[jambutty]

I’m not being xenophobic but I take the view that a national football team should be managed by a national of that country.

All it does to bring in a foreign coach to manage our national team is prevent our home grown club managers from attaining a level of expertise needed for International football.

Sven was brought in amidst much trumpeting of his past record but what has he done for the England team? Did we win the World Cup? Did we win the European Cup? Did we even get close? No! No! And thrice no! He wasn’t worth the reported £5,000,000 per year salary.

After the current World Cup our next International competition is the European Cup in two years time and that is plenty of time for a new English manager to blossom. No doubt an Englishman would give his eye teeth to manage our national side and would probably do so for free although £1,000,000 pa on a 2 years contract would help.

Let me take you back to 1966 when Alf Ramsey (who? – manager of Ipswich – now there was a team with European credentials – er not really) took us to International glory.

Steve Maclaren has been assistant coach to Sven for quite some time and is his natural successor and he could well have a European competition cup under his belt with Middlesbro by the time that Sven runs laughing all the way to the bank – a Swiss one probably.

If Steve Maclaren can motivate his team to come back from the jaws of defeat against all the odds, not just once but TWICE, to win two European cup matches then surely those are credentials enough to manage a national side. The Middlesbro players, good as they are, are not the best in the world but their manager motivated them to make supreme efforts and made a few tactical changes. The rest as they say is history and it sort of repeated itself too.

Just a small aside – I thoroughly enjoyed both games.

The FA should take note and appoint Curbishley as his assistant.