Mails: A natural pairing for every Premier League club

Daniel Storey

Another good Mailbox. We can see the new season on the horizon. Keep them coming to theeditor@football365.com…

 

Transfers and nature vs nurture
Fans of “elite” clubs should probably stop dreaming of a team of primarily home-grown, local boys achieving sustained success (like Celtic’s Lisbon Lions) – I believe this is unlikely to happen again at the top level, as talent has superseded development as the biggest driver of a player’s performance relative to its peers. I also think we should gladly accept this as a price worth paying for the extremely high quality of football on offer to fans today.

A football player’s performance at their peak can be simplified to a combination of natural talent and development. Talent is inherent, and has always been widely distributed around the world (sorry eugenists). Development (a very broad term which I mean to include everything that can improve a player such as technical coaching, knowledge of tactics, training regimes, strength and conditioning, nutrition etc) used to vary highly across continents, countries and clubs within a division.

However knowledge spreads, and if laggards can copy best practice faster than the best can innovate then the different levels of ‘development’ across continents, clubs etc narrows over time. I believe this has steadily occurred in football (helped by globalisation and economic growth), and as a result natural talent has become more of a differentiator in football.

A look at the Ballon d’Or top 10 from last year has entrants from 9 different countries across Europe (Portugal, France, Italy, Wales, England), South America (Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina) and Africa (Algeria); I expect this to become more diverse and less focused on “traditional” footballing nations going forward as clubs and academies elsewhere continue to close the development gap, which means their most talented youngsters will increasingly perform at comparable levels to the most talented Europeans and South Americans.

I accept this could be considered bad news for countries where the pool of youth footballers is low in numerical terms (due to small populations, popularity of other sports etc) but whose players have historically been well-developed relative to the rest of the world – I consider this to be main driver behind the relative declines in the number of “elite” players coming from countries like Ireland, Scotland, Hungary etc in recent decades.

Looking forward, the coming decades should see more elite players from countries like USA, Canada, Indonesia, Turkey and Nigeria and the relative decline in the number of elite players from traditional footballing nations (especially smaller ones such as Portugal, Belgium, Netherlands, Uruguay etc).

However, I for one welcome this new meritocratic world. As a football fan, I feel lucky to be able to see some of the most naturally talented players in the world performing at close to their maximum potential on a regular basis. Long may it continue!
Colm

 

A natural pairing at every Premier League club
There was a mail in the other day from a Southampton fan in which they mentioned their young tyros Targett and McQueen. Since then I have only been able to think about those two players as a double act in a hard hitting and gritty, but sadly long since decommissioned/never actually commissioned early 1980’s ITV cop show set in Edinburgh called, yep you guessed it, ‘Targett & McQueen’ in which our titular protagonists inhabit a world without mercy, and make morally oblique decisions every Saturday night at 9pm.

This led me to instantly and, characteristically lazily, assume that every other Premier League club must also have a similarly themed pairing of players. A pair of names that would just trip off the tongue, modern soliloquies each and every one, and their background and hierarchy would be obvious just by the witty and clever construct or the sledgehammer juxtaposition. No need for exposition here lads. The title says it all boys. Easy mailbox job. Off we go..

Arsenal: Holding&Cech You find one. Move on.

Bournemouth: King&Arter. Crime solving medieval re-creationists.

Brighton: Bruno&Bong. Jazz Detectives

Burnley: Pope&Ward. They have a licence to marry

Chelsea: Moses&Luiz. Foolish villains mistake them for Dempsey and Makepeace wannabees. Joke’s on them.

Crystal Palace: Kelly&Delaney. Irish travellers turn detective to solve the crimes society would rather ignore. Grim.

Everton: Lennon&McCarthy. Detective Paul Lennon and Inspector John McCarthy etc etc

Huddersfield: Hudson&Malone. A hotshot LA attorney and an old school New York cop are this years most unlikely etc etc

Leicester: Fuchs&Hamer. Justice. Cold steels balls of justice.

Liverpool: Woodburn&Robertson. Ya know, Watergate and stuff.

Man City: Sterling&Silva. Two antique silver spoon collectors solve cold cases and crosswords.

Man Utd: Blind&Bailly. One’s the owner of a company that makes braille books and the other’s a bailbondsman.

Newcastle: Dummett&Clark. The world’s most uninspiring, least glamorous, and brown detective agency.

Southampton: Austin&vanDijk. The worlds of sleuthing, art, and literature combine in a ‘what if?’ historical mashup.

Spurs: Kane&Son The Premier League footballers Harry Kane and Heung Min Son become Private Investigators. With hilarious…

Stoke: Adam&Allen. Because alliteration.

Swansea: Dyer&Barrow. Eastender Danny Dyer communes with the ghost of Clyde Barrow to solve West Ham connected slayings.

Watford: Watson&Mason. Multiple Golf major winner Tom Watson fulfills life-long dream of working with Perry Mason to solve the Zodiac killings

West Brom: Brunt&McClean. Do not fucking mess.

West Ham: Fletcher&Hart. Murder She Wrote. Hart to Hart. You do better.

F**k You Man City and Huddersfield for having more than enough for yourselves and everyone else combined.
Brian( seriously Huddersfield. F**K YOU) Waterford

 

Picking England’s 2022 team, because why not
I’m getting pretty bored with all this silly transfer will-he-won’t-he nonsense (not least because I can’t even indulge in it, being a Spurs fan), so I’ve decided to indulge in the only thing less productive: potential future England teams! *TOOT*

Apparently we’re supposed to win the World Cup in 2022, wherever it’s being held at that point. So here’s the team to do it, in an ever-fashionable 4-2-3-1:

Goalkeeper: Jordan Pickford
Goalkeepers grow slower than any other role (unless your name is Gianluigi, in which case you’re born ready) and Pickford is already excellent at 23. He could – could – be magnificent at 28. Let’s hope Everton don’t implode, shall we?

Right-back: Kieran Trippier
A tough one. Full-backs can be older than most other positions, with players like Lahm and Evra still elite in their thirties. Trippier will be 31 come the World Cup but he’s not got too much mileage in his legs (unlike Kyle Walker, the Caesar to his Mark Antony) and several year under Pochettino’s special full-back tutelage could create quite the circumstances for a swan song. I would also love it if Jonjoe Kenny is challenging at this point.

Right Centre-back: Michael Keane
Surprisingly well-rounded, and likely to only improve going from Dyche to Koeman. Will likely add some finesse and deeper tactical understanding to his game. And I’ve always got time for players who drop down the leagues and work their way back stronger.

Left Centre-back: John Stones
Who knows? Who, honestly, knows? He could be amazing, or his nerve could be broken by spending a second season trying to hold the fort behind six attacking midfielders, partnered by a converted full-back. I hope it works out for him, I really do. He could hit Bonucci’s level.

Left-back: Luke Shaw
Not really sure what the competition could be at this point. Ben Chilwell? Shaw should be in on talent, but will likely go down as yet another reason Jose Mourinho should be banned from working with any football player under the age of 24.

Centre-mid: Eric Dier
Established in a way Nathaniel Chalobah should be but isn’t, and with an underrated (and underexplored) passing game. At 28, whether at Spurs or somewhere else, he’ll likely be by far the best option England have for the position.

Centre-mid: Harry Winks
Or Will Hughes. Or Tom Davies. Or Lewis Cook. Honestly, I’m stumped – England will be awash with marginally-above-average central midfielders in five years’ time. But Pochettino seems to really like Winks and so do I, so he’s going in. (And Levy seems to be a sucker for academy players – can’t think why.) He’ll never be Xavi, but he might just be Mikel Arteta.

Right winger: Demarai Gray
The kid’s got class. It’s there in spades, he just needs the stage on which to strut. Unfortunately I can see him making at least three transfers before 2022, at least one of which will be an ill-advised big-money move to a top-six club (possibly Chelsea). Still, hope springs eternal.

Number 10: Dele Alli
At this rate he’ll be in the top 5 players in the world come 2022. Just try to imagine it. An English player who could walk into any team in the world. I can’t remember the last time we had one of those, but we must have been unstoppable.

Left winger: Raheem Sterling
His route to the top seems to become more complicated every year. From the third part of the SASAS, to Brendan Rodger’s right wing-back slash striker, to being in an unfortunate tug-of-war between two dying managers, to Pep’s paradise of paradoxes, to Leroy Sane remembering how to play football, to Bernardo Silva, to potentially Alexis-flipping-Sanchez. Poor kid. Used to live right round the corner from me as well. He seems nice. I hope it all works out for him, possibly while playing for Dortmund or somebody.

Striker: Harry Kane
By this point he’ll be a (*counts on fingers*) eight-season wonder. Keep on keeping on, Hurrikane.

Substitutes: Butland, Kenny, Maguire, Chalobah, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Rashford, Abraham.

So there you have it. That right there is the team that will be crowned world champions in Unspecifiedistan 2022. Absolutely no chance of anyone, least of all France (Lloris; Sidibe Varane Umtiti Mendy; Tolisso Bakayoyo Pogba; Dembele Mbappe Coman) stopping them in their tracks. I’m glad to have been the brightness in your day.
Gene, THFC, Guyana (This time next year, Christian Eriksen will be one of the top 10 players in the whole world)

 

Euro 2017 standard is good, now for the atmosphere
I watched the England women’s game last night and was struck by the lack of atmosphere.

The standard of football was fine, I’ve certainly seen worse games in the Premier League and even the Champions League (specific examples don’t spring to mind, probably as they were so forgettable) but without the roar of tens of thousands of partisan fans urging their sides on it just didn’t “feel” the same.

I often find that when I’m watching football on TV, modern life in the form of my phone distracts me – maybe I’m checking other scores, or my fantasy team, or some top banter (gah!) on Facebook, but I always know when to look up as the crowd noise “surges”. Save for a few lonely shrieks echoing round a largely empty 14,000 capacity stadium I just didn’t get that last night.

So, it’s simple, just pack the stadiums out with 50-60,000 fans to imbue the “product” with a perception of relevance and the women’s game will attract many millions of fans, TV money and all its trappings and all will be right with the world.

Just, er, haven’t worked out how to fill the stadiums in the first place yet – bit of a chicken/egg scenario really but I’m sure someone smarter than me can figure that little wrinkle out. In the meantime though, good to see the level of coverage that this tournament and, perhaps to a lesser degree, the WSL is now garnering. Exposure and planting seeds into the public consciousness can only be a good thing.
Luke Nuckley

 

This is a very pleasant thing
In light of the debate on the women’s game recently, I thought I would add to it by telling you guys about my experience watching the England v Portugal game in a pub on my way home this evening. I’ve been following the Euros and trying to make sure I catch as many games as possible.

As I was heading home I thought there would be a chance I could watch the England game at the pub. I had found that I normally have to ask the landlord to put the game on as no one seems to know the Euros are on. But to my surprise some other lads had already asked for it and the landlord then put the game on.

Halfway through the first half, a guy in the pub (whilst complaining about how shit women’s football is) asked to switch over to the Europa League game that Everton where playing. The landlord switched over.

But what surprised me was the chorus of boos as everyone in the pub demanded the England game be put back on and the cheers when it finally was. It made me think that maybe (just maybe) progress actually is being made.
Ken Lalobo

 

Scotland gonna Scotland
Can we all give the Scottish women the praise they so richly deserve?

In losing their first game heavily to superior opposition, screwing up in the second game against beatable opposition, getting a great win in the third match, having some bad luck, making dreadful defensive blunders, losing almost all their best players to injury before or during the tournament and going out in the group stage on goal difference (or however they work it out these days) they have truly lived up to national stereotype. There is nothing the men can do that they can’t. Well done, Ladies.

More seriously, and at the risk of being teacher’s pet, can I congratulate F365 for the quality and quantity of its Euro 2017 coverage. Proper competitive footy should come before pre-season kickabouts. I hope you get the traffic you deserve. I’m clicking on everything.
Mark Meadowcroft

 

Some Everton conclusions
This had the feeling of a pre-season friendly, rather than the start of the competitive season. Slow pace and a stadium half built, do not make a European night under lights at Goodison.

– My flatmate is a United fan; there was a bit in the second half when Rooney absolutely blooted a ball under no pressure over the bar and both Matterface and Townsend leapt to his defence. My flatmate said “Welcome to our world, it’s not his poor performances that’ll piss you off, it’s every pundit trying to defend him that will”. Immediately I agree: I genuinely want Wayne to do well for us, it will be a great narrative, but if he does play like he did tonight, then he’ll deserve criticism and should get it.

– Wayne wasn’t great; it’s one game; we move on. Poor passing, terrible shooting, and generally contributed to our slow build up. Didn’t stretch their defence enough, and reverted to type and dropped too deep as the game wore on.

– Sandro looks great fun. Like Carlos Tevez with his ‘head down, shoot first, pass later’ approach. I’m sure he’ll have me tearing my hair out throughout the season, but he looks a good trier.

– Hopefully, the early start of competitive football will mean he can hit the ground running in the league, as we have a horror start after Stoke at home, that said, it’s critical we need to progress in the UEFA.

– 1-0, not as good as it should have been, but at least we didn’t lose.
Matt, EFC, London

 

And some lovely news
You may have seen them, but there are pictures of Gazza are floating around again. However, these ones are unlikely to surface in the usual mainstream media. Why? Is it too much tragedy for even the rags to broach? No, it’s because he looks healthy. It’s not newsworthy but it’s worth celebrating all the same.

He was one of the most wonderfully gifted players we’ve ever had, and he’s been let down by his clubs who – to my mind – failed to protect him from himself, something that should be part of the duty of care they have for their staff.

He may yet take another downward turn, but let’s indulge in some humanity and celebrate the health of the once-sublime Paul Gascoigne.
RedWolf

 

We miss Keggy
The attacking full-back thing has really whet my appetite for nostalgia. Earlier in the the same season that Robbie Elliot and Steve Watson scored in the same match from full-back, at home to Ferencvaros in the Wafer Cup, Keegan was semi-forced to play Ginola and Gillespie as wing-backs. Yep, that happened.

Pav in goal; Peacock-Albert-Elliot as 3-at-the-back; David Batty just in front of them; Gillespie at right wing-back, Ginola at left wing-back; Robert Lee in midfield and Sir Les, Peter Beardsley and Tino up front.

It was Peak Keegan, really. We kept a clean sheet, Ginola scored his best Newcastle goal [still the best goal I have ever seen scored in front of my actual eyes – I was right along the line of it behind the goal, I still claim I was first to celebrate], Tino scored the most nonchalant of many nonchalant goals, and we won 4-0 to turn around the 3-2 defeat in the first leg.

Keegan quit about 10 weeks later.
Alex Stokoe, Newcastle upon Tyne

 

FYI: Write in on the subject you want to see in the Mailbox
No mails on the Concacaf Gold Cup? I know it ain’t much but it’s something during the offseason.
Jay-Raleigh (AFC)