their footballing education. This exposure to other cultures will also make the players better suited to travelling abroad for international tournaments.

Five steps and its not rocket science to do any of them - but they won't count for anything unless they are acted upon swiftly, and if people have the patience to stick with them over a 5-10 year period until they pay-off. There are no quick wins to becoming world leaders and every year the powers that be need to identify more steps like these to keep the English game moving forward. The inertia of the past is the biggest threat to a continually under-performing England team...

Tradition, but not just for tradition's sake

Debate rages between the modernisers and traditionalists in football. There are those who are willing to rebrand their clubs in an effort to secure extra commercial benefits - whether that is through a change in the kit of a club (as in the case of Cardiff City) or a change in the clubs name (as in the case of Hull City/ Tigers). In both of these cases, the new owners of these clubs claim the rebranding helps them to secure greater access to lucrative Asian sponsors and fans. But fans responded furiously, upset that their clubs' histories and traditions were bring cruelly discarded and that they, as die hard fans, deserved to have their voices heard and that these traditions deserve to be protected in their own right too (as in a leading editorial in this Saturday's Times). And not to say that they are wrong in voicing this opinion, but it would seem to be that this argument is like a red rag to a bull and that it would be better to place their argument in commercial terms. Their argument could be that, just as with the success of luxury European brands in Asia, so can these teams build successful brands based on an image of tradition and history. The new branding can always be integrated sympathetically over time through away kits and nicknames, marketing and mascots.

But as with Cardiff's new kit, I suspect that the drive for rebranding will win through, as commercial priorities force smaller clubs to be more bold in their changes than the larger clubs, just as young professional rugby clubs all started adopting new names to compete with the likes of Leicester Tigers and London Wasps, or how IPL teams adopted solar branded names, along the US sports model. In an increasingly crowded sports market place internationally, the drive to adopt successful practices from other sports will almost certainly continue...

KP decision - gossip seeking and meddling

The decision to sack Kevin Pietersen from the England cricket team was certainly a shock, despite all the speculation that had been going on for the last few weeks. But the clamouring for more information seems to be more of a desire to get juicy gossip on how KP is a nightmare to work with and how he's been mismanaged. Frankly, the brief communication from the ECB makes this very clear - they want to rebuild the team with younger players and hit reset on the culture of the team. And that means, rightly or wrongly, that players who are reaching the final stages of their career and who think they're bigger than the team have to go. Its not something particularly revolutionary - Alex Ferguson did it on a biannual basis and Stuart Lancaster has recently successfully taken the same approach to the red rose team. And although he obviously loved playing for England, it also strikes me as being pretty decent timing for Pietersen too, as it will give him time to sample life in the IPL and Big Bash leagues while he's still got enough mileage left on the clock to really make a success of his twenty20 career. What really makes this a shock is is that the decision has been taken before a head coach has been appointed. Surely the new coach would want to give his input into how he wants to build the team? Does this mean that Peter Moore's is back in the frame? Or that Ashley Giles has already given his input as the as yet unnamed coach? Or does the new Managing Director of the ECB, Paul Downton, fancy himself as able to interfere in playing arrangements? How the new management structure works out will be very interesting...

The nicknames of yore

The six nations is nearly upon us and your blogger is incredibly excited. The sporting competition which defines this part of the year is about to give us our weekend entertainment fix. The build up, the analysis, the matches themselves. And, of course, the nostalgia - reliving the great tries and teams of yesteryear. Misty eyed old codgers (your blogger included) will dream of the romanticism and innocence (well, sort of= of the amateur era. If only the modern pros would try to emulate their predecessors a bit more. And with Stuart Lancaster trying to instill this sense of history and pride into his team, perhaps he should consider getting his forwards to start coming up with nicknames like they used to in the old days - Mick 'the munch' Skinner, 'Iron' Mike Teague and Brian 'Pitbull' Moore spring to mind. It would certainly add a bit more colour than the Woodsey, Robbo and Lawsey that are probably being used currently, and would keep us old codgers happy too...

Reaching the masses

Andrew Murfett, writing in the Guardian, wrote about the big bash growing the second largest TV audience in Australia during their summer. Capitalising on this traditionally low season for TV programming and the TV friendly scheduling which is possible with Twenty20 cricket, big bash cricket has reached a level of exposure that few imagined were possible. Lessons could be learnt by the ECB - as the first country to introduce Twenty20 cricket, things feel like they've been stagnating. While it is still a vital source of income and crowds for county cricket, it feel like the UK version lacks the glamour of the IPL or Big Bash cricket. Granted, it is never going to be as big as the IPL, but as a way to create grass routes interest in the game, surely a free-to-air TV agreement would allow the sport to reach out to a much broader audience and cement its place in the British summer, along with Wimbledon and test match cricket. Sadly, I suspect that a more realistic outcome is that Twenty20 cricket will become a new battlefield between BT Sport and Sky competing for access and the ECB is likely to opt for the greater revenue goals available. The only hope then, is that one of the pay TV giants (most likely the new kid on the block, BT Sport) decide to cooperate with a free-to-view partner to allow greater exposure, sharing live games as well as highlights. And as the England team has struggled terribly over the last few months (including a new heartbreaking story today), the ECB could do well to diversify their focus on a strong national team as a way to drive interest in the game...

The danger of youth programs

Football acadamies are a good thing, right? Programs to encourage young talent and help them achieve at the highest level must be something positive, surely? Well, in terms of encouraging improved performance and results, then a well run youth development program is certainly a positive force. But a discussion with this blogger's friend brought up an interesting counter argument - if we want to reduce the prevalence of doping in sport, we need to abandon youth performance schemes. The logic behind it is that by getting kids trained at such a high intensity from such a young age leaves them so highly invested that they will do anything to succeed...even take performance enhancing drugs. It also exposes them at a young age to the kind of environment where they might be introduced to grey areas in the law (the misuse of painkillers, for example) when they are still impressionable - leaving them much more susceptible and accepting of more serious doping misdemeanors.

I'm not convinced it will be possible to keep talented kids away from high performance training programs, but the argument is an interesting one. And certainly, educating young sportsmen and women about the importance of having a level playing field, free from artificial performance enhancers is absolutely critical.

Post-Fergie blues

It was inevitable really - despite all the claims in the press that he deserves time to settle in, unreasonable pressure is already being heaped on David Moyes, even though he has only been in the Man Utd hotseat for the equivalent of the opening 5 minutes of a match. And while much has been written about his problems in the transfer market, perhaps the only legitimate concern for fans should be his many references to the peerless atmosphere at his new club and how this compares with the underdog atmosphere at Everton, giving the impression that he doesn't yet fit in with his new players' winning mentality. Time to stop making references to Everton and make himself the chief winner - but, simply, this will take time and I hope that he gets it...