Kenny Dalglish Won't Be Delivering the Module: English Premiership 2011-12

And Jim White. That was some serious o_O TV last night.

the EPL's huge spending power ought to have invalidated this whole britfetish since it has allowed teams to buy the best BRITISH players from all over the world, whereupon it will have been discovered that the best BRITISH centre halves and centre forwards come from the cote d'ivoire and serbia

dowie and lol bassett were all over this britishness trip last night on ssn

― diouf est le papa du foot galsen merde lè haters (nakhchivan), Thursday, September 1, 2011

yeah i saw this

What were they saying? I missed that bit.

"great bit of business for them, he's british" no really

the internationalism of the EPL is one of the best things about it

a few years ago blackburn had the most nationalities of any team, sthing like 14 i think, and they played really very bad and BRITISH football

it was wonderful

what about ibrahimovic then? Ey? EY?

Can we draw conclusions about the footballing characteristics of orphans from cron?

Gary doherty is as irish as damien duff. Run with that.

I think the approval of britishness from british pundits in britain is pretty much as sharivari says, no cultural, language or settling in issues to trouble simple football men like arry. Or big ron.

Big problem with people who big up Britishness as a positive quality in a footballer is they tend to have ideas about what qualities e.g. Africanness brings to the game.

Interesting discussion, not sorry I missed it tbh

I think there's also the British club culture where the team and club is this charisma-led gang, rather than the more orthodox corporate structure that continental clubs seem to follow. Buying British would be more likely to produce someone who understands and accepts this, and is almost inherently capable of working within it because that's what they've known since they were playing boys' football. Look at it the other way and what happens sometimes when you get a foreign manager parachuted into an English setup, complaints about Sven's halftime speeches or Capello's coldness.

I don't know, maybe it's better expressed as a negative; it cuts down your chances of ending up with a misfit like Andrea Silenzi or Džo Cole.

Think we're possibly underrating the value of team spirit here - it's what Liverpool with their various cliques seem to have lacked in previous years. What Bellamy's talking about isn't really "BRITISH PASSION!!!!!" but "good bunch of lads to go go-karting with".

The problem with this is that said bunch of lads now include Bellamy and Andy Carroll, who are not exactly known for their level-headedness. There'll be a bargain-basement equivalent of the same thing at QPR. It's what killed Newcastle in the mid-00s. Dunno, I'm happy that there are good English/British players coming through but on the other hand I'm not sure that rebooting Liverpool as Spice Boys 2.0 is the way forward.

Also, it means Jamie Carragher and his moronic ilk have won.

Also inherent Britishness with regard to football, like it or not, does mean kick-and-rush. The English players that look most promising - Wilshere, McEachran, Cleverley etc - strike me as far more continental in their approach, but that might not get noticed amid all the hubris.

Probably no coincidence that this discussion is happening at the time the Wenger approach has suddenly and massively gone out of fashion.

Should also be pointed out that anyone who thinks this Liverpool team stand a chance of getting into the Champions League without Best-of-British Luis Suarez is kidding themself.

Tbh the spine of the best current LFC side - Reina, Agger, Lucas, Suarez - isn't particularly British.

LFC lacking team spirit? Istanbul etc

Distilled in the spirit of ONE MAN

a few years ago blackburn had the most nationalities of any team, sthing like 14 i think, and they played really very bad and BRITISH football

Also Big Sam fielding a team without any British players and still being about as lumberingly route-one as it's possible to be.

I dunno, management philosophy strikes me as more important than personnel to an extent, and Dalglish shows every sign of not being an antediluvian idiot.

Never thought LFC lacked team spirit tbh Maybe 2010 team, but for most of the 2000's I'd have said it was one of the biggest pluses of the team. Making up for a lack of quality in some areas imo.

who knows, maybe the lack of banter drove them to such mindless rage that they had no choice but to attack each with golf clubs, but in their polyglot way they didnt lack for determination, indefatigibility or any of the other abstract nouns invented by iain dowie

your americans, your cubans, your mexican lads, they'll be comin at you with a baseball bat most likely. Watch out for that, slightly different arm angle required to block any high swing. The welsh and english boys will favour a golf club, maybe a long iron- the paddies too, most likely, but don't discount the hurl with them or the scots boys. Your french, italians, spanish- those boys will have a blade, every time, watch out for that. The eastern europeans are a facking liability, you could be walking into anythere there, so be on your guard- we all remember balaban pulling an uzi out of his sock during a particularly tasty pace lap in brighton.

Ronaldo is not an orphan

Gary Neville weighs in. I haven't seen him punditing yet but this sort of thing is promising.

ronaldo can be anything he wants to be imo

"The analogy I use is if a man takes a woman out 85 times and then she's not your girlfriend at the end of it, you've wasted a lot of time.

what possible analogy?

Arsenal 85 passes per shot?

Spurs 85 players bought per adequate recruitment?

Utd 85 seconds per ridiculous ref decision?

That did jump out as the voice of bitter experience.

clearly the shagging hadn't been very good during those 85 dates.

it always end up with the lads bursting into the hotel room wanting a roast ;_;

Something to add to this discussion:

They say the Premiership game is so much *faster* than other leagues. Would the English midfielders, pick say Jenas or Murphy be lauded abroad because they would have a quicker reaction, being used to a higher tempo, or would they still be midtable cloggers?

she always call out "neville" rather than "gary", and i end up thinking about my dad ;_;

sorry serious discussions

Jenas's main problem is his decision-making, so yeah he might do better in Italy or somewhere.

murphy clearly not yr typical eng mf anyway

Jenas would be lauded as athletic and energetic before they could digest his passing stats and howl with derision before packing him off to the changing rooms to athletically and energetically sweep the floor

I mean he's rubbish at a high-tempo when he had to play a quick pass, more time on the ball would probably help him.

he panics when given time too, though!

He's best without thinking at alll, but it's too easy to knock him out of the mental space necessary to flow like that

I haven't seen him punditing yet but this sort of thing is promising

He's been pretty good as a pundit so far

"Rebooting Liverpool as spice boys 2.0" cos of Bellamy and Carroll...there's a toilet iPhone post if ever I saw one.

Also pandemic otm, liverpool under rafa were synonymous with the big spirited comeback (on loads of occasions) and the last minute goal. It created about three memes here. They've lacked width and pace and creativity, seldom spirit.

i don't know that getting late goals (or, tbh, needing to) is the same thing as spirit. Penchant for drama, yes.

idk, i'd say the desire to keep pushing to the final whistle even in games that look destined to end in a draw / loss was one of the key factors in the season Spurs finished 4th and one of the biggest reasons they failed to last time. There's a definite mental factor involved.

Likewise Newcastle just giving up when faced with relegation - easily enough good players, no spirit whatsover. But I dunno, you can be spirited and still lose - thinking of West Brom and Wolves teams of the past.

Obviously luck comes into it - maybe what I'm reaching for is camaraderie rather than team spirit. Liverpool under Rafa always struck me as a club with cliques - English and Spanish-speaking blocs most obviously. Maybe not as pronounced as at Chelsea, but it rarely seemed to be the happiest of clubs.

see, last year we gained more points from behind than any tean in epl history, yet we still conceded stupid goals and lost bad points against lower half of the table opposition and i dunno, i think that 'spirit' that only kicks in on 85 mins or after you've already let in a goal is handy but not the all-positive aspect it's painted as. I'd rather my team had the spirit not to concede with every cross tbfh

That's just ineptitude though.

it's tied to motivation/team spirit etc imo, centre halves are the first and maybe most important manifestation of the mental toughness of a team i think

Likewise Newcastle just giving up when faced with relegation - easily enough good players, no spirit whatsover. But I dunno, you can be spirited and still lose - thinking of West Brom and Wolves teams of the past.

The Villa match? That was surreal.

I'd love to've seen that - I was abroad at the time where they showed Man Utd youngsters in a dead rubber instead, with no reference to the other games whatsoever. You had to work it out from crowd oohs & ahhs.

Don't think Chelsea particularly have language blocks, though the French-speakers have a habit of sticking together. The problem is more the older players who have been together for ages - terry, cech, lampard, cole, drogba, essien, malouda - having built up very strong relationships with each other that new players have to try and deal with. Like any office situation, that must be difficult for outsiders.

There used to be massive language (Italian/French/English) problems in 90s, early 2000s until Mourinho (I think) insisted on English being the only language spoken in training. Also the club moved training grounds - Cobham has one huge dressing room but the old one had three or four tiny drooms so players would gang up in groups of four and five and that got very cliquey (there used to be a black dressing room and a white one as far as I can tell).

This thread is first time I ever heard of language blocks at lfc.

the old new liverpool

that's cause the french dudes called them cleeks

It's good when you join a new club and everything cliques into place.