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Another World Cup, another defeat to Germany, another long road home.

Were we really surprised? Did we honestly believe that before this tournament we’d actually go home with the trophy? Yes. And why not? The team sheet is worth hundreds of millions of pounds, the most converted players in English football. Rooney, Gerrard, Lampard, Cole, Terry.

We had problems, we lost some “key” players to injury, we had a debacle of an issue surrounding the captaincy but none of that is the point. As soon as the first game was played we showed our true colours. But for some reason we felt the display against the USA was a blip, they’re becoming a better team, we’d thrash the other two teams…right?

Wrong. More poor performances from England and both games we deserved to lose. The display against Algeria was much better than the two prior but nothing to what it should have been, it was still dire.

Once again England are out of the world cup and the nation looks at why. We have the star quality in the players but these players are individuals, they are unable to play together as a team and that is our downfall. Rooney should have been playing much further up top in my opinion and Ledley King should never have made the trip, nor should Heskey.

Look historically, we have had the same core of players for a while now and yet for as long as I can remember none of them have been able to play together, yet still we persist with them. Why do we keep playing Gerrard and Lampard together? Why do we have goal-keeping issues? Why can we not score or complete a pass, hold onto the ball? Simple football eludes us.

Forget the big names, forget the foreign manager, lets scrap the England team as we know it and work from the ground up. Seemed to work well for the Germans didn’t it? Look at the depth of English young talent, it is there. Stuart Pearce guided them to near victory.

As football fans and Englishmen we expect the inevitable, yet the players on the pitch dropped their heads and stopped trying, hit by the psychological wall that was defeat to the Germans. With that went the hopes of the nation.

I urge the Football Association to look at English football and bring about change. Forget the egos of the “name” superstars and look to build a TEAM, a squad that can work together and has the heart of real England coursing through them. Then maybe we can once again be proud of our great nation that has the best domestic football in the world.

Archived: England Crash Out of World Cup - archived
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