You have to love the guy. How many times over the last three games has Scotty put his body and head on the line, throwing himself in front of shots, taking more hits than Brian Close facing the Windies bowling attack!
There were some glorious moments last night. One when Scotty fell to the ground, the ball a tantalising six inches or so away from his chin, and I swear Scotty was trying to eat it! He flopped forward on his belly like a beached walrus, his arms flapping like fins, his legs kicking forlornly behind.
Then there were the direct hits to the face. I think I counted two last night.
And best of all the glorious moment when Scotty, looking dazed and confused, was given a shove in the back by a team mate and pointed in the direction of the touchline, obviously with the instruction to go out and block yet another attempted cross with his hooter. As Scotty stumbled towards the edge of the box he looked just like his namesake Scott Tracey with his strings hanging limp.
But as heroic as this all is, I have a question. What is Parker bringing to the team beyond being a punch bag? Our play is disjointed with the defence and the attack looking divorced from each other. What creativity there is in midfield is coming from Gerrard and Parker looked lost last night.
And there is another issue. Time and again France, Sweden and the Ukraine have been allowed far too much space in the lines between the back four and the midfield four. Young has been at fault, as the BBC pundits highlighted last night, but far too often Parker and Gerrard have retreated too deep, too quickly, standing on the toes of Terry and Lescott rather than offering a shield in front of them. We paid the price against France, with Gerrard belatedly stepping up and unable to close in time, and better teams will murder us.
Parker has performed better than I expected but sooner or later his head is going to be knocked off. Better marking of space and tracking of runners would, I believe, render a lot of the heroics unnecessary. But that would require football intelligence rather than simple do or die endeavour!
16 comments:
I am inclined to agree with you Hf but one must give him 100% for effort and endeavor, but he does unbalance the team.
Who would you replace Parker with?Young has been a big disappointment for me, not a patch on how he plays in the premiership, definitely looks too lightweight in this competition.
For fuck sake will you just let it go???
from an aussie hammer fan:
england were pieces of shit at the world cup..
now you have topped the group into the knockout stages and playing some decent football..
get behind the team! dont bag scotty he is a legend. let him get hit in the head 50 times a game. good on him .. he a million times better then that useless f wit barry.
Good points all.
He must have about 5 concussions on the go at the moment. That ball to the chin he took near the byline last night looked as if he'd been sniped from the roof of the stadium.
England as a whole were disappointing on the ball, especially Parker and Gerrard, but this wasn't helped that both were being closed down almost immediately by the Ukrainians, making it difficult for them to feed the ball through to Rooney or Welbeck. Also, considering that both of their fullbacks were pushing Milner and Young quite far up the pitch, it was difficult for them to get any fluid play built up going forward. Still that's no excuse given that these are players that should be unlocking midfields and defences such as Ukraine's. I was also disappointed that Walcott wasn't utilised more when he came on as I felt his pace would have disrupted their fairly rigid defence.
Still, good result against the hosts and we've only gone and topped the group. Here's hoping Italy and their mental formations don't d*ck on us too much!
the problem is we don't have anyone better, atleast with parker you get 100% commitment, apart from terry who else would throw their head in the way of everything, our main problem defending is young, he must have asked cole 20 times where he should be and in the end cole had to mark youngs man leaving hge gaps that should have been exploited, problem two is milner just isnt good enough, problem 3 gerrard isn't young enough to get up and down the pitch all day and we NEED him up the pitch leaving a half fit parker to do 4 mens work and we were over run, its that simple
Hoe does he unbalance the team. Total bollocks. He allows Gerrard to get forward and because of that Gerrard I having his best tournament in an England shirt. True, Parker did get turned a few times yesterday and hit the deck on more than one occasion but a few days rest will hopefully let his body recover.
Would Parker get anywhere near the Spanish, German or Italian teams? Not a chance! Their midfielders make much better use of the ball. Scotty limits us when in possession sadly.
kevin in manchester writes
great teams and even good ones are a strange alchemy not necessarily -in fact rarely- made up of the best players available for each position. I think England are playing well; at the top level of any sport the number one 'must' is mental fortitude followed by consistency, Roy has managed to infuse the squad with such qualities and Scotty, for all his faults tabulated ad infinitum on this site, is part of the current success. Yes we could pass the ball better , snuff out danger quicker than we sometimes do and hold the ball better but you have to admit that this team has something of the ' they shall not pass' attitude that has never been seen in any squad we have sent to championships in the past - not even the 66 boys were this stubborn. I'm getting tired of all the negative folk who hanker after some platonic ideal that we will never achieve. As Maggie once said 'Rejoice'!
Kevin in manchester writes again..
Would Parker get near the Italian, German or Spanish team ?No, of course not - neither would Carroll or Milner - but then we do not play and never will play in their respective styles.
Parker is good for the team we have at the moment and how we play. In future I'd like to think we can have a technically better team with the likes of rodwell and wilshere
Doesnt get you out of the bet HF lol
Anony-mouse says,
After the Sweden game you described Parker as a 'revelation' and now just a few days later this.
He didn't play well last night but not many of them did. But importantly for once we have an England team that for is stronger than the sum of its parts, and that can still eke out results when it's not playing well. Parker epitomises this team's qualities that mean that unlike previous tournaments if we have several off the boil players at the same time the team ethic can still see us through. Not unlike West Ham at times last season come to think of it.
His omission from the world cup squad two years ago meant that England lacked a player who could help meld a midfield together and we were left with a collection of talented players who could not perform as a cohesive unit. Parker's omission from that squad looks even more ridiculous now than it did then.
He was Anonymouse - played really well. But reverted to type against the Ukraine and I fear his deficiences will ultimately cost us.
I think your comparison with South Africa is wide of the mark actually. We progressed this time because a goal was disallowed when the ball had clearly crossed the goal line, whereas we crashed out two years ago because a goal two yards over the line was not awarded. Yesterday we beat a very average Ukraine team; two years ago, we came back from two goals down to level against Germany and had we gone in 2-2 at half time, God knows what might have happened.
We were poor against France first game, whereas we outplayed the States and, but for Green's horrendous error, would have won that game.
It has nothing to do with team ethic and a hell of a lot to do with luck and keeper competence. We beat Sweden because of a keeping error, we only drew with the USA because of a keeping error. On such tiny margins are things decided. Yes it was great team spirit to fight back against Sweden, but even greater team spirit to fight back from 2-0 down against Germany.
In truth, France are nout special as Sweden proved, and as they showed in South Africa, so people are going over the top as usual. That sais, we may win the competition because in Rooney, Terry, Gerrard, Cole and Hart we have a spine to match most teams and a stronger spine, actually than Spain.
And Fate is playing her card. Germany against Greece? It's all set up for the Greeks to ram austerity up the Germans' arses isn't it?
Anony-mouse says,
Your'e right to a point- small margins do make all the difference in football.
Parker would not get in the Spain team. He isn't world class. He is a very good player though. And he can play with the likes of Gerrard. Lampard never could. And that's my point really and the difference between this team and the shambles of two years ago. The thin margin that we have in our favour this time is that we are a more together unit rather than a rag-bag of talented individuals who can't come together as a team.
We won't win this tournament. Spain are still too good for anyone else to get near to. But unlike 2010 this team will not disappoint, not leave us with a sense of disappointment or under achievement. The small margins you talk about are the likes of Parker who give something to a team that was previously missing.
And on a minor point we did not progress due to the disallowed goal last night. Even if that had stood we would still have gone through. And please don't tell me that had it stood Ukraine would have gone onto win because none of us can read the future.
England have been doing far better than people give them credit for.
The team's defensive approach has made Joe Hart the busiest goalkeeper of the eight sides left in the tournament, while England have made the most tackles in the tournament (62).
Yet the discipline has been exemplary, with just 30 fouls committed (only Germany have made fewer with 27).
It is the passing stats that most surprise, however: England's passing accuracy is the fourth best in the tournament at 82.6 per cent (only Spain, France and Germany are better), and the team's total of 1,124 passes is better than Portugal's tally and not too far behind Italy (1,317) and Germany (1,553). Spain top that list with 2,289 passes, almost half as many again as second best passers France (1,627).
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