The media lambast England manager Fabio Capello as some choice decisions see his side losing a friendly to France 2-1.
Fabio Capello can please no one. Harry Redknapp thinks he shouldn’t pick players he turned down for the World Cup. Sam Allardyce is upset that he disrespected Paul Robinson. Robert Huth thinks he should pick Ryan Shawcross. David Moyes wants him to play Leighton Baines more. And Roy Hodgson wants him to play Steven Gerrard less.
Big spending Premier League clubs could learn from the style and management of the newly promoted sides
The English Premier League is a festering mess of greed, sleaze and stupidity but, allowing for that, the 2010-11 season is shaping up quite well. It is at least less predictable than at any time in the century so far. It may be too much to hope for only three months in, but there is cause for thinking that, for only the second time in Premier League history, none of the three promoted clubs will go straight back down. For anyone other than local rivals of the clubs in question, this ought to be seen as a sign of progress.
Roger Titford reports on a year in the Championship in which may not have been vintage, but was notable for Blackpool providing the headlines
The Championship alternates between “strong” and “weak” years depending on which clubs have just been relegated from the Premier League. Next season we can look forward to a weak, and therefore more open, contest with two financial basket cases (Hull and Portsmouth) and Burnley coming down.
Huw Richards sums up the Championship season whilst asking of whether being at the top of the division correlates with playing better football
Do you want your team to play in the Premier League? Well, yes, me too. But this year’s Championship season shows that achieving what we’re told is the Holy Grail – or at least the answer to a £60 million question – can have unwanted side-effects. When your team is newly risen from the lower orders you have certain expectations. Better grounds, bigger crowds and classier football. No doubt about the first two, but hope of number three went largely ungratified.
The Bristol City manager is left red faced after giving Liam Fontaine the perfect motivation to score a peachy goal
By now Gary Johnson should have exposed his naked backside in a shop window in Bristol. Johnson promised to do so if Liam Fontaine scored this season, which Fontaine duly did against Wolves. However, despite talking about it in the press, as well as devoting a section of his post-match press conferences to discussing it, at the time of writing we still can’t be sure that Johnson has actually gone ahead and done so.