The dawn of the 21st century gave birth to a new generation set of England teams that would storm the world with furry in the game of football with a whole lot of star players between 2001 and 2010 to end the long drought of England wait for a FIFA World Cup trophy since 1966 when they won it, it was a period of high hope for English citizen to have a feel of what the FIFA World Cup is once again after four decades.
The Squad
During this period, the premier league club were force t recon with in Europe with clubs like Manchester United, Liverpool, arsenal and Chelsea forming a coalition of big four teams in English premier league and these clubs player were made up of a large chunk of English players at this time. The EPL teams were always in the UEFA semi final Champions league year in year out, outsmarting each other for dominance. So, it was right to say the England team had world star with premier and Champions league experience.
Unfortunately to this collection of stars, things didn’t fall in place for them and could not live up to expectation of the responsibility the England faithful had place on them as they failed to take advantage of their collective talent out outsmart the world.
The English team paraded stars like David Beckham, John Terry, Carragher, Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard, Ferdinand, Wayne Rooney, etc not including schools for not getting a place. The media hype this team received from the English media was equivalent to the bashing they got after every unsuccessful tournament. This was too much to overcome by the players and may have contributed to their abysmal display. This was very evidence in the 2010 FIFA World Cup hosted in South Africa, when the top striker failed to net in during the entire campaign despite being the top scorers during the qualifiers.
Bad Luck
This was Frank Lampard disallowed goal against Germany in 2010 world cup despite the use of goal line technology. Penalty misses was in no small measure hampered the success of the golden age generation. Of course penalty is like lottery where things can go either way but players like Gerrerd and Lampard had proven time without number that they can handle pressure arising from that. In 2004 European Championship, David Beckham missed a few penalties in the game against France and Portugal after a 2-2 draw with the host country and this was repeated in 2006 against Portugal. This was coupled with Rooney being shown red at the quarter finals of the tournament.
Poor managers
During this period l will say that the England team were a bit unfortunate with coaches that managed these players at the senior level. The likes of Sven-Goran Eriksson, Steve McClaren, Fabio Capello did their best but were lacking in one area or the other in their approach to football in using this players.
Club rivalry
There i gain saying that the English premier league remains the most competitive league in the world and this was due courtesy of the way these top stars took responsibility at their club levels to ensure they maintain dominance or at least make the top four. The bond between these players at the club level was far below that at the national level coming amidst allegation of some illicit behaviours of some players against another. Had the players took the national assignment the way they took those of their clubs, the golden age generation could have stun the world.
Conclusion
The golden age generation has come and gone but the wait of England team to get a squad of that magnitude with take decades to assemble once again. However, with the crops of young talents in the England national team if put into proper use in the hands of good coach can achieve the dreams of the golden age in the nearest futures.
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