England ‘can win things’ without ‘secretly worried’ Kane; Liverpool sextet prove ‘Klopp’s time had run’

The Mailbox reckons England ‘can win things’ without ‘disingenuous’ Harry Kane. Plus, six Liverpool stars are proving that Jurgen Klopp’s ‘time had run’.

Send your views to theeditor@football365.com…

The Egotistical Lummox
Dear Sir,

Having had the misfortune to have been a Spurs fan for more years than I care to remember, I have never witnessed Kane to be egotistical in the slightest.

Agreed, strikers in general have a selfish quirk in front of goal but the fact that Son and Kane hold the top spot for mutual assists in the Premier League proves, in H’s case, that he is and always will be a team player.

If he had the same service he gets at Bayern in the Spurs and England teams we might have won something by now. If Saka, Foden et al were not so selfish in providing a decent cross he might reach even higher targets than being England’s top scorer.

Let’s be honest, even I could have scored Watkins’s goal and I’m disabled. Mads made that goal. Jones’ goal was a touch of brilliance.

Yours sincerely,
A miserable COY

Harry Kane will be missed…
Short memories, some of these fans have.

I remember when Rooney debuted at a major tournament Euro 2004. It finally felt like we had that missing piece. A force of nature that could take that nearly team of WC2002 and push it over the line. A team of incredible defensive talent and midfield skill would finally have that battering ram up front. After that tournament? Very, very little.

For all the criticism of Kane you can at least say he’s turned up for tournaments. Whether he’s been used most effectively I’ll leave to others, but he was at his best when he had willing runners like Sterling to play off. It’s why he wasn’t his best in the last Euros. It was too narrow and too slow. Kane has been the striker we hoped Rooney would be. And when Kane finally retires maybe we’ll look at the striker landscape and wish he was still around. Look at his record at club level and I can’t be convinced he’s just a lump

It comes back to the Tim Henman problem. It’s not his fault he’s the best we’ve got. It’s not his fault that we put all our hopes onto him. If someone else made a really compelling case for his spot the past near-decade then maybe we wouldnt have to have these conversations. We can say Watkins or Solanke are ready to fill the void and I hope they are, but I’m not gonna retrofit some history where England would succeed if Kane wasn’t playing, I just don’t see it.

The best times I’ve had as an England fan in the last 30 years have been with Kane leading the line.
Keith. Worting

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I really think we can do without Harry Kane and let some of the old ones go as we had an excellent young group coming through. I reckon we can win things without Harry Kane as he has had his time in international football.
Kind regards, Keith Madley

Tino deserves his cap
There’s a lot of pleasure in the NUFC socials for Lewis Hall’s first cap, as well as some indignant muttering on behalf of Tino Livramento. Tino’s shown form much like Hall’s for his club of late. The way I see it, he’s training with and against his future opponents in big Premier League, but being rested, match-wise. He’d come back uninjured, fit, and possibly in even better form.

But if he doesn’t get his cap, I’d have to wonder whether he wouldn’t have preferred a luxury trip to sunny and 20C/68F Saudi. It’s Carsley’s last match in charge, and it would be a class move to blood some youngsters who have waited for it. Especially those he has coached in the U21 setup. Tino has represented England’s youth at every level of international soccer from U15 up, and Carsley’s U21 squad nine times. Surely, he’s paid his dues.

I wouldn’t mind Gordon getting maybe 25 second-half minutes, though. The lad naturally wants to play, and he’s the kind of fit that shrugs off many injuries. But even he could use a little break.
Chris C, Toon Army DC

The three main characters of this international break
Main character 1: David Coote
Remember that funny David Brent made to his colleagues about the bread bin and a black man’s c*ck ? Even back in hazy pre-woke, pre-outrage times you or I might’ve been quickly given walking papers by HR had we made such a crack in just about any proper workplace environment. But PGMOL believes itself a class apart from modern professional standards and supports its own policy-making-as-it-goes with such hubris that arbitrating otherwise academic, zero-sum decisions suddenly appear more like investigative jigsaw puzzles or cold case murder mysteries requiring decades to solve.

It isn’t just cancel culture speaking to believe Coote should have been put to pasture 72 hours ago, before any white powder videos even came to light. While we (some ?) may have dabbled as well in our hazy pre-whatever youth, you can be sure for most adults HR would have us boxing up our desktop items double-quick if they were purview to recordings of similar infractions. So basically you have a zero-sum scenario followed days later by another zero-sum scenario, and PGMOL’s response is to “further investigate.” Well anyone can see PGMOL is simply stalling on how best to handle this extraordinary PR catastrophe, even as it grows more legs by the day. I think odds are good Coote is back reffing games next term, partaking in a victorious pantomime snort of the touchline a la Robbie Fowler in his first day back on the whistle.

The saddest thing about all this is that Coote was always a subpar match official to begin with, Scouse and German biases aside. That he was arrogant and reckless enough to involve himself in these video recordings only masks the fact that while he was a shite referee anyway, he really was just plainly stupid in day-to-day life off the pitch too.

MORE DAVID COOTE COVERAGE ON F365…
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Main character 2: Harry Kane
Kane basked in his vainglorious patriotism with his sour comments on those unfit for England duty. It’s only as he’s now a Bundesliga benefactor entitled to a fortnight of schnitzel-gobbling unavailable to most of his teammates. How disingenuous; I reckon he’s just secretly worried the side perform markedly better without him, that Watkins, Solanke or Palmer offer more and he is aware his own time is running out. Nobody in world football looks more disenchanted when his teammates score than this longest of long-faced men.

Main character 3: Curtis Jones
Blasphemous as may be, I agree Ms. Winterburn’s assessment that Jones is benefitting from Liverpool’s modified playstyle and that Klopp did him few favors with the all-out midfield press and constant churn. The Scouse Chalamet (as he’s known in my household) is one of my favourite players yet I’ve always wondered why he was yet to solidly kick on until this season. The answer is clear; Arne Slot has been a new tide lifting all boats, and Jones is but one of the players at the club that have benefitted and improved immensely this season. I loved Klopp and his entire era, but Jones’ marked improvement (along with that of Gravenberch, Konate, Diaz, Tsimikas, even Salah) does evidence perhaps that Klopp’s time had run.
Eric, Los Angeles CA

Ref bias
This Coote guy is taking a real kicking this week. I’m glad this is around to keep us entertained during the latest inter lull. Next expected headline: Coke-snorting ref feeds drugs to kittens in a cat orphanage!

This entire affair is a rightful whack over the head for the “I will defend absurd decisions because they went against a team I hate” brigade. For ages we’ve had all manner of mental gymnastics being performed in the mailbox to deny that refs can be biased even though there are very clear indicators that bias could be a serious issue in the Prem.

As we can see with Coote’s responses to being barked at by Klopp, refs are human and therefore liable to bias. Do any of you still think that absolutely none of the refs could be biased against Arteta after his frankly mild criticisms of past decisions? There may not be a conspiracy but there certainly can be bias.

Michael Oliver going to the UAE to ref a few meaningless games in return for a generous payment from Man City’s slavemasters and some luxuries was shrugged off by people like some anomaly. In many professional industries workers are required to go through a rigorous ethics process where they have to declare conflicts of interest and potentially compromising relationships. How can the supposed “richest and bestest corporate league in the world” not implement such basic checks and balances for referees? Oliver should be thoroughly investigated along with all other refs with ties to owners of clubs.

In fact the entire PGMOL needs to be turned inside out and dismantled. Appointing a man that routinely favoured Man UTD for 50/50 decisions as its head was indicative enough of this organisation’s incompetence. Webb just acts as PR for the refs, he doesn’t actually manage or improve anything. This guy’s sole job is to do damage control after each weekly refereeing farce. And I’m sure they’ve spoken to Sky, TNT/BT and other broadcasters to soften their analysis of refereeing errors because shining too strong a spotlight on the blatant incapabilities of the refs would put the entire league’s “product” into jeopardy. That’s why the likes of Carragher and Neville barely criticise the refs.

The PGMOL investigating decisions and refs is like a thief’s lawyer determining if their client is guilty or not. Shut the whole operation down and bring in some refs from an actually sensible country like Japan.
Vish (AFC), Nantes

I’ve enjoyed the debate about referees. When I was younger I thought wouldn’t mind doing that but as I have got older thought it’s not worth the hassle.

I have a Season ticket for a League 1 club and am starting to get wound up by the amount of stick refs get. One supporter behind me abuses the ref without fail all game and fellow supporters kick off for decisions which are clearly right.

I enjoyed a game a week or so where there was a female linesman and why shouldn’t she be but was great. We had a female ref a few years ago and whilst I thought before the game this was a bit of a change she was the best ref we have had in ages.

I suppose my point is lay off refs and while everyone has their issues when they get abused for doing their job every week turning to substances is perhaps understandable.
Simon

The Tottenham conundrum
The Tottenham Circus has arrived (again). The speculation around who’ll be the next manager is increasing in volume as we ‘go again’ after another limp dicked defeat.

READ: Five PL moves for Ruud van Nistelrooy post-Man Utd include replacing Ange Postecoglou at Spurs

The one thing which isn’t being discussed, and probably because who really cares, is the squad that’ll be inherited. The talk of Postecoglu being financially backed is somewhat misleading. Transfrmarkt has us spending ¢148m this season….¢80m of which is on players who are firmly in the ‘ones for the future’ and of that one of them, probably the only one of two who’d expect to play, has been injured since we signed him (in our cursed left wing position). The other, Solanke, has been, in truth, great.

Two others are on loan.

The season prior, we had Kulusevski and Porro obligated purchases (and two of our most consistent players) along with van der Ven – a player Ange will break soon due to tactics and hamstrings. Then we have £100m on Maddison and Johnson – which is mind-boggling.

Few clubs do transfers so poorly as Spurs. The next manager will come in with a squad of players who can be excellent but are, as things stand, being asked to play as though each week it’s Kilmarnock, St Mirren or Dundee United…a league which Ipswich would piss all over.

Levy has tied his flag to the Up and Comers mast because he’s doing that thing where the lure of potential incoming transfer fees far outweighs what happens on the pitch.

I haven’t even mentioned our ‘leadership group’ of players…Son – busted flush, Maddison – dropped, Romero – bags packed (and actually quite shit).

Dan

Gary Cotterill
Has anyone seen this clip of Sky Sports’ Gary Cotterill demanding – while in Portugal, and at a Sporting press conference – that he answered questions in English? This is the same guy who began abusing Ten Hag before he’d even started as our manager, of course.

Yeah, the whole referee group in the UK is terrible, but my god so are our national “journalists”. Absolute weapons, the lot of them. Is it any wonder that we have a huge right-wing swing going on, red-tops and others baiting our new England manager because he has the audacity to not be English.

Can we put all of them – referees, journalists, paparazzi, politicians, the FA, the United owners – all on a boat to some far-flung island surrounded by sharks?
Badwolf (Good result by the way, who’d have thought playing a striker as a striker would work?)