MARTIN SAMUEL: England's draw with the USA was NOT a disaster
MARTIN SAMUEL: Don’t panic, most World Cup winners suffer a blunder in the group stage… PLUS, Jamal Musiala was born in Stuttgart and chose Germany over England – so why the fuss?
- There has been too much despondency over England’s 0-0 draw against USA
- Yes the Three Lions were poor, but only three teams have a perfect start in Qatar
- In total, 13 ex-World Cup winners didn’t win all their group games, so don’t panic
- Click here for the latest World Cup 2022 news, fixtures, live action and results
Since 1958, when the four-team World Cup group stage was formalised, how many of the 384 teams involved have endured the short, three-match process without dropping a single point?
Twenty nine. So, just 7.5 per cent of those that have reached a World Cup across 16 editions, including four hosts who played every game at home. And the draws are seeded, too. Chances are there will be one runt, maybe another opponent that is no great shakes.
Spain meeting Germany, as happened in Al Khor on Sunday, is really quite rare. It was by a mile the standout fixture of the first round.
England were poor in their draw against the USA, but dropping points is not a disaster
Meaning the first thing to say is: don’t panic. After just two games, there are only three of 32 teams in this tournament with back-to-back-wins. Yes, England were poor in the second game of their campaign against the United States, but it happens. And, yes, a flying start is better, but the only time England have opened with three wins was in 1982, and they went out in the next round of matches.
So did Brazil, the only other team to take a winning run into stage two that year. In fact, between 1958 and 1994, those that won every game at the group stage accounted for a single world champion and no other finalists. The exception was Brazil, 1970.
Then again, they remain the only team to win every match of a World Cup campaign from qualifying to the final, so it could be argued the signs were already there.
There has been too much despondency from the result – winning all your group games doesn’t always guarantee success in the World Cup
Historically, Brazil are best at groups: six 100 per cent records in 16 World Cups. By contrast, in 1958, 1962 and 1994 there were no teams that did not drop points at the group stage, and just one in 1974 and 1978.
In terms of superpowers, Germany have only won every group game twice in their history, and one of those times was 2006, when they were hosting.
If France defeat Tunisia on Wednesday it will be the first time they have won every group game outside their own country. That year, 1998, was the first time Argentina did it, too – so never with Diego Maradona in the team – and Spain had to wait until 2002.
The Netherlands’ first 100 per cent group record was 2010. So much for total football. Italy have done it twice, once when they were hosting, and not since 1990.
Holland, Colombia, Argentina and Belgium all got maximum points from their groups at the 2014 World Cup. Germany drew one of their games against Ghana and lifted the trophy
We draw from this that the World Cup group stage is a strange beast because there are always complications around injury and fatigue and conserving energy if possible in game three, plus a lot of teams that are highly motivated and stronger than their reputations suggest. The ratios have remained the same across the decades.
When the World Cup was contested by 16 teams across four groups, no more than two nations emerged with spotless records. Now 32 countries play in eight groups that has risen to four. The quartet of immaculate qualifiers first happened in 2006 when Germany, Portugal, Brazil and Spain all won every game at the group stage.
The final that year? Italy versus France. In 2014, the Netherlands, Colombia, Argentina and Belgium all did it. And who won the World Cup? Germany.
This is not to say it does not matter how England played against the United States. A good performance is obviously more desirable.
The negativity because Gareth Southgate’s men are not marching imperiously into the last-16 is extreme. England were not going to win the World Cup by putting six past Iran
Yet the level of despondency because Gareth Southgate’s players are not marching imperiously into the last-16 is extreme. Just as England were not going to win the World Cup by putting six past Iran, all is not lost on the back of two points dropped.
Yet it is the same people that seem to be doing the over-emoting at both ends. Those that sarcastically asked whether England were now going to win the World Cup after game one – no, nobody said that, nobody even thought it, such jingoism is a complete invention – are the same voices who imposed a negative certainty on a goalless draw against a useful American team.
There have been three World Cup winners that played a four-team group stage and won all three games. That means there have been 13 that did not. From this, only a fool would extrapolate England are destined to make it 14. But, equally, it does not foretell disaster. Calm down.
NO SPECIAL TREATMENT, THE GLAZERS’ SALE OF UNITED IS NOT COMPARABLE TO CHELSEA
Duncan Drasdo, chief executive of the Manchester United Supporters’ Trust, wants the Government to take the same interest in the sale of the club that it did in the disposal of Chelsea, to prevent ‘another Glazer’.
Yet, due to the sanctions against oligarchs and acolytes of Vladimir Putin over the war in Ukraine, Chelsea’s was the Government’s company to sell. That is not the case with Manchester United. The Government cannot start seizing assets in an attempt to deliver a football club its perfect owner.
Drasdo said the prospect of another Glazer-style buyer was a concern, yet what does that mean? The Glazers didn’t do anything illegal. They just weren’t very good at football. As a business, they are selling Manchester United for a fabulous price and stand to make significant profits. How can a government interfere in that?
Just because United haven’t won the league lately, just because the club hasn’t been run with great vision and has conceded ground to its rivals, that’s not a case for intervention. That’s business. That’s football.
The Man United Supporters’ Trust want the Government to take interest in the club’s sale in the same way in did with Chelsea to ‘prevent another Glazer’ taking over – but that’s not realistic
Some owners are better than others. So far, the Saudi Arabians look wonderful for Newcastle but human rights advocates will disagree. So who gets to say what model receives a seal of approval? Gary Neville is honest enough to admit he never spoke out against the Glazer takeover as a player because the team was winning. Now it isn’t and he is a critic, but what are the Government meant to do? Approve only owners who are guaranteed to make United a success?
That is not what happened with Chelsea. So far, Todd Boehly has sacked a very talented manager and watched his team slip down the table. He has come up with some strange ideas to revamp English football and spent more money in one transfer window than Roman Abramovich ever did – and perhaps not wisely.
There is no assurance at all that Boehly is a good owner, just as there was no certainty at first that Malcolm Glazer would be a bad one. No club gets or merits a free pass. The Glazers will sell to the best bidder and over the years we shall see if the buyers prove smart custodians.
Nothing comes guaranteed, otherwise the biggest and richest club would win the league every year which, deep down, would seem to be the one regulation Manchester United fans really want.
MUSIALA WAS BORN IN STUTTGART AND CHOSE GERMANY OVER ENGLAND – SO WHY THE FUSS?
Roy Keane said it was nice to see England get a taste of their own medicine with Jamal Musiala turning out for Germany, having played for this country throughout the age groups.
Musiala represented England from Under 15 to Under 21 level before switching. Keane said England similarly took Jack Grealish and Declan Rice from the Republic of Ireland. ‘Don’t get me started on that,’ he added.
Jamal Musiala (right) was born in Germany and picked them as his national team – just as Declan Rice and Jack Grealish snubbed the Republic of Ireland for England
One difference, Musiala is German. He was born in Stuttgart to a German mother and lived in Fulda in west-central Germany until the age of seven. He played for England as a teenager because his family moved there and was on the books at Southampton and Chelsea.
Now to Grealish and Rice. They are English, both of them. They played for Ireland as young men because of their family roots and because the Football Association of Ireland have an aggressive recruiting policy that targets raw young players from similar backgrounds. Old enough to make up their minds, Grealish and Rice went with their country of birth. A European Championship final and a World Cup later it does not seem to have done either much harm.
So a kid who was born in Germany plays for Germany, and two kids born in England play for England. Not sure what Keane’s got to start about there.
BEALE WAS WRONG TO TALK LOYALTY
When Queens Park Rangers manager Michael Beale turned down Wolverhampton Wanderers earlier in the season, he did make a virtue out of his strong sense of fidelity. ‘Integrity is a real big thing for me – and loyalty,’ he said.
‘If those are the things you live by then at times when you are put in a position you have to be strong by them.’ Little more than a month later, he is off to Rangers. And you cannot blame him for that. Rangers is a huge club and Beale knows it, having worked there with Steven Gerrard.
He will think he can do better than Giovanni van Bronckhorst and, if he does, it could be the pathway to a bigger job in England than QPR.
So, when Wolves came calling, why not just say that? Say that the move wasn’t right at the time and leave it there. Beale must have known there was a club that could attract him, but it just wasn’t Wolves.
Nobody is judging him for taking a promotion – but why the speech?
No one begrudges Michael Beale for taking the Rangers job, but he put his foot in it by talking about loyalty after rejecting Wolves last month
ENGLAND PLAYING A BACK FOUR AGAINST FRANCE AND MBAPPE WOULD BE MADNESS
There are many who prefer England with four at the back, including one here. Having said that, watching Kylian Mbappe in his first two matches at this World Cup, anyone believing Gareth Southgate should risk letting him get past the full-back to drive straight at our two centre backs is mad.
Harry Maguire and John Stones did well against the United States, but this is a player on a different level. It is another reason why the draw last Friday was disappointing, because Kyle Walker really needs minutes in a back five before the knockout stages begin and a dead rubber against Wales would have been the perfect opportunity.
The midfield cannot cover a four against Mbappe if England meet France later in the tournament because they will be too busy dealing with the two-footed, two-brained Antoine Griezmann.
England might be a better side with a back four – but play that formation in a possible clash against France and Kylian Mbappe (right) will have a field day against our defence
MEAD’S BLAME GAME SHOWS LACK OF PERSONALITY
Beth Mead is odds-on favourite to win the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Award. This is great for the women’s game but, at the same time, slightly troubling. To promote her book Lioness: My Journey To Glory, Mead recently gave an interview to the Guardian.
In it, she was asked about the noticeable whiteness of the England women’s team and replied that she thought it was mere coincidence and that the suggestions of systemic racism were more an ‘outsider’s perspective’.
This did not go down well and, after the game against Japan, Mead claimed she had been selectively quoted. ‘Don’t believe everything you read,’ she said.
And she may have got away with that, except the journalist whose reputation she was impugning is probably the most respected interviewer in sports media and penned an eloquent and forensic rebuttal.
Beth Mead showed a lack of personality by shifting blame over her interview with the Guardian
He generously laid some of the blame at his own door for introducing the word ‘coincidence’ in his question, but insisted he had used everything Mead said by way of reply, that it was on tape and all who listened had agreed the accuracy of his transcription.
So that is the problem with this award – personality.
The branding makes it more than just the athlete of the year. Mead may well be that, but surely personality involves leadership and the willingness to take responsibility. And on this occasion, Mead was found wanting.
Jill Scott – now that’s personality.
IS UNDERWATER FIND A BOOST FOR VARDY?
Heartening news, for those interested in the truth. Clare Atfield, from Havant in Hampshire, was paddle-boarding near her home when she dropped her Apple iPhone into the sea. Gone for good, you might think, or at the very least damaged beyond repair.
But, no. Some 460 days later it was washed ashore, found by a dog walker on Eastney beach and reunited with its owner. Astonishingly, housed in its plastic cover, it was found to still be working and allowed Clare to retrieve precious photographs and other important information.
This is an incredible breakthrough because it means we may yet get to the bottom of an even greater riddle, namely who it was who leaked all those stories about the Rooney family to the Sun.
Until now, it has been shrouded in mystery due to that unfortunate business where Rebekah Vardy’s agent Caroline Watt accidentally dropped her phone into the North Sea, destroying valuable evidence and leaving behind only tantalisingly vague clues, such as the message to her client stating: ‘It was me.’
But now we know the average iPhone survives underwater much like a submarine, no doubt Rebekah will be trawling the distant seabed for the piece of kit that could restore her tainted reputation. Drums fingers. Sound of wind whistling. Tumbleweed.
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