England Managers
It appears that England's main sports teams have all got (or have had in the recent past) the same problem - a manager who has lost touch with the game as a whole and will play it according to his vision only with his favourite players.
Selection policies of all of Andy Robinson, Duncan Fletcher and Sven-Goran Eriksson have all been similar - large number of players used, lack of consistency. players played out of position and some favourite sons always getting into the side no matter what.
To a certain extent, I leave out criticism of Fletcher regarding the Ashes in 2005, but the one-day squads and the current ashes tour bear out the point quite nicely.
Cricket first - Ashley Giles and James Anderson have been playing despite not having any warm up cricket to speak of, Monty Panesar has been left out despite being in cracking form (and he has showed that he can even bat and effect run outs). I believe that the captaincy went to the wrong person - it should have been Strauss not Flintoff even though Flintoff was technically the man in possession.
The wicket-keeping is another matter entirely. As pointed out in the Telegraph today, England have taken Jones, Read, Prior and one other on the Academy tour, but have left out the one player who is a proven high class keeper as well as having made serious runs at Test level - James Foster. Personally, I think that Jones and Prior should be in the team only if they deserved their place as a batsman. Neither does. The choice should therefore come down to Foster or Read, and I think that Read did nothing wrong to deserve being dropped fro a second time. This is especially true after the Western Australia game where Read got 59 and Jones 0. The fourth seamer is a difficult one until Simon Jones returns from horrendous injury, although Flintoff seems very reluctant to bowl anyone but himself, Harmison and Hoggard. Would it be better to bring a batsman who can bowl seamers (Collingwood...?) then the No. 8 position is made easier?
Rugby - Andy Robinson seemed confused and insistent on (a) playing people too soon after injury, and (b) playing his favourites (Corry, Goode) even if they were not delivering the goods.
Football - too much has already been written about Erikson's issues, although McLaren is not proving much better in terms of results.
Selection policies of all of Andy Robinson, Duncan Fletcher and Sven-Goran Eriksson have all been similar - large number of players used, lack of consistency. players played out of position and some favourite sons always getting into the side no matter what.
To a certain extent, I leave out criticism of Fletcher regarding the Ashes in 2005, but the one-day squads and the current ashes tour bear out the point quite nicely.
Cricket first - Ashley Giles and James Anderson have been playing despite not having any warm up cricket to speak of, Monty Panesar has been left out despite being in cracking form (and he has showed that he can even bat and effect run outs). I believe that the captaincy went to the wrong person - it should have been Strauss not Flintoff even though Flintoff was technically the man in possession.
The wicket-keeping is another matter entirely. As pointed out in the Telegraph today, England have taken Jones, Read, Prior and one other on the Academy tour, but have left out the one player who is a proven high class keeper as well as having made serious runs at Test level - James Foster. Personally, I think that Jones and Prior should be in the team only if they deserved their place as a batsman. Neither does. The choice should therefore come down to Foster or Read, and I think that Read did nothing wrong to deserve being dropped fro a second time. This is especially true after the Western Australia game where Read got 59 and Jones 0. The fourth seamer is a difficult one until Simon Jones returns from horrendous injury, although Flintoff seems very reluctant to bowl anyone but himself, Harmison and Hoggard. Would it be better to bring a batsman who can bowl seamers (Collingwood...?) then the No. 8 position is made easier?
Rugby - Andy Robinson seemed confused and insistent on (a) playing people too soon after injury, and (b) playing his favourites (Corry, Goode) even if they were not delivering the goods.
Football - too much has already been written about Erikson's issues, although McLaren is not proving much better in terms of results.
posted by Jonathan | Sunday, December 17, 2006
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