YAY, OWEN HARGREAVES!
Owen Hargreaves, Owen Hargreaves!
I've been keeping an eye out for this guy ever since England went out to Portugal in the World Cup this year. (Only in the papers though, I don't watch football--not religiously.) So I was really pleased for him, and with him as well after I read about the England-Greece friendly (a few days ago).
Hargreaves shows why club and country want to build around him
"Hargreaves inherited the former captain's No7 shirt and went on to match the kind of industry Beckham showed the last time Greece visited Old Trafford"
Richard Williams at Old Trafford
Thursday August 17, 2006
The Guardian
Only one man was entitled to pick up last night exactly where he left off in Gelsenkirchen six weeks ago and Owen Hargreaves did not disappoint a nation of recent converts to his cause. In front of a crowd that booed the mere mention of his name back in May England's outstanding player of the World Cup finals received the man of the match award for a performance encapsulating the virtues that now make him probably the team's least dispensable individual.
Once again he chased, tackled, harried and distributed with a speed, alertness and tenacity that should have been allowed to set the standard for the entire squad in Germany. Had he spent the last few years playing for a Premiership club, the England captaincy might have had another credible candidate when Steve McClaren came to choose the successor to David Beckham last week.
Hargreaves inherited the former captain's No7 shirt last night and went on to match the kind of industry Beckham showed the last time Greece visited Old Trafford for a memorable World Cup qualifying match almost five years ago. Like Beckham, Hargreaves appeared to cover every blade of grass between the penalty areas, his example doing much to establish England's high-tempo game.
A pinch of spice was added to his display on this particular pitch by the knowledge that Manchester United are attempting to lure him from Bayern Munich in order to form a central midfield partnership with Michael Carrick. The curious thing is that it has taken so long for a Premiership manager to respond to Hargreaves' frequently expressed desire to move to England. He was a member of Sven-Goran Eriksson's squad from the early days and in Japan four years ago he was fittest member of the group. His maturity and professionalism have never been in doubt. While he was being restricted to cameo appearances as a substitute, usually during England's incoherent performances in friendly matches, he was unable to demonstrate the range of his talents. Once Eriksson finally turned to him in Germany, however, he seized the opportunity.
As the 45,000 spectators produced a spontaneous chorus of the national anthem to start last night's second half, with McClaren's team already four goals to the good, it seemed as though an easy victory might be taken as the excuse for an instant revival of England's dreams of glory. But the excellence of Hargreaves' contribution, and decent displays from two or three others, should not fool anyone into believing that it marks a turning point.
This was supposed to be a meeting of the reigning European champions and the new champions of the world. As with a lot of the Football Association's recent plans, something went missing along the way. But as a first test for McClaren's reshuffled team, Otto Rehhagel's Greeks ought to have offered serious opposition, not least because they are still smarting from their failure to follow up their success in Portugal with qualification for the World Cup finals.
Yet if there was a measure of bite in their early play, it proved to be an illusion. Greece's smothering five-man defence, on which their European triumph was based, might have promised a difficult night for a reshuffled attack, and for a lightweight such as Jermain Defoe in particular, but long before half-time they had presented McClaren with the sort of start for which he must have been praying.
The current flood of inside stories from England's World Cup campaign makes it clear that the senior players were bemused, and in some cases horrified, by Eriksson's decision to include Theo Walcott in the party at Defoe's expense. Last night represented the 23-year-old Tottenham striker's chance to show McClaren what England had missed.
His ability as a pure finisher has often been praised but, as England ran up their four-goal lead, it was in linking the play that he showed his value, making himself available as the midfield men drove forward in search of an outlet and offering a foil to his partner, Peter Crouch.
Greece's defensive system relies on outnumbering their opponents and Defoe knew that even when he managed to outwit his marker, Konstantinos Katsouranis of Benfica, he would encounter a sweeper ready to block his path. As the half developed, however, it became clear that Greece's marking of Crouch was haphazard in the extreme and that a supply of crosses from either flank would bring profit for England.
This was not greatly to Defoe's individual benefit but he kept himself busy by pulling Katsouranis from side to side while making troublesome little runs down the channels and by making sure that he was there to pick up the odds and ends provided by sloppy clearances.
His beautifully weighted through-ball to Frank Lampard provoked the deflected shot that gave England a second goal and it was his persistence in winning possession in the penalty area, and his coolness in playing it back to Stewart Downing, that preceded the confusion which enabled Crouch to force the ball home for the third.
Last night's result will have lifted his spirits, and those of the squad as a whole, but not to the extent that harsher realities can be conveniently avoided. England are not suddenly a great side, or even a good one. In Hargreaves, however, they now have a cornerstone.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Okay, this is totally unrelated, but I just thought of it and told my sister. And, yeah well, I just couldn't resist--football is basically the business of twenty-two men chasing balls.
If you don't get it, I'll help you along--what's a skirt-chaser?
I've been keeping an eye out for this guy ever since England went out to Portugal in the World Cup this year. (Only in the papers though, I don't watch football--not religiously.) So I was really pleased for him, and with him as well after I read about the England-Greece friendly (a few days ago).
Hargreaves shows why club and country want to build around him
"Hargreaves inherited the former captain's No7 shirt and went on to match the kind of industry Beckham showed the last time Greece visited Old Trafford"
Richard Williams at Old Trafford
Thursday August 17, 2006
The Guardian
Only one man was entitled to pick up last night exactly where he left off in Gelsenkirchen six weeks ago and Owen Hargreaves did not disappoint a nation of recent converts to his cause. In front of a crowd that booed the mere mention of his name back in May England's outstanding player of the World Cup finals received the man of the match award for a performance encapsulating the virtues that now make him probably the team's least dispensable individual.
Once again he chased, tackled, harried and distributed with a speed, alertness and tenacity that should have been allowed to set the standard for the entire squad in Germany. Had he spent the last few years playing for a Premiership club, the England captaincy might have had another credible candidate when Steve McClaren came to choose the successor to David Beckham last week.
Hargreaves inherited the former captain's No7 shirt last night and went on to match the kind of industry Beckham showed the last time Greece visited Old Trafford for a memorable World Cup qualifying match almost five years ago. Like Beckham, Hargreaves appeared to cover every blade of grass between the penalty areas, his example doing much to establish England's high-tempo game.
A pinch of spice was added to his display on this particular pitch by the knowledge that Manchester United are attempting to lure him from Bayern Munich in order to form a central midfield partnership with Michael Carrick. The curious thing is that it has taken so long for a Premiership manager to respond to Hargreaves' frequently expressed desire to move to England. He was a member of Sven-Goran Eriksson's squad from the early days and in Japan four years ago he was fittest member of the group. His maturity and professionalism have never been in doubt. While he was being restricted to cameo appearances as a substitute, usually during England's incoherent performances in friendly matches, he was unable to demonstrate the range of his talents. Once Eriksson finally turned to him in Germany, however, he seized the opportunity.
As the 45,000 spectators produced a spontaneous chorus of the national anthem to start last night's second half, with McClaren's team already four goals to the good, it seemed as though an easy victory might be taken as the excuse for an instant revival of England's dreams of glory. But the excellence of Hargreaves' contribution, and decent displays from two or three others, should not fool anyone into believing that it marks a turning point.
This was supposed to be a meeting of the reigning European champions and the new champions of the world. As with a lot of the Football Association's recent plans, something went missing along the way. But as a first test for McClaren's reshuffled team, Otto Rehhagel's Greeks ought to have offered serious opposition, not least because they are still smarting from their failure to follow up their success in Portugal with qualification for the World Cup finals.
Yet if there was a measure of bite in their early play, it proved to be an illusion. Greece's smothering five-man defence, on which their European triumph was based, might have promised a difficult night for a reshuffled attack, and for a lightweight such as Jermain Defoe in particular, but long before half-time they had presented McClaren with the sort of start for which he must have been praying.
The current flood of inside stories from England's World Cup campaign makes it clear that the senior players were bemused, and in some cases horrified, by Eriksson's decision to include Theo Walcott in the party at Defoe's expense. Last night represented the 23-year-old Tottenham striker's chance to show McClaren what England had missed.
His ability as a pure finisher has often been praised but, as England ran up their four-goal lead, it was in linking the play that he showed his value, making himself available as the midfield men drove forward in search of an outlet and offering a foil to his partner, Peter Crouch.
Greece's defensive system relies on outnumbering their opponents and Defoe knew that even when he managed to outwit his marker, Konstantinos Katsouranis of Benfica, he would encounter a sweeper ready to block his path. As the half developed, however, it became clear that Greece's marking of Crouch was haphazard in the extreme and that a supply of crosses from either flank would bring profit for England.
This was not greatly to Defoe's individual benefit but he kept himself busy by pulling Katsouranis from side to side while making troublesome little runs down the channels and by making sure that he was there to pick up the odds and ends provided by sloppy clearances.
His beautifully weighted through-ball to Frank Lampard provoked the deflected shot that gave England a second goal and it was his persistence in winning possession in the penalty area, and his coolness in playing it back to Stewart Downing, that preceded the confusion which enabled Crouch to force the ball home for the third.
Last night's result will have lifted his spirits, and those of the squad as a whole, but not to the extent that harsher realities can be conveniently avoided. England are not suddenly a great side, or even a good one. In Hargreaves, however, they now have a cornerstone.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Okay, this is totally unrelated, but I just thought of it and told my sister. And, yeah well, I just couldn't resist--football is basically the business of twenty-two men chasing balls.
If you don't get it, I'll help you along--what's a skirt-chaser?
posted by fairypenguin at 5:30 AM
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