Target 2006 - World Cup qualification banter starts here

i think ireland can get a win at home and a draw away - and i'll be more than happy with that. no roy, no holland, no delap, possibly no miller - midfield is left a bit thin. duff on left wing, i guess, morrison and keane up front. kilbane and andy reid will start. with miller out, it could be kavanagh (in the centre) or finnan (down the right) in the first team, i'm not sure. barrett down the right is also a possibility, he did well there in some of the summer friendlies.

I think Eriksson has ended Heskey's England career, as anything more than a squad player at any rate. Bringing Vassell on alongside Owen in Euro2004 and opting for Smith upfront since would suggest that. The calamitous fuckup against France was probably the last straw.

Ireland really ought to finish at least second in their group - it's amazing how poor Switzerland looked in Portugal while Ireland look like much the better team, considering the results between the two in the qualifying for Euro 2004.

defoe or smith, in rooney's absence? which centre-half to partner terry?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/testthenation/

????

james
g(roan) neville, king, terry, cole
beckham, lampard, terry, bridge
owen, defoe/smith

Both Smith and Defoe are playing as well as they've ever done at the moment but I reckon Smith will start, possibly with Defoe coming on after the break. The Terry-King partnership looks solid and its heartening that they're not even England's first choice partnership.

Are we expecting Rio to walk straight back into the first team when his ban ends?

Heskey should not play for England again.

I think when Ferdinand and Campbell are both fit again they will be competing with Terry for two places: I suspect King will slip back to fourth place, and Woodgate could make a claim at Real too. We're strong there.

Ireland despatched Cyprus well, no great trouble, and Reid was excellent. I didn't see Northern Ireland's 3-0 defeat against Poland. Wales just played very poorly for a 1-1 draw in Azerbaijan, but almost get a win in the closing seconds when an Earnshaw header hits the post. The commentators referred to Bazeraijan at one point, and collectively as "the Azerbaijans" are playing well - yes, and the Waleses aren't.

Austria-England to come. Bridge and Cole playing, but Bridge in front of Cole. Who thinks that Bridge is the better attacker and Cole the better defender?

Goalkeeping moments are what I'll remember: Maninger not getting sent off for a handball clearly outside his area, his save from Smith, who from there should have given him no chance, James letting one through his hands that was stopped between his feet, and letting the equaliser through in a dive that was so wrong, so amateurish-looking. Very disappointing.

Having said all that, there is no one particularly terrific in the group, and maybe things will run our way a bit on Wednesday - I think Poland might be the second best team in the group, so winning there would be a very big step towards winning the group.

I'm a bit worried that James's confidence will be shot for Wednesday now as well.

I hope Sven does a Heskey, voicing his support for Calamity and then quietly dropping him.

If things go to form then England will tonk Poland on Wednesday. It always happens this way round.

There definitely needs to be more tackling in midfield - Austria seemed to be able to just run straight through at times, ditto Portugal and France and...

SWP should be given a crack, give some pace to what is a largely static midfield. I thought Bridge and Cole combined well on the left, mind - Cole passing to Bridge than racing ahead to get Bridge to pass back to him.

You want holistic thinking..try this...my squad of strikers for the World Cup would have been Owen, Crouch, Darren Bent, Defoe and Ashton

Tough luck for Rooney and Walcott can wait till 2010, also Jenas would NOT have been in the squad!

5 Strikers selected NOT 3 and 1 injured passenger. Why didn't Trevor Brooking and that useless plank Brian Barwick knock some sense into Sven when the final squad selection was actioned. 4 Strikers ! and one has a broken foot and another who has never played top flight football ....Bonkers ! what happens during the tournament if a striker is sent off or injured...where are the options then?

by the way, porkpie have you eaten humble pie YET ! Portsmouth FC in the Premier League 2006-2007 !

When Wembley is finally opened I have visions of Porkie turning up for an England International, and guess who is nearby Pompey's Johnny Westwood ringing the bells !

he can always play lone man upfront with Gerrard or whoever just behind, should that eventuality actually occur.

will be interesting to see how other sides like Portugal cope with their similarly limited striking palette.

Burchill was once tagged Scotland's Michael Owen

Unfortunately he got injured in the Autumn of 2001 and never achieved his full potential

Ha, I've just remembered, your mob signed Gerry Creaney off us, another of those perennial underachievers we kept churning out in the 1990s.

he was off loaded by terry fenwick to Man City for 1.2 million ...and then it was all downhill for Creaney.

which lower league Scottish club[s] did he end up playing for?

Hansen on Carragher, "He goes square again but we've kept possession, erm, *they've* kept possession."

Crouch's celebration OMG! I was cringing so much I almost lost a tooth.

which lower league Scottish club[s] did he end up playing for?

All of them :)

(St Mirren, Raith Rovers, Queen Of The South, Clydebank)

He was doing it in the presence of James Brown. I thought it was because he was excited about James Brown, but then he did it last night as well.

I think I would do the splits for James Brown, not the robot.

The thing about this is that they obviously don't know how bookmakers work - they're only too happy to give you odds for very unlikely events. I am getting so sick of the BBC's commentary team.

Although, for all this talk about who plays in the holding role and Theo Walcott and whether Rooney will be fit, I can't help but think the most significant factor in England's forthcoming campaign will be the return to form of David Beckham. I can't remember the last time I saw him play that well for England.

In other news, my dad claims to have had a Sven Goran Eriksson haircut.

For all the talk of how anonymous lickle Michael was, I thought Lampard just as bad - maybe worse. I'd rather someone else was taking the penalties.

Incidentally, apropos of nothing at all on this thread particularly, I was in the centre of Paisley earlier on and I passed a bloke in an AFC Wimbledon shirt. When I returned to the car park later on, he was still standing there explaining the structure of lower league football to his companion. Unfortunately, I could only hang about being surprised for as long as it took me to amble slowly back to my car, with a little pause to rummage in my handbag. Still, your wombling mob get everywhere!

That is my Joke Of The Day.

It makes sense, really, that Crouch is a robot.

No.

Ha ha! Bummer on the loose!

Lampard sounds a bit like lamppost - instant hilarity.

I hope the robnot dance catches on - it is so much better than that rocking the baby celebration. Hopefully someone will hand him a Union Flag Nazi helmet.

"When Wembley is finally opened I have visions of Porkie turning up for an England International, and guess who is nearby Pompey's Johnny Westwood ringing the bells !"

I guess this makes sense to someone somewhere, but reads like mad crap to me.

http://www.dectech.org/Links/WorldCupForecasts.pdf

Key phrase:

Likewise, the patriotic betting of proud
nationals has placed England at 8/1 or 11%, rather
ahead of the more sober analysis presented here.

They give England an 80% chance of making 2nd round, and a 5% chance of winning the whole thing.

Interestingly, France is behind only Brazil in likelihood of winning, with 11% and 13% respectively.

It's all bollocks though, I suppose.

Eriksson must call upon Carrick so that Lampard can focus on how best to support Gerrard and Owen without worrying what he has left behind.

This analysis from the BBC website makes sense to me. Lampard was far too anonymous yesterday and England can't afford that.

http://football.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1787348,00.html

Some of the other placings seem a bit bonkers to me (Argentina have a better chance than that, I'd say, and Portugal seem to me to be a side on the wane).

PJM there was a feature on that same thing on Newsnight last night. Is this really a story? Does anyone actually care? Matey boy who is some kind of robo-aerobics instructor was funny, mind.

i assumed PJM was being sarcastic re Guardian article excellence!

I give England 1% chance of winning the whole thing (revised up from 0% two minutes ago, just in case).

I was being semi-sarcastic, in that I haven't actually read it. I haven't noticed the craze sweeping the nation at all. It's like Crazy Frog all over again.

-- DJ Martian (altmartinu...), June 12th, 2002.

OTMFM!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kv1EbxiRWxk&search=Crouch

Yes. It is Peter Crouch. Singing Here Comes The Hotstepper. By Ini Kamoze. Somewhere nearby, William Bloody Swygart's head just exploded.

but we're going to start a new one....on Friday!

more than they have of winning this World Cup i guess...