Capello to good for undeserving England

Fabio Capello looks set to become the new England manager but in all fairness England don’t deserve him.

As Steve McLaren huddled under his umbrella in the Wembley rain, Brian Barwick and the FA were sealing his fate.

And from that moment Capello declared his intentions.

The stylish Italian coach threw his hat into the ring amidst renewed calls for an English man to take the helm.

But his declarations have not been well received among those in the English game, with few have been more vocal than Portsmouth pairing of Tony Adams and Harry Redknapp.

Adams made very similar noises when Arsene Wenger began his revolution at Arsenal in the late 90’s and hasn’t learnt his lesson from history.

And Redknapp made his claims with his eyes firmly on the hot seat hoping his comments would strengthen his position.

But what about the fans?

When Mourinho was the favourite the supporters conveniently forgot that he was Portuguese but no-one can forget that Capello is Italian.

Despite the lack of a home-grown manager who has the credentials of the former Real Madrid man, many still seem unmoved by his appointment.

Considering the current state of the national side we cannot afford to turn our nose up at a man who was won almost every accolade possible.

We should be welcoming him with open arms.

Rant of the week: Pedants

There is nothing wrong with striving for accuracy, after all if something is worth doing, then it was worth doing right.

And there is nothing wrong with correcting mistakes – if it is done in the right spirit.

However, putting someone right isn’t about humiliation. Pointing out a simple mistake in an attempt to be witty is the trademark move of the pedant.

But who cares if Nike is pronounced Niekey, who is bothered whether the line ‘Play it again Sam’ is actually uttered in Casablanca and why can‘t I just refer to myself as me rather than I?

If you know what I mean, then why correct me?

Is there anything more irritating than those who love being technically correct?

Case for the defence

After threatening to finish in the top four for the past two season some might be surprised to see Tottenham in the bottom six of the Premier League.

Spurs have an array of quality players at their disposal but if they have no top class defenders they will never become consistent.

And it has been a problem for many years.

Tottenham may have been more impressive in recent years but they have never had a great array of impressive defensive players.

They have brilliant strikers but the only good defender they have is the permanently injured Ledley King.

Rocha, Kaboul, Dawson and goalkeeper Paul Robinson are just not good enough to guarantee European football to the north London side on a regular basis.

In many of their games over the past two seasons they have had enough firepower to outscore most of the inferior sides in the league but they rarely manage to beat any of the big four because they do not have the ability to keep a clean sheet.

If Ramos wants to be a success at the Lane he must make a case for the defence.

Changing of the guard

Changing of the guard
The last few weeks have seen a number of high profile managerial casualties in the Premier League.

Billy Davies got the boot at Derby County, Steve Bruce left Birmingham for Wigan and Alex McLeish took over at St Andrews after ditching his post as Scotland manager.

But that question that remains is whether or not club owners and chairman are patient enough with their managers and coaches.

Davies got his club promoted to the Premier League after just a few months at the helm and was given just over a dozen games before Paul Jewell took his place.

Bruce got his chance with Wigan after Chris Hutchings was give just a handful of games after moving up from assistant manager to manager in the summer.

And lets not forget the plight of poor Martin Jol who guided Tottenham to a couple of fifth place finishes and was undermined almost from the start of the season.

Maybe chairmen should take their lead from Manchester United and Sir Alex Ferguson.

It took Sir Alex a few years to settle down in his position as manager of the Red
Devils but once he was given time to flourish he delivered.

Not every club can back their manager with millions of pounds but why not give a manager a little bit of time to make their mark in the job.

After all, Rome wasn’t built in a day.

Rant of the week: Tube paper readers

At the best of the times using the tube network means leaving your manners on the platform.

It’s a curious place where usual British codes of conduct are left by the wayside oftening resulting in chaos.

The underground killed chivalry; young men refuse to give up seats for old ladies and women in pushchairs are shoved aside by businessmen trying to get on at Canada Water.

But this week I noticed a new breed of tube commuter – the paper reader.

Seemingly innocuous the paper ready keeps quiet and rarely peers over the top of the Financial Times to even be noticed.

However, their pattern of behaviour changes dramatically as the train gets busier.

Despite not having enough room to take my hands out of my pockets on the Jubilee Line this week, optimistic newspaper readers have been trying to maintain their habits.

And it was bloody annoying.

I stood in front of one woman who tutted, sighed and moaned every time the train lurched and I brushed against her copy of The Metro.

At one point the train stopped and I knocked the paper clean out of her hand and almost failed to stifle a chuckle as she didn’t even have the room to bend over and pick it up again.

From Monday, I’m going to make it my mission to nudge any idiot who thinks that they have the space to read a broadsheet on a packed train.

And when they react with Superman eye lasers – I’ll pretend it wasn’t me.