angelman

Amazing what a few months does to people's opinion. It was Saints and Liverpool being the saviours and future of England.....now its Arsenal.

Brilliant. Guess that means Clyne won't be playing today then. Frankly, the way the national team has been run in past years, I might as well pick up my previous stance, previous to last year, which is complete ambivalence. Last year was of course different, but guess as they have all but buggered off, who cares? People say it was Gerrard tapping players up, but it probably was Woy telling them they need that big move and it will all be OK if they are warming the bench. Nice one. Does wonders for the league and smaller clubs trying to hold on to their players. Berahino will be next off to a bigger club. Then ours will be off. God I hate (most aspects of) modern day football.

The sad thing about the national team is that we were told we were going to rebuild with exciting young talent. But we got the same staid, boring play of yesteryear with the same self aggrandisement from the manager. I would have loved for the manager to come out and say we were going to start from scratch, prob not be overly competitive for several years but in the end we would have something special. Like Germany did. We could all have gone on the journey with pride. But no. Same old, same old.

Not according to most journos, his team mates, Woy etc. Chambers apparently played a blinder.

I sort of agree with Abramovich. It's not good enough just to win, you need to win while playing stylish football. He wanted to be entertained by his team. Were you entertained by last night's 5-0 win? I was bored rigid, paid scant attention to the TV (missed Townsend's goal) and was tempted several times to turn over. My criticism is nothing to do with Saints. I endured a stale World Cup, where he thought we did well, and further stale displays since then. If Clyne/Forster hadn't been in the squad, I doubt I would have watched the game, or at the very least, I would have turned over pretty soon having found the first half incredibly dull. Fairness and having the 2 RBs play a game each - if anything is embarrassing it's the naivety that there is anything fair about the England team, but I wouldn't go that far. It might turn out that Clyne will be chosen, but if I had to have a gamble, I would say that he won't. I wouldn't go as far as to say that Woy is listening to the press too much (the call for Clyne, and the call for some of the U21s to play for the U21s rather than the national side) but I am beginning to question whether it might be so. Why else have Clyne there, and then when Stones gets injured replace him with the U21 player. I would agree with you though about the formation against a team offering no threat what so ever. Wingbacks like Clyne would surely have been much better than more defensive fullbacks like Chambers. Which all rather goes against your opinion that Saints fans are embarrassing by bashing Hodgson and that he made no mistakes, as it seems rather justified. While everyone else seems to think Chambers and Wilshere were brilliant, I thought they were shït. Lallana and Ox on the other hand, I thought that they both deserved MotM more than Wilshere. At least they showed something more than the dross the rest served up. But that's just my opinion, which in the scheme of things is very irrelevant.

What a depressing read. Basically he is calling for a European super league as he thinks teams of a certain size should have an entitlement every year to being at the top table. That there are more of these big teams than places available is of course his problem. As for overseas BPL games, I see UEFA are likely to not allow it.

"You are very different now, since you've played for England"

The9, I guess Saggy was the only other option at the time who was English. Still is really.

Saying that 3 centre backs were picked is a little disingenuous. Chambers is a right back, was with us, was with Arsenal when he signed until injuries/sales moved him into the centre. Wenger says that he will be a CB in time, but for now, his primary position is right back. Chambers and Clyne are to me very different players. Chambers is more a fullback and Clyne a wingback. Woy was asking Chambers to play as a wingback and he sucked. To me, the modern game has much more place for wingbacks and Clyne is good at that and certainly better than Chambers. And frankly, given the opposition, there was no need for fullbacks (or those more suited to be a fullback). Wrong choice and one that shows a certain mentality in the manager. I sometimes now regret that we didn't have Saggy as manager, although no idea how set in his ways he might be.

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Wes, I don't disagree with you but at 25.45 I would question.... Now we know that us fans got into a blue funk, because the communication was ineffective, or maybe too concise. Clarity has to be questioned - say something won't happen, and the next day it does. So OK, the communication with the fans isn't so important, but it is clear that the players were also wondering WTF was going on as well.

Wonder why Clyne was even picked for the squad. Anyway, http://www.thesportreview.com/tsr/2014/10/england-5-san-marino-0-player-ratings-as-arsenal-stars-impress/

Aye, I thought to myself when Irish Andy named him, "what do I know?"!

He may well play in a different position but as he does so badly in it, might as well not have him. And Lallana does play more than 60 minutes. The average time he played per game in the last 2 seasons was over 81 and 84.

What ever the score is, it will flatter us. Can't understand why Wilshere gets picked ahead of Lallana.

LOL. As it is the starting line up is City x2, Arse x4, Chelsea x1, Everton x1, L'pool x2, Utd x1

What a dire 1st half..... Clyne vs Chambers. I might well have my Saint's tinted glasses on, but I do feel that Clyne is far more aggressive going forward. Chambers is passing back too much and not running their defender with the ball. He does seem to be taking up very advanced positions, but a) he hasn't been effective doing it and b) he seems to be getting in the way of others and/or not really knowing where to go.

Or Wishere. Can't understand what he does. He scored quite a good team goal last season and now seems to be an automatic pick.

Not sure who it was on the radio today, maybe Alan Brazil, who said that the whole qualifying for Euro16 is a farce. The likes of San Marino should go through a pre qualifying round. The whole thing is unexciting and predictable. More idiocy from those running (ruining) football.

Apart from 4 out of the last 5 games for Arsenal. EDIT - been posted, same source as well so might be complete bollhocks

Would I be alone in thinking that the opening 12 minutes have been very boring? No doubt we'll score as soon as this gets posted! But even then, it's still not very exciting.

Nope, you know it's not that, I know it's not that, we all know it's not that.

Wilshere in the side. **** me our manager is clueless.

Sentry, I like your sense of irony.

WTF is going on..... I see news emerging that England, or rather the FA, might consider staging games away from Wembley from 2018 if Wembely becomes home of a NFL franchise. Soon the Yanks will have all of soccer being in ¼s so that they can run adverts.