As much as I agree that if you put him on with a few minutes to go then he’ll score given the chance, my fear is that by putting him on the pitch you have to take someone off who will help create that chance.

Who would you put him on for?
Rooney? not way – our best player and a far better chance of scoring a goal out of nothin
Heskey? – our attacking play revolves round him
Gerrard? – possibly
Barry / Lampard – take them out and holes appear in our midfield, leaving us more susceptible to counter.
Lennon / Walcott? – Capello won’t take off any pacy winger in the last 10 minutes, unless to replace with another pacy winger

By the same token Defoe wouldn’t be put on if we were chasing the game. The best players are the ones that start, and they should be the ones to recover the game.

Under Eriksson or any other system over the past 10 years, Owen would be on the plane. In fact I would like him to play for selfish reasons. But England is bigger than Owen, and I think we are better without him, and won’t find ourselves in those situations where we have to chase the game.

Incidentally Dexy, it’ll be 5 strikers I think, with Rooney, Heskey, Defoe, Crouch, and one from Cole / Bent (if he keeps scoring / Walcott (agreed not a striker though) and Owen. Capello likes Crouch, and so do I!

Its an easy question… do you want Owen to score 1 or England to score 2???

What im saying is that normally, when England are losing 1-0 to Brazil/Portugal etc, its because we arent playing well as a team and NOT creating these hypothetical chances. Bringing Owen on, would not change that as (as sunday showed) he can go 20mins without touching the ball. That is not an impact sub. He wouldnt change the way England are playing- which has always been the REAL problem. An impact player would be a Walcott, Agbonlahor or Cole- someone who’s pace or presence would change the last 20mins of a game, exploit the gaps and CREATE the chances from this. I dont rate any of those 3 particularly highly- but as impact players they are much more practical than Owen.

Ps. Darren, my all time favourite player is Juan Carlos Valeron. Please put him on the list.

Ash, you’ll get used to our current Blogger of the year.

Matt’s heros
Lionel Messi
Craig Bellamy
Juan Román Riquelme

Matt’s donkeys
Steven Gerrard
Michael Owen
James Milner

For the record, Dafoe has started well this season, but he is by no means the answer as every seems to think. He’s offside more then Inzagi and Adebayor put together.

To say he misses more chances then Heskey in a ridiculous comment. How could he, 40 goals in 80 games for England against 7 in nearly 60 – facts are there mate. Yes he has missed a couple of chances for Man U, but I’m not saying he’s going to score everytime his put infront of goal! I’m saying he’s proven pedigree and could score against Lucio and Cescar cos they’d just be on a long list of defenders Owen has made a mug of.

Havent we been 1-0 down to the likes of Brazil and Portugal in the last few world cups and hasnt Owen been on the pitch each time? And we always lost! He isnt good enough. We need to look forward and give someone else a chance.

The number of chances he normally needs to score is worse than Heskey!!! Have you seen how many one-on-ones/clear cut chances he’s missed while at United already? There seems to be this myth that you give Owen a chance and he will score. Watch his misses against Burnley (when United lost) and think again if you reckon he will suddenly crack a couple in against Lucio and Julio Cesar in the World Cup QF.

Imagine this, yr 1-0 down against brazil in the qf, there’s 5 mins to go, who do u bring on? Cole, walcott or owen? It’s got to b owen, he might only touch the ball once but it might be the most important touch since 66!

Walcott will go as the overrated midfielder that he is, i’d be very concerned to see him play up front seeing as he has hardly played there for Arsenal.

Yes Owen had some ‘big’ games for Newcastle, but Owen cant win them on his bloody own can he! If he’d had the chances given to him, maybe he’d saved them who knows.

Rooney/Defoe/
Cole/Heskey

Walcott/Emergency forward

Owen had some big games at the end of last season and didn’t do much then for the Geordies then.

I think Matts point is relevant if you are talking about Owen getting into the England squad. At United, they can accomodate an out and out poacher, and I actually agree that he will be an asset for them this season. I like Owen as a striker – he is one of the last of his breed, and a proper Premiership star.

However the international game has moved on amazingly quickly, even since Owen was last a regular (particularly the England team). The strikers mentioned in the article all have other elements to their game that support the team, and create space or options. I think he would have a negative effect on the current set up. However with all things England I am happy to be proved wrong!