A Golfer's view of the Rugby World Cup

First topic message reminder :

With the group stages of the Rugby world cup drawing to a close and we approach the sharp end of the tournament, I wonder how many people here are avidly following it

I know we have a rugby section here on V2 and it's pretty lively at the moment but I've noticed many golfers also seem to be keen on Rugby. I know at my club there are an awful lot of rugby fans and the big games get a large crowd to watch at the club - we even have a four nations weekend with matches between England Ireland Scotland and Wales

So who here is watching the RWC and who are we supporting?

I'm trying to work out my schedule for Saturday morning with the England/Scotland group decider at 8:30am and a tee-time at 11:10 - debating with myself whether I should watch the game at home, down the pub for breakfast or even have the (superior) breakfast at the club but then have perhaps an hour to kill before my tee-time!

There is no way that Jones will be picked ahead of Vidic Mac. The last few weeks have seen him look a bit more ragged I think, he still has an awful lot to learn IMO, center halfs are very rarely anywhere near their best at 19-20. I do think he will turn into a fantastic player though. Just out for me big style on Cleverly though, neat little footballer yeah, outstanding...Im not at all convinced yet.

Super

Scotland have been selecting players from the championship for a while now and we know how good they are.

No Super I didnt misunderstand, was just making a joke. I also think you are wrong about a championship side, the championship players are even less flexible in terms of playing different formations the the English Premiership players, its like watching the SPL quite frankly, awful.
Also every team in the world picks most of its best players....because they are its best players. You also have to come up with a method of getting the most out of your best players. To me that is where England have failed, not by picking the best guys but by not applying a long term strategy to how they would play together effectively.

Mac, that isn't the issue, Scotland have to pick them out of necessity, and would probably actually be better picking Championship players than SPL players, but given how poorly the Premier League English players perform on the pitch, would they do any worse using Championship players instead, they might play more as a team and with considerably less ego and selfishness.


Diggers, I know what you are saying, but England try to shoehorn in what they consider to be their best players regardless of how they actually fit. For instance, much is made of Rooney, but there are occasions when I think a Darren Bent or someone similar may be a better fit for a particular game.
People like Ginola, Cantona and Di Canio were left out of their respective teams despite their brilliance.

Ginola and Cantona played plenty of times for France SR, just not very well and they were replaced by very good players, not by second divsion hackers.
Bent has played in around 5 of the last 6 games, he has been picked and has scored 4 goals but he doesnt do a lot else to be honest.
Ive seen plenty of different formations with different players, I really dont think thats been the problem. People were talking about Scott Parker being the man and why didnt he go to the world cup. Who was getting overrun in midfield in the last match...Scott Parker.
Ultimately most players who have deserved a chance have had a chance and usually quite a few chances, but whatever flaws are in the system keep stopping it from working.

Where did the rugby go??? Tut, tut Mac. Posting off topic? Whatever next?!

Super is right.
England do give themselves problems by trying to pick their best 11 players and then wedging them into a formation. A la Scholes, Lampard, Joe Cole, Heskey....

You can do that to an extent but we have done it to a level detrimental to the quality of the team. Spain have a load of quality centre mids but they're not stupid enough to play 3-6-1 just to fit them in. We would!!

Heskey has never been a top premiership player. In fact Id say he is the example of a player being picked to fit a system rather than being picked on reputation.
I honestly think a lot of this comes down to the whole Lampard/Gerrard thing and I think its a bit overplayed personally.

Agreed re Heskey but what I mean is Sven saw him as a player and so wedged him in, often at left wing?!
Cole and Scholes the same. It's not all about the Lampard thing but that too is an example.

The best sides have good balance, see United circa 1999, and we've not had that for ages. If we had I think we'd have done better

Maybe, but both Scholes and Cole played plenty of times for Chelsea and Man Utd out wide, Cole was really a winger his whole time there. And also Cole was one of the better players in a world cup playing out wide.
And when out and out wingers have played by and large they havent really done much apart from flatter to decieve, Walcott, SWP, Lennon, Downing, Johnson etc etc.
All a bit depressing really.

Players like Matt le tissier and Ian wright were never played as much as I think they should have been.
I remember a story about Geoff hurst when he said to ramsay, 'see you next time Gaffer' to which ramsay replied 'perhaps Geoffrey, perhaps'
England players seem to think that they play international football for who they are rather than what they can do or even if they fit in. For instance I think its worth getting leighton baines a go instead of Cole for a spell, who has been dining out on ancient reputation for ages.

Nah, Wright was shocking for England. Problem with Le Tiss is they would have had to build a team round him and he was basically the Shane Lowry of the football world, a fat lazy sod but with a lot of talent. (not saying Lowry has the same talent, just that he's fat)
Dont disagree re Baines as I think Cole may well have lost his pace, but I dont think Baines is fantastic either, just solid.

Digs I'm not saying you have to have out and out wingers. But you do need balance. Pires and Llunjberg gave Arsenal balance as does Villa for Barcelona without being wingers.
For too long everyone knew that England could only go right, mostly to Beckham. No threat at all from the left. Once you know that it's easy to defend if you've decent enough defenders.
I don't remember Scholes ever playing wide for Utd and yes Cole did for Chelsea but everyone knew he thought he was a centre mid.
Both played wide for England without wanting to be there and were rarely a threat.
Scholes incidentally should have played central but Sven thought he could pick him Lampard and Gerrard.

I think there is a difference between being picked on reputation and being picked on sustained form. I don't like Ashley Cole but I think he is the latter of those two

Diggers wrote:Nah, Wright was shocking for England. Problem with Le Tiss is they would have had to build a team round him and he was basically the Shane Lowry of the football world, a fat lazy sod but with a lot of talent. (not saying Lowry has the same talent, just that he's fat)
Dont disagree re Baines as I think Cole may well have lost his pace, but I dont think Baines is fantastic either, just solid.

Yet they built a team or at least insisted on finding room for Beckham all the time despite him being a bit of a one trick pony (although a hardworker) and with about a tenth of the skill of Le Tissier. Same with Frank "Square Peg" Lampard.

Well done on the Lowry comment, I wonder if he ever reads these pages?

Maybe we should have a thread entitled "A Golfer's view of football" - could be some legs in that one!

BTW I'm amazed to see Doon didn't try to chastise JAS for the use of the "J" word. Obviously it's OK for a fellow Scot to use it but not English

Scotland 2 nil down,

I predict 4-0 Op,

They'll have to play the last 30 minutes VERY well then

Davie wrote:They'll have to play the last 30 minutes VERY well then

Ha ha, Brilliant.
Men and Boys isn't it. I'm going to watch Wheeler Dealers instead.

Even when you are getting taught a footballing lesson by Spain they make it quite painless to watch. A 6-3 defeat over 2 legs against them isn't bad considering just how good they are. They have a completely different mentality to Brits. They just don't pass the ball more than 10-20 yards unless there is a target in space, their players are always moving and showing for the ball. Every player regardless of position has a touch that at it's worst is better than our average touch.

This is taught from a young age and they are coached the same way all through their age groups so that by the time they are nearing the first team they are completely ready for it and slot straight in. The sooner youth coaches start teaching the basics properly the better we'll perform in years to come. If we continue favoring hammer throwers we shall continue to languish in the doldrums as a sporting nation. It's not just Spain, Italy, Germany and the Netherlands all do it too. Englands best players can do this, but they don't have enough of them as Gary Neville pointed out last week.

Well said Redrage

We scored 3 goals over two games against what is recognised as one of the greatest ever international sides.
We have a good young side and a decent manager.
Wait and see.

The Spanish side is certainly good but I really do think this is a very weak international era, very hard to judge between past teams.
There is a fair bit of luck in the groups really, you get an easy group then you get a qualification then you get a better seeding next time round and hopefully an easier group and so it goes on.

Last night's result wasn't a bad effort by the Scots.

I think you've got to add some perspective when comparing yourself to the current Spainish side. It's not much use saying "the spanish pass it like this" and "they're movement is so good". Yes all true but their current side are an outstanding one off. For all this apparent good coaching, they weren't up to much before the current crop.
Germany and Italy too aren't playing any better football than England at the moment, and Holland aren't in good form either.

I do think our players are as good technically as most other countries. For every Xavi we have a Scholes. Don't think for a second if English players, the likes of Rooney and Wilshire, weren't up to it technically that they wouldn't get replaced at their clubs by foreigners who were. They would be, in a heartbeat.

That said, Redrage is right, in that our coaching isn't up to scratch. Since the days of Charles Hughes we've taught our kids that the correct way to play is to get it forward early and play from there. There was a reason for this, in that for a long time this was the best way to play. But no longer, and we haven't adapted. Partly because we have this belief that we invented football and no one can catch us up, let alone overtake.

There's nothing wrong with the quality of our footballers but there is plenty wrong with the way we play

I am not sure any english manager ever realised just how good Scholes was and instead favoured the likes of gerard and lampard. Scholes was never given the respect he should have been with England for reasons I do not understand. He is the best English player since the days of bobby Charlton and yet was often played out of position or not given a prominent enough role. Just look at how spain use xavi and iniesta to such great effect, England could have had that with scholes.

Lampard is a lot better than Gerard however and I could never understand the conundrum of which one to pick.

McLaren wrote:I am not sure any english manager ever realised just how good Scholes was and instead favoured the likes of gerard and lampard. Scholes was never given the respect he should have been with England for reasons I do not understand. He is the best English player since the days of bobby Charlton and yet was often played out of position or not given a prominent enough role. Just look at how spain use xavi and iniesta to such great effect, England could have had that with scholes.

Errrr, Scholes chose to retire from international football and on two separate occasions was the subject of attempts by England to get him to come out of retirement.

How can you possibly suggest his skills were not appreciated?

Scholes does get a lot of smoke blown up his backside. He was an excellent player but he did play for England 50 times and he never played that great that often. He played in a lot of positions for Man Utd, its pretty clear from his autobiography he wasnt that jazzed about playing for England really.

Mac is right
Scholes definitely was not appreciated by England. He may have been asked to come out of retirement but that doesn't mean he was fully appreciated.
He was the best English central midfielder of that era by a distance and whilst he played plenty for England i'd bet most of those were out of position.
He did not play in a lot of positions for United and his book implies he wasn't jazzed about playing left wing for England. Completely understandable.
What a waste

As he and Beckham were the only world class midfielders england had between 1970 and when they came on the scene a team should at least have been built around scholes. Unless a player could take advantage of what scholes could do and help facilitate that at the same time they sould not have been in the team.

Someone should have realised he was the most important player to play for England since Charlton, indeed since scholes retired no one has come along to match him.

MPB, he did play all over for Man Utd, I think he even mentioned recently himself that he had played out wide for Man Utd many times without any problems. As you yourself said, playing out wide doesnt mean you have to be a winger.
If you look at the central midfield at Man Utd from his time, he wasnt getting picked ahead of Ince or Keane and Butt also played a lot of games and he did play central. Even when Veron was there Scholes wasnt playing alongside him in the middle.
Scholes started as a striker and then played in the hole and anywhere up front and only really morphed into a central midfielder as his career progressed.

Digs, i hardly ever remember Scholes playing wide for United.
He and Ince barely overlapped. Ince left in 95 and Scholes barely had his foot in the door then, and as you say was more of a forward early.
When Veron turned up United tried a 3 in midfield with Keane and Scholes. This was a well known failure! It did not push Scholes out wide.
Butt was first reserve to Keane and Scholes and whilst he played a fair share, only when one of those two didn't.

Wide players don't have to be out and out wingers, like Pires who was excellent. But Scholes wasn't one of them. He just wasn't a wide player and was wasted there by England. I don't think that can be challenged to be honest

I think to many of the big teams, spend that much money on buying foreign players, then very little is left to spend on encouraging home grown talent.

Now even good British players cannot get into team squads due foreigners.

This might sound old fashioned but it is true if you want a good national side, you have to stop or restrict foreign nationals in domestic football, to give our younger players a chance.

The English Premier division might be the best in the world, but that is due to the amount of foreigners playing in it, and does nothing to help the national sides

Digs, bear in mind Scholes was the same era as Giggs and Beckham/Ronaldo on the wings for United. Those two wingers played every game and Scholes played every game so if Scholes was wide i don't know how on earth that worked

Scholes and Keane were the first choice CM by the champions league final in 1999 without question. Scholes was 25 then so not that late in his career

I think we were watching different Man Utd sides then MPB as I remember him playing wide in a three or four many times. As you say wide isnt a winger and I dont think Scholes was ever asked to play as a winger a lot for England. He was asked to play a wider midfield role and he didnt really do it that well. Cole played teh same role much better and witha fair bit of success.
I kind of think the link below proves my point as they are Scholes own words.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/england/8627596/Former-Manchester-United-star-Paul-Scholes-insists-England-players-are-too-selfish-to-succeed.html

Digs, areed re wide/wingers. Some players can play wide effectively withut being an out and out winger. Scholes wasn't one of them.

He says in the article "i don't know how many times". That hardly implies regularly. That could be 10 or 15 over a number of years. He definitely did not play there regularly. As per my posts above it just wouldn't have worked with Giggs, Beckham and Scholes was definitley first choice CM by 99

I think we will have to disagree on this one MPB. Its clear from his article he didnt believe playing wide was an issue or new to him, cant really see what else I can say. He certainly did play most of his later career central but that certainly was not always the case.

Money is killing football. All tournaments are all only interested in the bigger teams now, 4th gets you in the Champions League in top leagues and champions of others have to qualify!? Its all weighted to the same teams meaning unless you have a rich benefactor you'll continually struggle to compete. Fifa/Uefa are allowing clubs to spend way beyond their means. They should cap transfer fees and wages. I lose a bit more interest in football every season.

Agree to disagree it is
I am happy to accept that my memory may be wrong but should that be the case, with Giggs and Beckham there as 1st choice wingers I can’t even see the logic of how Scholes would have played any significant proportion of his 466 games out wide. And as I say, there is no doubt he played centre mid in 99.
 
He would say playing left wing was not a problem, but as we’ve agreed, he didn’t do it very well so it must have been a bit of an issue!
 
Of course whether others rate him as highly as I do is only opinion anyway

All depends on how well a system works with the other players in it. Just because Scholes could operate at Man Utd with the payers around him doesnt mean he could work as well doing the same job for England. Messi is a classic example of this.
Maybe England should have built a team around Scholes but they didnt so we will never know how well that would have worked. My own personal view, it wouldnt have changed history much.

Diggers

Scholes may have had the odd spell in a wider left role for Utd but never more than a few games in row and not even every season. He might focus on those small periods because he was displeased with the role but I would imagine it would be less than 5% of his games for utd that he played in that role.

For England he should have been given his favoured position as he was the best player by a long way.

Possibly not but I can't think of a better passer or keeper of the ball available to England at the time than Scholes and this is an area we seriously lacked in.
In that at least 4 of his United colleagues would have been in the team around him I don't think its a wild assumption that Scholes's performances would have been similar for England.
As you say, we'll never know. Which is a shame

MustPuttBetter wrote:

I think you've got to add some perspective when comparing yourself to the current Spainish side. It's not much use saying "the spanish pass it like this" and "they're movement is so good". Yes all true but their current side are an outstanding one off. For all this apparent good coaching, they weren't up to much before the current crop.
Germany and Italy too aren't playing any better football than England at the moment, and Holland aren't in good form either.

I do think our players are as good technically as most other countries. For every Xavi we have a Scholes. Don't think for a second if English players, the likes of Rooney and Wilshire, weren't up to it technically that they wouldn't get replaced at their clubs by foreigners who were. They would be, in a heartbeat.

There's nothing wrong with the quality of our footballers but there is plenty wrong with the way we play

I don't quit go along with these points, the sides you mention are all regularly among the best in the world. They have their lulls, but each has been in a major final in the last 3 or 4 major championships. They consistently produce fantastic players of exceptional technical ability.

I think you mean For every Xavi there is an Iniesta, a Fabregas, A Silva, an Alcantara and every now and then there England produce a Scholes. This is exactly why the Premier League is full of foreigners. Players like Wilshere come through at Barca every year or two, Gaurdiola said so himself. They are every generation in the UK, because we don't coach them into players from childhood the way the best nations do.

It has taken Spain a long time to get this good, they underachieved for many a year but it is paying off handsomely now and they seem to have a raft of young players coming through who can fill the shoes of their predecessors. Even England struggle for depth, I think we can agree that the coaching is at the root of this.

For all Scholes' talents he was worse than Boris Johnson at tackling:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWIUp19bBoA

Redrage, I do agree that our coaching is a problem.
 
What I’m saying is there is nothing wrong with the players we produce. All those Spanish lads you names are current generation and the current generation is an outstanding one off. For each of those I could offer you Gerrard, Lampard, Wilshire, Scholes and so on. Players of equally good technique. The difference is the style of play. Back to coaching.
 
England have produced good players a plenty. As many as Spain if not more.
 
Guardiola may come out with something like that about Barca but current generation aside, name me some of the others that have come out every year or two?? Are you telling me that United, West Ham, Liverpool haven’t regularly produced quality English players? Of course they have.
 
I’m not disagreeing that we’re behind the times in style of play and coaching. I’m disagreeing with the notion that English players have poor technique. I don’t think that’s true

Enough of the Scholes love in. Although a decent player there are 3 major black marks in his career:

1. An inability to tackle, actually he was a liability with his reckless lunges.

2. Turning his back on England, at a stage when he still had a lot to offer and would have featured regularly for England.

3. His digraceful hand ball goal in a Euro qualifier against Poland in 1999. Disgustingly, the England commentators choose to ignore the blatant cheating. Scholes tried it again in a Champions League game ( 2008 v Zenit St Petersburg I think) and rightly got sent off. Should have been banned and fined by the FA for being a dirty snivelling little cheat.

1. Scholes premier league red cards = 4, Gerrard = 6
He was no more a liability than anyone else

2. Scholes retired from international football at the age of 30. He could have given a bit more but not much!

3. I'd guess you'd condemn Messi too then as he has done this?

These crimes are hardly earth shattering are they. I think on the whole Scholes is considered a better professional than most

I think Mackail-Smith looks like he will be a decent player. He has pace, positional sense, good in the air and he's a big lad.

There was uproar up here when Levien first picked him for the Scots squad, Comments like how low can we go, we have a Peterborough[?] player in the Scotland squad.

Doon the Water wrote:I think Mackail-Smith looks like he will be a decent player. He has pace, positional sense, good in the air and he's a big lad.

There was uproar up here when Levien first picked him for the Scots squad, Comments like how low can we go, we have a Peterborough[?] player in the Scotland squad.

"Looks" like he'll be a decent player? You are aware he's nearer 30 than 25 aren't you? I agree though he's better than any other strikers Scotland have to offer. Then again he was born in Watford has played for England previously and probably needs a map to find Scotland.

We definitely need a "Golfer's view of Football" thread

MustPuttBetter wrote:1. Scholes premier league red cards = 4, Gerrard = 6
He was no more a liability than anyone else

Yes but if you compared the ratio of his red cards relative to the number of tackles made I'm sure it would be interesting. Sadly do not have any stats to back that up. Although Gerrard has a history of flying in, he probably makes more tackles a season than Scholes did over his entire career. To be fair, Benitez was fairly successful in coaching Gerrard out of sliding in needlessly.

MustPuttBetter wrote:
2. Scholes retired from international football at the age of 30. He could have given a bit more but not much!

He still quit early. Look at Beckham and his valid contributions over the last 6 years.

MustPuttBetter wrote:3. I'd guess you'd condemn Messi too then as he has done this?

Yes I would. Scholes had a history of doing it. On more than one occasion he jumped up and punched the ball into the net. Think about it in golf terms - can you imagine how such blatant cheating would be received, even if it secured the Ryder Cup?

Ray

All of those points are your opinions and your entitled to them.
Personally I thought Scholes was a wonderful player and I understood why at the age of 30 he didn't want to be dragged away from his family to play left wing for England anymore. No one moaned about Shearer and he was playing in the correct position!

Henry, Guardiola, Xavi, Zidane and I'm sure a number of others agree with me, all of whom are quoted as saying Scholes was the best player of his generation in his position