The worries of English football

One morning in 2009, after England U21s' crushing 4-0 defeat to Germany U21s in the European Cup final, FA Technical Director Sir Trevor Brooking sat silently in a hotel in Malmo, Sweden. Amid the debris of that defeat, he raised a seemingly small but systemic problem: "We are not producing players like Mesut Ozil."

Of course, Germany had more than just Ozil. They also had Neuer, Boateng, Hummels, Howedes, Khedira - names that later became pillars of the 2014 World Cup winning journey. But Ozil at that time was a symbol of football with technique, sophistication and distinction - something that English football had hardly produced for many years.

Ozil was once the nightmare of English football.

Ambitious but incomplete plan

Sir Trevor Brooking loves Ozil's football - clever, graceful, creative and hard to predict. And he believes that unless English football changes its youth system, it will never produce players like him.

From there, the FA embarked on the Elite Player Performance Plan (EPPP) - a project to gather the best young talents in the most modern academies. Combined with the world-class training center St George's Park, English football hopes to produce a generation of elite players.

And there are some promising names. Phil Foden, Mason Mount, Bukayo Saka, Kobbie Mainoo, Rico Lewis and Myles Lewis-Skelly and Ethan Nwaneri have all emerged recently. They are all technical, skilful players who can play in multiple positions, move between the lines and hold the ball in tight spaces, similar to Ozil, but still the "missing" version.

Despite having plenty of quality attacking midfielders and full-backs, England are sorely lacking in key central positions. They lack centre-backs, defensive midfielders, strikers and goalkeepers. These are roles that require character, experience and exposure – something that many young players today are not getting the chance to gain.

They don’t get enough competitive football from the age of 18 to 21. Big clubs prefer foreign players, while lower-league teams shy away from academy talent who are used to playing “clean football” on perfect grass in their training grounds.

Declan Rice was released by Chelsea and Jude Bellingham moved to Germany very early. Ezri Konsa and Dan Burn, the central defenders who started against Albania on 22 March, started their careers in the lower leagues. This is a testament to the difficulty in developing "backbone" positions in England.

England's goalkeeper position is considered not as good as the world's top teams.

A training ecosystem out of sync with real-world needs

"In the centre-back position, England don't have many top players," Fabio Capello commented in an interview with Mail Sport . "And their goalkeeper is just average."

With the advent of EPPP, big clubs gathered the best players at the age of 15-16, but did not give them enough time to play professionally. Without real competition, many names that were considered "natural talents" gradually lost their will, drifted away and disappeared from the football map.

In addition, the style of play in the Premier League is very different to the rest of English football. Teams in League One and League Two do not easily use goalkeepers and defenders who are trained to "pass the ball into the penalty area". Instead, they often tackle and clear the ball decisively.

Sporadic success and standout individuals like Lewis-Skelly cannot mask the deep problems within English football’s talent development system, which remains riddled with gaps and lacking a sustainable development strategy.

It is time to ask ourselves what kind of football England is training its players for, and whether they are creating enough conditions for them to grow up. If they cannot solve the problem of “backbone formation”, England can continue to produce good players, but lack the foundation to win the championship. And Ozil, in a way, is still a shadow that they have not been able to reach.

Ozil's best moments at Real Madrid Real Madrid's homepage has just shared Mesut Ozil's most impressive moments in Spain after the German midfielder announced his retirement on March 22.

Source: https://znews.vn/noi-tran-tro-cua-bong-da-anh-post1540542.html