Sourced from SBS World Game - Graig Foster's Blog - http://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/craig-foster/blog/1011355/The-lesson-from-England's-demise 30 June 2010.
This is a very interesting piece of observation / analysis. It has implications for what we are doing at the local level in the context of the National Football Curriculum. Take the time to read it.
There is a valuable lesson(s) for Australia from England’s World Cup failure, and it is in the different ways we handle our tournament exit.
The lesson from England's demise
by Craig Foster
Most of England’s press and former players will blame Fabio Capello, and call for a more ‘English’ approach, and we can be assured that their next coach will be another home-grown product.
This is why they will likely struggle for quite sometime now, because Capello is not the issue, their football style is, and this predictable reaction will entrench their cultural deficiencies, rather than seeking to overcome them.
England remains the only World Cup winning nation to hire a foreign coach and for the country that invented the organized game, this is an admission of failure that their football doesn’t work internationally.
Capello could not change their style to a more modern version and when under the most pressure, it is natural that they regressed to a fairly predictable style where players rush forward and look for crosses, while Germany’s youngsters immediately come together to play in small groups to break a team down with combination play.
England were robbed by a shocking decision on Lampard’s disallowed goal, but the problem for English football is that if they focus only on this officiating error, they will miss an opportunity to progress, because the difference in football played by Germany, a far more successful football nation, was clear for all to see.
Even the most passionate English fan would have to admit this.
The reality is that we have moved away from the outdated football of England, which we used to play under British coaches. Thankfully, today we no longer import from England, because their methodology has again proven to be a long way behind.
But the core difference is in the way we move forward from here.
After our loss to Germany, we called for our team to play with an Australian mentality, an attacking and aggressive approach, because this is what makes us the world’s best sporting nation, per capita. But we never called for an Australian style, because we are employing international coaches to change it.
England, conversely, will call for both.
Put another way, Australia is tied to our cultural approach to sport, because it is a very great strength, but we are not tied to the way we have always played football, rather we are actively trying to modernize it.
This is why we cannot have an Australian coach for some years, because they are not yet capable of taking us to the next level of improvement, so be very wary of calls for an Aussie to take over because this confuses the value of our mentality with the tactical quality required to express it.
And is the same mistake England will make.
Australia must be aggressive and attack, or at least be forced back to defend, and we pay several million dollars a year to a foreign coach to structure our team to do so in an intelligent way.
This is why we said that Australia must play with the head and heart, in equal measure, because strength of character and strong mentality are extremely valuable traits, as the Germans demonstrate time and again (and theirs is closest to Australia’s), but must be allied with football intelligence and tactical structure to control a game.
This is what England ultimately lack, because their players are not taught correctly, their coaching is well behind the best, and the EPL promotes a kick and rush style of ‘second ball’ football. This is why in the last few years I have talked about the A-League moving away from an EPL, British style, and becoming closer to the Bundesliga in tactical quality, and intensity of play.
This is the benefit of being a young football nation, we can change quickly and easily, and do not have the burden of a hundred years of history to hold us back, which is what England are constantly trying to overcome.
And this is also why I have congratulated Socceroos fans not just for being highly critical of the approach against Germany, because we all regulate standards and expectations through our collective, cultural response, but also for recognizing that our football needs to progress.
Above all else, Australia knows sport, and thus our fans have an advanced understanding of the necessities of sporting achievement. We are flexible and hungry to advance, not tied to the past.
English fans are renowned for their great passion and support for their favoured clubs, but the one area where they hold their own football back is because they don’t want change.
They support and believe in an all out fighting style that is tactically shallow, and cannot move forward. Whereas a player is congratulated for a piece of skill elsewhere, in England they clap a fierce tackle or a corner kick, the level of understanding is simply not as high as in Italy, France, Germany, or South America.
For a thorough analysis of the differences between the Italian and English football cultures, including the media and fan responses, read “The Italian Job” by Gianluca Vialli. It explains why Italy has won four titles very clearly, because the culture is demanding, educated and tactically deep.
International styles and philosophies are an important part of the cultural diversity of football, and for this reason I am pleased to see England go back to what they are, rather than hire an Italian to change them, but success for Australia will come from developing a new style based on possession, short passing and constant player movement, individual technical quality and improvisation, and sophisticated tactical understanding that is flexible enough to play quickly when needed, slowly when required, and can solve all the problems a nation must confront to win a World Cup.
So please, never confuse the great lesson of our 2010 World Cup, for our mentality and cultural strengths to be understood and capitalized on, as Hiddink was able to achieve, with a cry to play the same way we always have, because it is nothing of the sort.
We are, in fact, desperately trying to modernize the way we play, as quickly as we possibly can, whilst never forsaking the cultural gifts we are born with, as Aussies.
This is why our next choice of coach is so important, and why going back to an Australian would be regressive (at least for another 5-10 years).
That’s why Australia will ultimately be successful, because we are aggressive about learning and improving, and why England now have a huge cultural dilemma on their hands.
So I say well done to the Australian football community, you have all shown an ability to absorb cultural change quicker than probably any country has ever done before.
Typically Aussie, I’d say.