Gerrard: Passing game must improve
Steven Gerrard says England need to work harder at retaining the ball
Captain Steven Gerrard admitted England had not played the best football at Euro 2012 and needed to work harder at retaining the ball following the quarter-final penalty shoot-out defeat to Italy.
The Azzurri dominated possession and hit the post twice, and although England were able to keep them at bay for 120 minutes, the failure of Ashley Young and Ashley Cole to convert their shoot-out kicks led to an another last-eight exit for England.
Gerrard said: "At times the football hasn't been fantastic, we haven't blown people away. The possession stats speak for themselves. Moving forward as a nation we do need to improve with the ball."
Despite the less-than-impressive performance, Gerrard was happy he and his colleagues had not come up short for effort.
"Everyone has given everything they've got and that's all you can ask for," he added. "I think the supporters will agree with me that we have played for the shirt."
But Gerrard stressed: "I think we've performed to a better level at this competition than in previous tournaments."
Gerrard is keen to continue as captain and also said he was happy with his own individual performance in the tournament.
He added : "I think performance-wise I'm reasonably satisfied. I'm just in a zone of frustration and disappointment because we've come so close to ending that quarter-final hoodoo."
Gerrard was given the captaincy by Hodgson and the Liverpool midfielder revelled in the role, and he said: "I've loved it, I've loved the responsibility and I've enjoyed every minute of it."
Hodgson has also been happy with Gerrard's captaincy. Gerrard said: "I've had a brief chat with the manager, I'm available as long as I'm wanted at this level. The manager has told me he wants me to continue and carry on."
related stories on msn
The truth is that we dont learn to play football the right way from an early age. Every kid just plays with play stations and gadgets. When they go to play football, they have big goal posts in playgrounds, so it is more tempting to shoot for goal than to develop skills which take you past opponents. Those skills are the skills required to dominate games and tire out the opposition but we always encourage our kids to shoot for goal and punt the ball forward. If that is the way we want to develop our football, we should not complain whenever we get totally dominated by footballing sides.
Even in the premiership, the commentators always talk more about grit and determination than to applaud proper talentt/skill. Until we get those things right, there will always just be the usual noise and no trophies. Does anyone ever notice how quick the media is to label average English players as world class? Yes we have a vibrant media which does help but it also leaves us blinkered and masked away from reality. Sky sports commentators are always "bigging" up the below par players.
As much as i love Stevie G, how many times have we herd 'we just didn´t show are best'? EVERY BLOODY COMPETITION!
What is wrong?, is it down to coaching techniques?, do our football managers in the UK lack serious technical frames of mind unlike our other European countries? or do we just not have the class of players we need to compete?
Was Gutted last night and still am today, but am proud of our boys out there. Roy has only been in charge for a month and he has instilled a togetherness and pride for the 3 lions and we did better than many thought we would. The future looks a little brighter but there is a lot of work to be done.
We miss a player like Pirlo someone who can control the game but the whole passing game needs to be improved as well as our stamina as we tired way before the Italians.
With what Roy has acheived in a month we can all now look to the future with a bit more promise, but if they get tired so easily in the 'heat' of Poland just wait till they play in Brazil, they will be crawling off the pitch at half time.
So it would seem England has finally learn't what Arsene Wenger has been trying to promote at Arsenal for the past 15 years. Took you idiots long enough to figure it out!
I've been saying it for years now, English football will continue to be the laughing stock of the footballing world until you start to encourage the development of skillfull technically gifted players comfortable on the ball and a passing game instead of the usual defensive minded physical cloggers and donkeys that seem to be the norm in the EPL.
Oh well the lads gave it their all but just were'nt good enough....England player's need to learn to use their heads more at this level and be more savvy when on the field.....The top international teams play football like a game chess, once they've passed the ball their already thinking about their next positional move, making sure their team mate in possession of the ball has plenty of options to pass it to....When England player passes the ball he feel's his job is done and is not thinking of his position to receive the ball, meaning less options for the player in possession hence why we keep losing the ball......of course the game in England is played at such speed there is a limited time to think when on and of the ball, so it become's difficult for the player's to adjust to the international of slyte.......We as fans love the high octane football played in the premership but there's a flip side to that as witnessed yesterday.......The player's gave it their all and for me done the country proud!!!!!!
So what if its a global sport , its been global for 80 years or more ! Go back 15 / 20 years how many english ( &welsh / irish ) boys plied their trade in Italy , Spain , Germany , France !!!!!! quite a few ,,, why ???? Because they were talented footballers and wanted to improve their understanding of the game and to become even better players , which they all did , LINEKAR , PLATT , INCE , WADDLE , HUGHES , RUSH ,HATELY ,McMANAMAN , R.KEANE ,BECKHAM , !!! how many today ????????????? personally i cant think of 1 , not 1 ( OH ! joe cole sorry joe, forgot youve been in france , allways on the sub bench for LILLE ! ),, , the reason now is they dont want the english ( british )boys , they are not good enough ,( sorry Gareth Bale , didnt mean you ! ) ! Mentaly they are not strong enough ! ( also very few have got the bottle to do it ! ) so your national side has some seriously strong decisions to find answers to , ! GOOD LUCK WITH IT !
