How do. A 5-minute mouth off today, a sort of two-parter. Lucky buggers
Psycho Stu Pearce steps up to the plate tonight with the young lions against the impressive host nation Sweden in the semis of the UEFA U21′s. After starting out as 3rd favourites, we have eased into the latter stages after an edgy start against Finland when goalscorer Micheal Mancienne netted 1st and then lost the plot bringing down the Fin Striker. He conceded a penalty and took an early bath, They leveled and we were under the cosh, not an ideal start. Pearce rallied his troops and we found the self-belief to overcome with a Micah Richards header putting us back in the driving seat.
Games 2. Spain, pre tournament favourites and a very promising side playing in the same possession based style of the European champions. Nay bother for the lad Pearcy, again, excellent tactical nous stopped them for playing in midfield with Milner and Johnson and Muamba all flying in with the tackles, denying them the chance to launch attacks. In the 2nd half, the Spaniards who only managed a draw in the 1st game against Germany played further up the field trying to get a decent shot or 2 in, something they failed to do in the 1st. Enter whippet Walcott who murdered them in the space they left behind. 2 goals later and we were coasting. Milner even missed a penalty. England were installed as tournament favourites soon after and ensured their route to the last four with a game in hand, the only team of the eight to do so.
Last Monday, our final game was against the Germans. Basically, we put out a B-team (Stu has already given all 23 squad members a run-out, how good is that for team building and morale!). We were in a win win situation, If we lost or drew the favourites Spain were out, we didn’t need to win so just went through the motions giving everyone a run out against a pretty weak German team in my opinion. I’ll happily face them again in the final. That’s the history of 2009 UEFA under 21s tourno so far. Pretty good eh? Well here comes part 2, The Rant!
Imagine how much we could improve if my beloved FA pulled their gold rattling digits out of their arses and caught up with Europe. This is just how far we are behind the big four when it comes to coaching.
Psycho is one of just 115 coaches who hold a UEFA Pro Licence, that’s for the whole country, not just Darlington or Eccles.
What a joke, guess how many current Euro champs Spain have in their backyard……2,140. 18.6 times as many!!!!
If we look at the other license levels, everyone seems to be miles ahead. We have 1,789 members who hold an A, B or Pro license. Spain, Italy and Germany all laugh at us with 10-fold the amount of our lot. Germany alone has 28,000 coaches alone. It is not good enough!
Any way good luck tonight boys!
