Originally published by Ace Magazine Liverpool June 2014.
When supporting England, the feeling between despondency and elation is sometimes so blurred that you can go from one World Cup competition having crashed out in the second round (1982) but feeling optimistic about the future to then getting so close that the air of expectation hangs round every football fan you meet like a bad smell in summer time (1990). There never has been a real mix of consistency, no real so called Golden Generation, except for what the Fleet Street media like to impose upon the thoughts of the fans that for years have doggedly followed the national team exploits (or lack of them).
Perhaps the greatest generation since the great Bobby Moore lifted the Jules Rimett Cup in 1966 involved a core of players that didn’t have the riches of the Premier League thrust upon them. The players whose adulation and scorn came from the terraces in equal measure. Footballers such as Gary Lineker, Peter Shilton, Stuart Pearce, Terry Butcher and Bryan Robson, all great ambassadors of the game and who gave their all for club and country.
When trying to work out who would make your all-time England squad for the World Cup since 1982, an arbitrary date but nonetheless an important one, there are many factors to be drawn upon, perhaps the most important is not the players you would have liked to see in the team, (for myself Joe Corrigan of Manchester City would have played a much bigger part in 1982 than he did and Kevin Keegan, alongside Trevor Brooking in the same finals would have been a shoe-in if not for bad timings of injury.
1982 was the first time England had gone to a World Cup Finals having gone through the necessary business of going through the important task of actually qualifying since 1962. 20 years without even making it of the group stages. Of course England had won the trophy; every school child knows that and everybody under the age of at least 60 has never seen it repeated. So close in 1970, surely England should have at least lost to Brazil in the final with Captain Bobby Moore perhaps playing arguably the best football of his career. In 1974 and 1978, even with the likes of Kevin Keegan, Emlyn Hughes, Ray Clemence, Peter Barnes, Mick Mills, Ray Kennedy, Gerry Francis and Micky Channon in the team, the only way England fans had anything to cheer was hoping that the fantastic Holland sides of those years would defeat West Germany and Argentina.
To choose a team who would wear either the red or white of England with pride and distinction is a brutal task. It is made even more difficult when you impose the criteria that the player must have at least played one full game for England in the seven World Cup Finals they have qualified for since 1982 and of course you must truly believe that is the best team. There is no room for sentimentality when it all boils down to it. With that in mind there is no room for perhaps some of England’s most naturally gifted players such as Glenn Hoddle and the mercurial Paul Gasgoine, there is no room for one of England’s golden strikers in Trevor Francis who played a part in all five England games in 1982 and who to this day still holds the record for appearances by a Manchester City player in a World Cup year with five, something that perhaps Joe Hart can emulate or even beat in Brazil…there is always hope after all.
The team that would represent England if time were not a factor would arguably pick itself but with a twist in the formation that no side has tried since the halcyon days of Manchester City’s Revie Plan era. To have the forward Don Revie, himself a great tactician who unfortunately got it all wrong when taking over as England Manager after doing an unquestionably sterling job as the boss at Leeds, despite Brian Clough once saying they won the league by cheating, confuse opponents by playing just ahead of the back four is something that perhaps would have been employed to great effect if you allow current England Captain Steve Gerard the absolute freedom to play anywhere on the park. To shore up the defence when needed, to burst through and score the goals that he is capable of doing time and time again, Steven Gerard would be the perfect foil to carry off one of the most highly efficient tactics of the period and it would allow other picks in the team such as David Beckham and David Platt the creativity and space to feed main striker Gary Lineker.
Some players pick themselves, even across thirty years. David Beckham, Peter Shilton, Terry Butcher and Gary Lineker would surely be seen as automatic choices in Bobby Robson’s squad. Again the manager unquestionably picks itself as the only English manager to get the team to a World Cup semi-final on foreign soil.
It is though the choice of left back that causes the biggest headache. Between the determined Stuart Pearce and the gifted Kenny Sansom they have over 160 international caps between them, to choose is a near impossibility and arguably no England left back, not even Chelsea’s Ashley Cole, himself a measured and controlled footballer, can touch them for their placement on the ball or their sheer endeavour on the pitch.
In the end Stuart Pearce gets the nod with Kenny Sansom bowing out gracefully to the subs bench. The decision in the end coming down to grit, who would be able to gee up every single player on the pitch, even the unflappable Gary Lineker, who would be able to back Terry Butcher up as captain better when the chips were down as they were in Mexico 86 when the whole world and its wife saw Diego Maradona score the most dubious of goals in a match that England didn’t deserve to lose in the manner that they did. If Stuart Pearce had been playing in that game, it is doubtful that Maradona would have been on the pitch long enough to get the second of his goals that day, or Stuart Pearce would have been sent off in the attempt. On sheer guts, Stuart Pearce gets the nod.
There is no doubt that England have had many great footballers who, in modern parlance deserve to have been part of a World Cup winning side. Nicky Butt, described by Pele as the best player in the 2002 tournament, Bryan Robson, England’s Captain Marvel who put his body on the line more times than you could ever want him too and who turned England’s World Cup possible nightmare in 82 against a very good French side into one of joy after 27 seconds and of course Michael Owen, the young goal scorer who announced himself on the world scene in one blistering piece of attack against Argentina, all worthy of making the team but for the ones infront of them.
In a special case, the inclusion of Trevor Brooking, the man who had delivered West Ham United the F.A. Cup in 1980 and promotion to Division One, would be included in the squad. In a country that has developed and nurtured such talent as Paul Gasgoine, Glenn Hoddle, Steve Coppell and David Beckham, Sir Trevor Brooking was perhaps, alongside Kevin keegan, the most unfortunate player to have gone to a World Cup and due to injury only playing the barest of minutes in the final game of England’s tournament. His steadiness on the ball and an eye for detail would have seen him included in the squad, even if it was only as another pair of eyes for Manager Bobby Robson to use to the squad’s advantage.
Watching England is like sitting in a new barbers, you truly never know how it’s going to turn out. The enjoyment but heroic fall out of 1982, 1990 and 2002, the disgrace of 2010, the shame of 1998, the bitterness of 1986 and the non-entity of 1994 where had we qualified would have more than matched the shambles that would be inflicted upon the team in 2010, the roller coaster ride of World Cup Finals is upon us again, will anyone from 2014 make it into the squad of the best from the last thirty years, possibly not but there is at least cause to dream.
England Squad: 1982-2010.
1. Peter Shilton (1982, 86, 90)
2. Gary Stevens (1982) 4. Sol Campbell (1998, 2002, 2006) 5. Terry Butcher(Captain) (1986, 90) 3. Stuart Pearce (1990) 11. Steven Gerard (2006, 10) 8. Ray Wilkins (1982, 86) 7. David Beckham (1998, 02, 06) 6. Steve Coppell (1982) 10. David Platt (1990) 11. Gary Lineker (1986, 90)
Subs:
Michael Owen (1998, 2002, 2006)
Bryan Robson (1982, 1986, 1990)
Kenny Sansom (1982, 1986)
David Seaman (1998, 2002)
Nicky Butt (2002)
Special case: Trevor Brooking (1 substitute appearance in final game in 1982)
Manager: Bobby Robson