England World Cup Squad

[The Red Baron]

Butland and Pickford I get, both have had good seasons in struggling sides. Pope? He wasn't even Burnley's No. 1 at the start of the season and he plays behind a well organised defence.

I can see the argument for not taking Hart though - he's jumped the shark. Ben Foster would have been my other keeper.

[NickDRFC]

Ben Foster has long since retired, though. Think that’s a bit harsh on Pope - he might have been playing behind a well organised defence but he was still busy, in fact I’d bet that he made a similar amount of saves to Pickford. There are players in the squad who weren’t first choice in their position at any point during the season - Rose, Rashford, Welbeck - so I disagree that him not being first choice 9 months ago should have any bearing on it.

[pib]

Very harsh on Pope. He's played most of the season (35 games) after Heaton's injury, and has better stats than any of the others not only in clean sheet terms, but save % as well suggesting it's not just down to the defence.

Would rather have someone in the squad who is performing rather than solely based on name/reputation or the club they play for.

[DearneValleyRover]

Very harsh on Pope, he’s stats wise been the best English keeper this season and commands his area better than both Pickford and Butland. The two in the squad who should feel very lucky are Rose and Delph who have hardly played for their Clubs.

[NickDRFC]

Very harsh on Pope, he’s stats wise been the best English keeper this season and commands his area better than both Pickford and Butland. The two in the squad who should feel very lucky are Rose and Delph who have hardly played for their Clubs.

Delph? Admittedly he got a bit lucky in that Mendy got injured and allowed him a run in the side, but after that he must have started a dozen games, for the best team in the country, before getting injured again. Then when fit, he was back in the side. I wouldn't call that "hardly playing".

[selby]

  The manager getting the team to play how they do every weekend is the key, playing at the same pace, and taking the other teams out of their comfort zone.
   We have to speed the game up to normal premiership pace.
   The excuse the team is inexperienced should be put to one side, all of them play every weekend in the premiership, a standard of play that is way beyond the average world cup standard. Only in the later stages do they come up against the more experienced sides.

[DearneValleyRover]

Very harsh on Pope, he’s stats wise been the best English keeper this season and commands his area better than both Pickford and Butland. The two in the squad who should feel very lucky are Rose and Delph who have hardly played for their Clubs.

Delph? Admittedly he got a bit lucky in that Mendy got injured and allowed him a run in the side, but after that he must have started a dozen games, for the best team in the country, before getting injured again. Then when fit, he was back in the side. I wouldn't call that "hardly playing".

22 appearances all season not even half the games Citeh played.

[NickDRFC]

Very harsh on Pope, he’s stats wise been the best English keeper this season and commands his area better than both Pickford and Butland. The two in the squad who should feel very lucky are Rose and Delph who have hardly played for their Clubs.

Delph? Admittedly he got a bit lucky in that Mendy got injured and allowed him a run in the side, but after that he must have started a dozen games, for the best team in the country, before getting injured again. Then when fit, he was back in the side. I wouldn't call that "hardly playing".

22 appearances all season not even half the games Citeh played.

I did cover this in my first comment, but here's a bit more detail:

First 5 games - Did not play
Game 6 - on as a sub
Games 7-19 - started every game
Games 20-21 - slight niggle, not in squad
Games 22-23 - starts both, injured in game 23
Games 24-31 - not fit
Games 32-38 - 6 starts out of 7

So out of the last 22 games he was available for, he started 21. Overall, of 28 games that he was available for, he started 21 and was brought on in 1. A higher proportion of games than Copps started for us this season - Copps must have done extremely well to get the player of the year award whilst playing less than someone who hardly played.

[RoversAlias]

Butland and Pickford I get, both have had good seasons in struggling sides. Pope? He wasn't even Burnley's No. 1 at the start of the season and he plays behind a well organised defence.

I can see the argument for not taking Hart though - he's jumped the shark. Ben Foster would have been my other keeper.

What!? Pope is right up there among the top goalies for stats all season, he played almost the entire campaign and was a shining light for Burnley. He hasn't hidden behind Mee and Tarkowski, he's been a big success. He ha also committed zero errors directly leading to goals which is very impressive over a season.

Ben Foster stepped out of England contention years ago and was in the worst team in the league, he didn't stand out at all compared to Pope.

[Chris Black come back]

Also, as good as Mee and Tarkowski have been, they are not Maldini and Baresi!

[BillyStubbsTears]

Also, as good as Mee and Tarkowski have been, they are not Maldini and Baresi!

Nail. Head.

And of course that assessment can be extended pretty much the whole squad. How many England players would get into a squad of real contender countries? Germany, France, Spain, Brazil etc?

Kane. Maybe Walker and Sterling as back ups. And then...?

[Pancho Regan]

I've been thinking the same, but I hesitated from posting it!

I don't like to be negative and I truly hope I'm proved wrong, but I can't help feeling quite underwhelmed when I cast my eye over the names in our squad.
On the world stage, there are some distinctly average players there.
I'm struggling to come up with any that would get into Germany's squad.

Kane, and possibly Walker. I'm not sure how our goalies compare to be honest.

[NickDRFC]

I don't think it's a bad thing to be underwhelmed. Helps to temper expectations which may just lift a bit of pressure off the squad. The best thing about the squad is the average age - a lot of these players are still young enough that they could significantly improve and a lot of this team could conceivably still be around for 2-3 tournaments after this one. If the team can grow together and we add some of the talented youngsters there appears to be coming through we might have a shot at sticking around to the latter stages over the next few years.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Trouble is Nick, we have a long record of taking promising young uns to World Cups and them fading away.

Aaron Lennon?
Luke Shaw?
Ross Barkley?
Jermaine Jenas?
Stewart Downing?
Theo Walcott?

[NickDRFC]

That's very true, but of the group going, the only ones who you could argue as going too early are Alexander-Arnold and possibly Loftus-Cheek. However, Alexander-Arnold has just had a season where he's established himself as the first choice full back for Champions League finalists, playing all the big games, and generally playing very well. Loftus-Cheek it's harder to make a case for but he's still had a decent, albeit interrupted, season at Palace and played well for England earlier in the year.

[DonnyNoel]

Trouble is Nick, we have a long record of taking promising young uns to World Cups and them fading away.

Aaron Lennon?
Luke Shaw?
Ross Barkley?
Jermaine Jenas?
Stewart Downing?
Theo Walcott?

Seems to be an English problem overall. Despite what people think we do produce (along with Brazil) some of the best youngsters around up to the age of 16/17/18. It's the kicking on from 18-22 where we seem to fall down whereas thats when your Dutch, French and Spaniards start to develop (and where Brazil continue to develop). Arguably we could say we've seen the same at Rovers - Fairhurst, Lund, Middleton, Mandeville et al.

Back on to the squad, overall I like it. Maybe question the presence of Cahill and Jones with both being similar (and similarly limited in a back three) and I was half hoping for a Sessegnon or Sancho wildcard, possibly at Welbeck's expense but then he has a decent record of goals for England over the last couple of year.

[DearneValleyRover]

Very harsh on Pope, he’s stats wise been the best English keeper this season and commands his area better than both Pickford and Butland. The two in the squad who should feel very lucky are Rose and Delph who have hardly played for their Clubs.

Delph? Admittedly he got a bit lucky in that Mendy got injured and allowed him a run in the side, but after that he must have started a dozen games, for the best team in the country, before getting injured again. Then when fit, he was back in the side. I wouldn't call that "hardly playing".

22 appearances all season not even half the games Citeh played.

I did cover this in my first comment, but here's a bit more detail:

First 5 games - Did not play
Game 6 - on as a sub
Games 7-19 - started every game
Games 20-21 - slight niggle, not in squad
Games 22-23 - starts both, injured in game 23
Games 24-31 - not fit
Games 32-38 - 6 starts out of 7

So out of the last 22 games he was available for, he started 21. Overall, of 28 games that he was available for, he started 21 and was brought on in 1. A higher proportion of games than Copps started for us this season - Copps must have done extremely well to get the player of the year award whilst playing less than someone who hardly played.

My problem Nick is that Southgate stated he wouldn’t take players who were not playing for their clubs and had doubts over their fitness. Both Rose and Delph fit that profile. I hope both play well I just feel they are lucky.

[NickDRFC]

DVR - I think we will just have to disagree about Delph. He had one bad(ish) injury this year that kept him out for 7 or 8 games, but proved his fitness and was back as first choice once fit again. No doubts there for me - do you have doubts over Kane’s fitness given he was out injured for two separate spells this season?

Completely agree about Rose, though, and I think Bertrand should feel very hard done by.

[swintonrover]

I reckon we'll do better than expected at the World Cup. There's a lot to be said for teams, rather than a group of players. Look at Wales in the Euros. The only world class Welsh player is Bale. If Southgate can tap into the "us against the world" mentality, we could be pleasantly surprised.

[DearneValleyRover]

DVR - I think we will just have to disagree about Delph. He had one bad(ish) injury this year that kept him out for 7 or 8 games, but proved his fitness and was back as first choice once fit again. No doubts there for me - do you have doubts over Kane’s fitness given he was out injured for two separate spells this season?

Completely agree about Rose, though, and I think Bertrand should feel very hard done by.

I agree with you over Kane and you could argue Stones but unfortunately we don’t have the depth in those positions, nice debate though

[NickDRFC]

Yep, nice to read something that isn’t about the budget for once!

[Pancho Regan]

I reckon we'll do better than expected at the World Cup. There's a lot to be said for teams, rather than a group of players. Look at Wales in the Euros. The only world class Welsh player is Bale. If Southgate can tap into the "us against the world" mentality, we could be pleasantly surprised.

Good points Swinton, and I hope you're right. I certainly agree that a well-balanced, organised, motivated team can perform 'better than the sum of its parts' and there is plenty of evidence for that.
Maybe a couple of the younger lads will play without fear and surprise a few teams.

My expectations are modest, so I'll try not to feel too disappointed if we don't get through the group stage!