Club vs Country.

[Gromit]

The club v Country debate in football is back. England play Germany in a friendly on Wednesday, and England players have been dropping like flies. There are some genuine injuries (Joe Hart), but the majority seem to be slackers (Rooney, Lampard et al).

Most will be back playing for their club at the weekend, but do not seem to want to get out of bed for the honour of playing for their country.

Overpaid Prima donnas or is their no honour playing in a pointless friendly?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/robborobson/2008/11 /a_friendly_word_from_fab.html

[R1Geezer]

Disturbingly Gromit I agree 100%.

The "Honour" of pulling on the shirt for England has become a chore for most of them. I once read Sir Stanley Matthew's account of getting his first cap and his description of his emotions at the time and it brought a tear to the eye. If we could engender an ounce of his passion into the overpaid premadonna fa66ots we'd be getting somewhere.

[Quinlad]

This really is a pointless friendly. It comes at the wrong time of the season and it is too long before the next competitive game to be a relevant warm up exercise.

He should have gathered the squad together for a week of tactics and training. There'd be fewer pull-outs and it would remove the pressure of getting a meaningless result, leaving them to work on the things that need addressing.

I don't blame the players if they feign injury. Look at Liverpool. After the last two or three international breaks, Torres has come back injured and has missed 10-14 days each time.

Liverpool are in with a realistic shout of winning the league. Why would Gerrard risk derailing his team's season just to puff his chest out and show off his patriotism? That'd be misplaced loyalty, especially when there's so little to be gained from it.

[Sgt.Rock]

Quinlad, it's pretty obvious that you have no pride in your country whatsoever so patriotism is something you aren't in a position to properly comment on.

[Quinlad]

Oh, why's that?

[ludwig]

It's nothing to do with what Gerrard and Rooney might want, and how proud or not they may be to play for their country.
It's about what Ferguson and Benitez want, neither of whom could give a flying f. about any England matches, friendly or not.

[Sgt.Rock]

Because I've been reading your posts on here for the past few weeks.

[Quinlad]

Which ones, out of interest? Pal?

[Sgt.Rock]

Firstly, please lease don't call me pal, I don't know you and consider it very rude. I'm not trawling through here looking for your postings, I'll point it out to you next time you post anti-British material.

[Quinlad]

I think what's happened is that you've got patriotism muddled up with brainless nationalism.

If the government organised a superfluous England Day Parade, would you go along if it meant missing a job interview?

Pal?

[Sgt.Rock]

Not only anti-British but also extremely rude. I'm interested to know what poisons your mind so much. It is a paradox that you continue to live in a country that you despise so much. Always support for the "oppressed" minorities though haven't you?

Who said I was English by the way? A good tip for you - never assume.

[Quinlad]

You've got yourself in a tizz here, kidda.

I love my country. I couldn't live anywhere else. I love its sense of humour, its diversity, its culture, its tolerance, its history, its multiculturalism. It's the place to be. I love football. And I love the England team. I want nothing more in the world than to see England win the World Cup. Literally.

Getting prissy about a meaningless friendly designed to raise money for the FA and which contributes nothing to our chances of success? No ta. I'll leave that to the angry Lovejoy wannabes and the shouty callers on 606, thanks.

By the way, do you have a view on it?

[Sgt.Rock]

ii couldn't give a toss about the Ingerland football team or their vile racist supporters, who I have witnessed at close hand. However if you were a real supporter you would want them to field their strongest team to give them a better chance of winning.

I'm very interested to know which "minority" group you belong to that has caused your mind to be so twisted though?

[Quinlad]

No. Wrong again.

A real supporter (a proper one, not the ones who developed an interest once Sky got involved) would see that their best chance of winning would be to conduct an intense training and tactics programme for the whole week. Then we might actually win something.

It's a case of looking beyond the friendly against a third-choice German XI, and not getting caught up in the lion imagery, and the rousing music and the WWII sentiment and Danny Dyer reading out the lyrics to Jerusalem - and looking at the bigger picture. That's all.

Sadly, I'm as minority-free as they come. You?

[Sgt.Rock]

"and not getting caught up in the lion imagery, and the rousing music and the WWII sentiment and Danny Dyer reading out the lyrics to Jerusalem"
Why are you so embarrassed by this?

[Quinlad]

Only when people get caught up in it and lose sight of the bigger picture. As I think I just said.

It's that brainlessness I mentioned.

[Octavius]

I don't get the hoo-haw really, why not let some younger underlings shine on the internation stage and earn a cap for playing in the first team? As I understand it, Germany are fielding a few uncapped fledgliings and preserving the 'stars' also.

[nogginthenog]

why bring rooney into the argument he has been out injured and has not played in united's last game when they beat stoke 5-0

1 Edwin Van der Sar
23 Jonathan Evans
15 Nemanja Vidic
3 Patrice Evra
22 John O'Shea
16 Michael Carrick
24 Darren Fletcher
13 Ji-Sung Park
7 Cristiano Ronaldo
32 Carlos Tevez
9 Dimitar Berbatov
Substitutes
12 Ben Foster
21 Rafael
17 Nani
28 Darron Gibson
8 Anderson
26 Manucho
19 Danny Welbeck

[anotheoldgit]

Surprisingly I have to agree to a certain extent with Quinlad over this.

22 overpaid prima-donnas kicking a ball about, as got nothing to do with patriotism or even nationalism.

For those that are interested in the game, I suppose they can gain a certain amount of pride in their country if they beat the opponent.

What I can never understand is why they have to play friendlies? And didn't all friendliness go out of football years ago, even at school boy level?

[Gromit]

nogginthenog

True he wasn't picked against Stoke, but perhaps Fergie guessed he wasn't need. He was not picked for QPR match either, but trained all last week without any apparent injury. Then it was announced on Saturday he would be unavailable on Wednesday.

Darren Fletcher is not available for Scotland either. He was subbed on Saturday (63 minute), but did not hobble off the pitch.