The English FA have decided to let Fabio Capello sway in the wind for the next two weeks as they decide whether to keep him or fire him after England’s disappointing World Cup.
Capello wants to stay on saying in his press conference today:
“I want to stay on as manager of England. I refused a lot of opportunities to be manager of important clubs because I like to stay here. I like this job. I like to be England manager.”
England managing director Adrian Bevington did not give Capello the strongest vote of confidence saying:
“We are all very clear that Fabio is under contract to the FA until the 2012 European Championships and nothing has changed in that respect. Everyone is very disappointed in going out of the World Cup. Everyone is frustrated. It makes perfect sense for us to go back to London and take stock of the situation and reflect fully on the tournament, what we can take from it and speak again to Fabio again from there. We just want to show a common-sense approach rather than making a knee-jerk reaction within 24 hours of a very disappointing result.”
Capello has already said that he will not resign as England boss and with a contract worth £12million over the next years, you would not expect Capello to walk away from that kind of money. But there is no doubt that England underperformed at South Africa and the FA have the right to ask a lot of questions of Capello from the tense atmosphere in the England camp to his selection policy.
When Capello took over from Steve McClaren in late 2007, England had just failed to qualify for the 2008 European Championship and morale was at an all-time low. Capello came in and laid down the law in the England camp, increasing discpipline and the team responded winning its qualifying group easily.
But that authoritative style of Capello that worked so well when he only saw the players for 4 or 5 days every three months, did not work so well when he had the players for 5 or 6 weeks straight.
In his press conference Capello was asked about his rigid 4-4-2 formation, that caused Steven Gerrard to be stuck on the left and not in a deeper role behind Rooney. He responded
“I think you can decide on a different style but a good style depends on the form of the players,’ he said. We played this style for a long time and the results were very good. Sometimes you can change with the game but that depends on the physical situation and not the style. The style always depends on the players in my squad.”
Capello cannot blame the players for being tired, the Lampard “goal” against Germany or anything else. He just got it wrong.
The best England player is Wayne Rooney. How Capello cannot play Rooney as the target man where he has played all season for Man United is beyond me. How can Matthew Upson be a better choice to face the speed of the German attack than King, Dawson or Carragher? Heading into the first game against the U.S. and with all that hype, how could he not tell RobertGreen the night before that he would be playing in the biggest game in his life?
An England team with quality players like Ashley Cole, Frank Lampard, Steven Gerrard and Wayne Rooney should be able to do more than finish second in a group that includes Slovenia, Algeria and the U.S.
This is an aging England team that needs retooling for the 2010 Euro’s and I don’t think that Capello is the man to do that. It is time that England go back and get an English manager.
Either Roy Hodgson (who has international managerial experience) or Harry Redknapp would be my choice as England’s new manager.
