Oy Sven!
January 17, 2006 by Dave Earley
Filed under News
England football manager Sven Goran Eriksson will not be a popular man. News Of the World reports Sven is prepared to walk out on the English team. In great English tabloid tradition, thousands of British pounds were spent tricking Eriksson into meeting with a fake sheikh about employment prospects.
Given the things he’s said about Michael Owen, Rio Ferdinand and especially Wayne Rooney, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he gets turfed out before the World Cup. How could they dump him? He’s five years into an eight-year contract and less than six months out from the World Cup England hopes to seriously challenge for. A lot of Britons could be said to come from a ‘poor’ background, but of Wayne Rooney’s temperament, Sven said:
It is his temper…He’s coming from a poor family, a very rough…
I think the public outcry will be enough to pressure him into at least an offer of resignation, and the FA will itself be none too happy with his reported willingness to walk out on his contract with them.
It’s not like he’s been a great asset to the English team. Their form under his tutelage has not exactly been consistent, comforting or otherwise instilling confidence. Could the team perform without a coach? Every international team has a lot of staff who assist the coach, I’m sure they’d do without Sven.
Take Australia as an example. Guus Hiddink is both coach of a national team and PSV Eindhoven on opposite sides of the globe. In his role as club coach he will miss several Australian games because of Champion’s League commitments. With assistant coach Graham Arnold and other staff, I’m sure the team will do well at the AFC (Asian Football Confederation) Asian Cup without the head coach being present.
For a team like England the loss of the coach is perhaps felt less by players of such a high quality who have played and trained together much more often, and against much better quality, than Australia has been able to. Nonetheless, Australia beat England 3-1 in December 2003, so naturally Sven must be crap and England can do without him.
