Rooney banned for 3 games

EFC Si · October 14, 2011

Artetafan said:
England haven't earned that as an expectation.

No, we haven't, but we should be expecting that given the size and standard of our league, and the world class players in it.

Allezfan · October 14, 2011

EFC Si said:
No, but we should be expecting that given the size and standard of our league, and the world class players in it.

England have never been a team who have consistently challenged for honours.

What's more likely? Every single manager we've ever had has underachieved or that's not a reasonable expectation.

Mutzo Nutzo · October 14, 2011

Artetafan said:
England haven't earned that as an expectation.

Sadly not! But my point is we should, and if the right counter-measures had been applied after the last world-cup then maybe just maybe we would be on the road to challenging, - right up there with Brazil, Spain, Germany, Argentina. It saddens me to see that we have simply chased our tail for the last 18 months, and nothing significant has changed in respect of our style of play, our approach, and our footballing policies.

We need a revolution

Allezfan · October 14, 2011

Mutzo Nutzo said:
Sadly not! But my point is we should, and if the right counter-measures had been applied after the last world-cup then maybe just maybe we would be on the road to challenging, - right up there with Brazil, Spain, Germany, Argentina. It saddens me to see that we have simply chased our tail for the last 18 months, and nothing significant has changed in respect of our style of play, our approach, and our footballing policies.

We need a revolution

What the hell have Argentina done to be mentioned in that company?

EFCNIK · October 14, 2011

With the players we have we should be challenging. It's only really Spain I would say, damn, I'm envious of their team. The Germans and The Brazilians just seem to work better as a unit.

Allezfan · October 14, 2011

If you think we have the second best group of players in the world then yes I can understand why our most recent performances would worry you.

But, we don't. It's probable that our current set up isn't good enough to go toe to toe with the big boys when we meet but we have to get far enough to actually meet them before we find out. And we've got a decent record of beating the teams who aren't the elite. Which is why calling our current team as broken and awful strikes me as so over the top.

We've reached the knock out stage in six of the last eight major tournament, the quarters in three and the semis in one. And we've only really been hammered once in that time period, four of our losses came on penalties FFS.

We're doing alright. Not great, I would love to see us routinely reach semi and finals but alright. It would be nice if we'd qualified in a bit more style, it would be nice if things were clicking a bit better than they are, if we played much better football then we have been but we played really well in the qualifiers last time and were awful at the actual tournament. It's not always the best judge.

The fact is, we're there. If we can click and play well at the actual tournament, I'll take the dull but effective qualifiers every time.

Mutzo Nutzo · October 14, 2011

Artetafan said:
What the hell have Argentina done to be mentioned in that company?

I have a soft-spot for Argentina - due in part to a mind-blowing sexual encounter I had with a petite Argentinian chick in Mendoza

nevthebest · October 15, 2011

Artetafan said:
If you think we have the second best group of players in the world then yes I can understand why our most recent performances would worry you.

But, we don't. It's probable that our current set up isn't good enough to go toe to toe with the big boys when we meet but we have to get far enough to actually meet them before we find out. And we've got a decent record of beating the teams who aren't the elite. Which is why calling our current team as broken and awful strikes me as so over the top.

We've reached the knock out stage in six of the last eight major tournament, the quarters in three and the semis in one. And we've only really been hammered once in that time period, four of our losses came on penalties FFS.

We're doing alright. Not great, I would love to see us routinely reach semi and finals but alright. It would be nice if we'd qualified in a bit more style, it would be nice if things were clicking a bit better than they are, if we played much better football then we have been but we played really well in the qualifiers last time and were awful at the actual tournament. It's not always the best judge.

The fact is, we're there. If we can click and play well at the actual tournament, I'll take the dull but effective qualifiers every time.

this is rubbish the "it's probable that our current set up isn't good enough to go toe to toe with the big boys" current set up? so we catch up,
then what? they've all moved farther right. We're losing are game, ARE game, yeah its not pretty, villa forest, them , and us battered them, man u celtic etc.

we falling "behind" because we dont play our game.

nevthebest · October 15, 2011

and it is too late. we battered them. battered them. (f u maggie), now its not allowed probably

Elong · October 15, 2011

EFCNIK said:
Not once have I defended Rooney's actions. I'm just raising the point that the standard punishment would have been a one match ban (It's a cup competition entering a different phase) and possibly a fine. But because it's Rooney and England UEFA have decided to excercise the absolute maximum punishment possible. I mean it was hardly a full on smack in the face was it? It was a petulent kick out which the other player milked to the absolute maximum (not exusing Rooney AT ALL but the player fell down far too long after he was actually kicked for it to have been a real reaction) and had it been any other country, it would have been dealt with as such. I'm not saying Rooney doesn't deserve the book thrown at him, but I do think 3 games is extremely harsh considering 1. It's a cup competition heading into a new phase. 2. It was hardly an act of terrorism. 3. The opposition player over reacted. 4. The standard punishment for any red card is a 1 game ban. 5. The furthur punishment is reserved for the most henious of crimes- this was hardly it. Maybe I could even understand a 2 game ban for the sheer stupidity of it. But 3 is ridiculous. It's effectivly saying it was as bad as if someone double footed someone and snapped their leg in two.

As I say any other player for any other country and it's a 1 game ban. Stand by that.

Fair enough mate, agree to disagree. It's hard to look past someone like Rooney with his history and I'm sure it stacks against him in this scenario. 1st time offence and it may have been a 1 game ban. That doesn't make it a conspiracy in my view, him having history has counted against him. If you drink drive repeatedly, you don't get the same slap on the wrist everytime you do it for example.