Roy Hodgson announces unbalanced England squad

Yesterday Roy Hodgson announced his England squad for the final two World Cup qualifiers against Montenegro and Poland, and while he did the obvious and backed Joe Hart I was more concerned with the fact that he named only two recognised wide players, Milner and Townsend, and left out Ashley Young.

Granted Young’s form has been patchy, but to name a squad with no cover in the wide areas is surprising to say the least.

When the last squad was announced there was concern about the limited number of striking options, but that was due to injuries this time Hodgson has named just two wide players and too many central midfielders when there were, with the exception of Walcott, no injuries in that area.

He could have picked Young, Lennon or Sterling to provide another option but chose not to, at this level that is an elementary mistake.

Of course all the players selected still have a game at the weekend to get through but based on the squad he’s picked this is the 11 I’d go with in the two games.

Hart

Walker-Cahill-Jagielka-Baines

Gerrard(c)-Carrick

Townsend-Rooney-Milner

Strurridge

Subs:

Forster

Cole

Jones

Barkley

Wilshere

Welbeck

Lambert

I can say with 100% certainty that Hodgson will do something completely different and will most likely start with Lampard and Gerrard even though everyone has known for the best part of 10 years now that playing those two together doesn’t work.

Why can’t England managers seem to understand that? It’s all about picking the best team not the best 11 individuals, but for some reason every England manager has persisted with great ignorance thinking they can solve the problem, well guess what they haven’t and won’t, the only way to sort it is to drop one of them and as Gerrard is captain, and I’m not a fan of Lampard I’d nominate him as the one to make way.

Anyway I’ve a gut feeling we’ll do what we always do in qualifiers and that is just barely do enough and scrape through, and god help us in Rio if what I predict comes to fruition, because if we do make to the World Cup and Hodgson shows the same ineptitude he’s demonstrated by naming an unbalanced squad then we’ll be lucky to make it to the last 16.