Aston Villa’s remarkable unbeaten start to the season is football’s equivalent of Jim Bowen’s ‘look what you could have won’. England fans are ‘smelling the leather’ of Martin O’Neill’s incredible motivational power and technical know-how. Saturday’s draw with Tottenham showed that despite one Colombian’s best efforts, Villa are capable of salvaging a game.
Sadly, the past couple of games suggest the national team has won the infamous “BFH†with McLaren. The FA were after continuity following Eriksson’s departure – presumably, Barwick had hoped he would inherit the Swede’s lucky qualifying wins, rather than his very boring football with no Plan B.
I suppose we did have a Plan B against Croatia, the only problem was, it didn’t work; and we didn’t have a Plan A… or C.
I’m not yet calling for his head, but Bully’s Star Prize is a long way off – I can’t help thinking O’Neill would have given us a better chance.
[Paul Tovey]