Cronky

Ibe would be a tremendous buy, but I can't believe he'd opt for dropping down a division.

Mason would be a good buy. Certainly an upgrade on Tiote.

Which also begs the question as to whether he was a great captain. He certainly didn't seem to be a unifying presence.

Why? A year or two ago he'd have been in the frame, but one bad season has cost him a lot.

It did look to me that he was made captain only because there wasn't anyone else that could realistically be considered. I can't remember seeing him actually talking on the field, or directing his team mates. There often seemed to be a lack of leadership on the field, which has cost us in the end.

It really is that simple. Too many forrins in the PL. If you want a better national team there's got to be more English players actually playing at the highest level. I can't see that at all. The individual quality of English players has improved because the competition for places at clubs is greater, with the number of good foreign players coming in. Whether it's improved enough, I suppose, is another matter. All round, we're still not technically as sound as other countries. A particular difference is their defenders have more confidence on the ball, and can contribute more in possession. It allows them to function better and more flexibly as teams. 10/15 years ago Germany had the same issue then why did they bother to put so much effort in tackling it? Eng isn't just attracting good players a lot of squads are filled out with average non Eng players which is limiting the chance of youth players coming through. We aren't even discussing key roles in a side. The creative fulcrum of most top PL teams are foreign players. Eng can develop as many pacy wingers as they like but untill they develop midfielders who can come through and play regularly in the PL they haven't a chance on the international stage. "But the Germans don't need so many foreign players. Over the last decade they have invested more than £570m in youth academies, a move that has seen the average age of Bundesliga players in that period fall from 27.1 years to just 25.2 years and given birth to a generation of players that, as the World Cup showed all too clearly, know each other's games inside out. "It's our youth academies that continuously provide the talents that make the Bundesliga and the national team so exciting and attractive," adds the DFL's Christian Seifert. "Our clubs invest €100m (£80m) in these academies and are rewarded with a sustainable basis of excellent homegrown players." Crucially, these homegrown players have far more opportunity of playing in their national league than their counterparts in England, where just 37 per cent of players in the Premier League are eligible to play for the national side. In the top tier of the Bundesliga it's 57 per cent. It's another reason that Germany performs so consistently at international level, as Christian Seifert explains. " Even the 37% is misleading because although they may be eligible how many of them are playing regularly? The more you look into it the worse it gets sadly. German footballers have been technically better than ours for decades. That didn't begin with their new development programme. I've no doubt that their programme has been successful, and if possible we should copy them and hopefully receive the same boost. But somehow making it easier for English players to get into their teams isn't the answer. Competition raises standards. I mean, if only 10% of Premiership players were English, the pool wouldn't be big enough. But 32% should be fine.

I'm going by the evidence of my own eyes. He looked slow, and as a player who isn't the quickest anyway, he can't afford to lose what pace he has. But you do have a point. He's suffered some significant injuries in his short career and maybe that's taken its toll. I hope not, because he's a major talent.

It really is that simple. Too many forrins in the PL. If you want a better national team there's got to be more English players actually playing at the highest level. I can't see that at all. The individual quality of English players has improved because the competition for places at clubs is greater, with the number of good foreign players coming in. Whether it's improved enough, I suppose, is another matter. All round, we're still not technically as sound as other countries. A particular difference is their defenders have more confidence on the ball, and can contribute more in possession. It allows them to function better and more flexibly as teams.

On reflection, one major thing that we failed to do last night is get the ball in to players between the opposition back four and midfield. It's something that we've got better at over the last couple of years, but last night it didn't happen. That may be down to the way Iceland defended. Roy seemed to anticipate the problem by picking Sterling and Sturridge to get round the back of them. Trouble was, neither played with enough skill or confidence to do that. It was only when Rashford came on that we opened them up. Lallana is the player who gets our short passing game together, and I'd have picked him. We've also been unfortunate that, looking at our other skilful midfield players, Wilshere looks unfit and Barkley is out of form. But at the end of the day, we're not the first team that has failed to work out how to beat this Iceland team.

The players looked inhibited and slow. Rashford was the only one who looked confident and willing to go for it.

This has been a bad week.

We don't look like scoring.

Iceland might well tire. An equaliser would relax us, and we should then go on to win.

Neither Sterling nor Sturridge look sure of themselves. Wilshere and Lallana would give us more guile and creativity. We look very ponderous at the moment.

Playing with no intelligence at all. Like Sterling.

Yeah, the plan's not working. We need players with better technique out there ie Wilshere and Lallana.

I think Roy saw the difficulty that we had in breaking Slovakia down, and Iceland are going to defend in a similar way. So Vardy is out because there won't be space for him to run into, Sterling is in because he'll have the pace to beat a defender out wide, and Kane is in because we could do with a strong physical presence against that team. Lallana is unlucky. He seems to make everyone play that bit better.

Not with 4-4-2 and two wingers we won't. Others teams will be able to read us like a book.

The squad is big game naive. Not sure how much that matters however. Nearly every player of Beckham's generation would win European competitions and appear in multiple finals at club level then look naive for England. In this whole squad only Rooney and Joe Hart have been in CL semi finals or better. The Germans I watched the game with were saying that these have been the best overall Eng performances they have seen for ages and that I was being too critical. I'd agree in the sense that this England team is far more comfortable on the ball as a unit than any other that I've seen.

Over the course of the game, I'm sure that we missed out on at least half a dozen free kicks by trying to stay on our feet or not going over with that just-been-shot attitude. I do think that young players on the continent are taught techniques for buying free kicks. NB y'all - I'm not talking about going over when you haven't been touched. I'm talking about taking the contact and making sure it looks like a foul.

I'm pretty sure the starting eleven for the next game will be the one that started the second half against Wales. None of the players coming in made a decent case for inclusion. So at least we have a settled side now, and a set pattern of play. Clyne did well in the first half against a poor full back, but overall I felt we missed Walker and Rose. Those two have really improved this season.

Not sure the goal last week helped his game. Its fine to drop off every now and again, but our best chances were vardys knock on to him that was blocked & the ball over the top to him. If you have two in there, the cbs will be stretched. Instead as we were struggling to put in incisive passes, he kept dropping out of the box & was putting in crosses to Bertrand at one point. Not what you want from a striker consistantly. At times, it looked like he didn't want to go for a 50-50 challenge. I don't think he's afraid of getting hurt, more like his ego doesn't fancy the prospect of losing out and looking (in his head) a bit silly. He's a poser.

Should have won, but the attack was often a bit slow and deliberate, and by the time a shooting opportunity came up, the opposition was well set to get a block in. Hopefully we'll find more space playing against a team that's prepared to attack more. I think the problem with Sturridge is that whilst he's good, he's not as good as he thinks he is. Occasionally aspiration and ability meet in the middle and we get something, but a lot of the time he either loses possession or misses an obvious pass by looking for something marvellous. He must be very difficult to play with because you never know when he's going to give you the ball.

The full backs look a bit nervous in defence, but providing we don't get silly and throw too many men forward, it's hard to see Slovakia scoring. Sturridge just hasn't matured as a player. He froze for the first 20 minutes and didn't get involved. Once he relaxed, he did better, but his decision-making is erratic. He does have ability but he sometimes acts like he's one of the world's best and tries something that's too difficult. I'm a big fan of Wilshere, and I hate to say it, but his lack of fitness is showing.

Sturridge just isn't in it at the moment. He looks very nervous.