Capello's PR war

It started with Beckham. Capello got the hacks so excited about whether Beckham would get to play his 100th game that they lost focus: what kind of job was he doing? Wasn't he, in fact, showing ominous signs of making no structural changes?

Then came the captaincy nonsense. There was clearly no issue about who should be the captain. Either Terry or Ferdinand, the two obvious candidates, would have been fine. It hardly took a rocket scientist to come up with Terry as captain and Ferdinand as vice-captain. So what was all that about? It just kept the hacks off his back. Once again, he was throwing fish to the sharks t keep them distracted.

If they hadn't been so busy with Beckham and the captains, they might have stopped to ask, as the away game with Croatia draws ominously near:



1) Is the defence really world class? We always assume that the England defence is the one solid area of the team, but there isn't a top goalkeeper, Wes Brown and Ashley Cole are troubling and - captain or no captain - while John Terry is brave, strong and superb at Premiership level, all those injuries are taking their toll and he's vulnerable against real class and speed.

2) We're still stuck with the midfield combination -- Gerrard and Lampard -- that has rarely worked and will not work in the future.

3) Who is going to bite the bullet about Beckham? He may manage a few corners and free-kicks, but he's lost his pace and clearly won't be a realistic contender for 2012 so when will Capello find a replacement?

4) Which combination of strikers is going to work in the absence of a fit Owen?

These were the key questions that were exposed during the end of the Sven years and the failure to tackle them did for McLaren. Here we are now, after five matches with Capello, and none of these four questions have been dealt with.

Of course, there are the usual problems with injuries. Hargreaves, Carrick and Owen were unavailable. Neville has not fully recovered from his year out, and may not. The defence, as usual, was left exposed to fast counter-attacks and the speedy Croats will have fun with that.

And Capello can only deal with the cards he's dealt. Owen and Neville may never recover from their injuries to be the players they were. Beckham will never again be the player he was. There is no outstanding English goalkeeper, no outstanding English striker and the Premiership turns increasingly to international talent.

No one blames Capello for these problems (though no one forgave McLaren or Sven for them). But playing 'will he, won't he?' games with the tabloids is not going to answer any of the problems that will throw England into disarray in just a few weeks?