England, Redknapp, Capello and do we really give a shit anyway.

English football lurched into it's latest 'crisis' yesterday when Fabio Capello resigned after coming out with his nonsense to the Italian media over the John Terry captaincy issue. I find the timing off this all really quite bizarre given that it came on the very day that Harry Redknapp was found not guilty in his tax evasion case - a case that's been knocking about for 5 years... in terms of timing more than a little suspicious.

Dear FA... I don't know, something obscene in Italian. 

Personally I find it all a bit too convenient that Capello jumped ship on the same day as a suitable replacement became - well, suitable. I have a suspicion that this is what Capello wanted all along.  

Give an interview to Italian TV saying something completely the opposite to your 'bosses' stand on an issue - in this case stripping John Terry of the England captaincy (admittedly a few days before Redknapp's trial verdict). Then when you get called in to a meeting about you can just say, well fuck your stupid job anyway and voila you have the perfect reason to get out of a job I suspect he couldn't be bothered with anymore anyway... because let's face it, his reputation as a manager was unlikely to be enhanced any by England's latest failure to progress beyond the quarter finals of anything. Much better to engineer a spurious reason for walking out and go and manage Anzhi Makhachkala for a million quid a game in that Klingon league presumably.

It doesn't really make sense for him to do have done this for any other reason.. other than to pick a fight that he wasn't bothered about winning anyway. The FA were right to strip John Terry of the England captaincy, especially as they have previous with taking the captaincy of people.. even Terry himself for that business with whoever it was. This issue is far more serious.. alleged racist abuse caught live on national television is not really conduct you expect of anyone really and whether he is found  guilty or not is frankly irrelevant. If a large part of your job (as it is with the England captain) is sitting in front of the press answering questions it would be helpful if 90% of the questions aren't about your impending court case.

There is a curious parallel between Capello's stance on John Terry, defending him against the FA following accusations of racism, and Kenny Dalglish's stance with the Suarez affair... with a few differences. Mainly, I would hope that Dalglish has plans to stay in his current job beyond the summer and John Terry can't think, fuck this I'll go and play for Spain instead and I wont get any of this hassle.

From England's point of view their is only one viable option in Harry Redknapp.. whose glorious record in European football amounts to one chaotic season in the Champions League straight out of the Kevin Keegan defending text book (although drawing 0-0 in San Siro was a little more disciplined). They did get back into Europe this season but the contempt they showed that competition is a little strange given the possibility of actually winning a European trophy which hasn't happened at Spurs too often over the years.  

Personally, I'd be delighted if Redknapp took over the England job. Primarily because Spurs are ticking over nicely at the moment with him in charge and if they got someone else in then there is a possibility that the wheels might come off and Spurs might remember to be a bit crap again. This does of course depend on who they get in, but I suspect it will result in taking a bit of a step backwards for a period.

I did find it quite interesting when I thought about this that that was one of the first things I considered.. OK, so this is probably going to happen, so how does it affect 'actual' football. The full-time business, not the nonsense that every man and his wife and her hairdresser gets involved with every other summer with all the flags on cars and so on. All the crap in the papers.. this time we can win it. And to be fair it would be quite good to see England win something, because it's not going to be the World Cup unless we manage to host it and when that happens I suspect we'll have Satan skating up and down the touchline as one on the linesmen.

No we can't. Because whoever the England manager is, he still has the same major drawback in that all his players are English and even the ones that aren't rubbish are knackered by the summer anyway.

One interesting and slightly depressing thought - Since England actually won the World Cup they beaten 5 teams in World Cup knockout games - Paraguay (86), Belgium and Cameroon (90), Denmark (2002) and Ecuador (2006).  In that time Germany have got to 5 World Cup Finals, winning it in 2 of those.

It's not Fabio Capello's fault that for some reason England have a warped perception of how good they ought to be.. but when it comes down to it, we're not.