Fabian Delph - Signed for Manchester City

[Clampy]

As for Savage, yes he's right, but he'll no doubt come out with some arsey comment about us sometime this season.

[Dante Lavelli]

Thank you Roy! I am very grateful our players are not risked in crappy international football. Wilmots plz take note and drop Benteke, Lukaku is a much better option.

Hopefully Lambert can use it to help motivate our players too.  Not that they seem the type, but one of the challenges this squad faces is maintaining the motivation and commitment when the players feel they've "made it".

[ozzjim]

Quite how Gabby and Delph are being ignored is very odd indeed. Looking at that squad I just end up fearing the sort of display that we would muster in a world cup. Not great is it.

[Big Dick Edwards]

And Andros Townsend?! Ridiculous.

He's probably been Spurs best player so far this season and was very good for QPR at the end of last.

There are plenty more players in this squad more worthy of ridicule than Townsend.

My point is, Andre Townsend shouldn't be anywhere near the England squad, and if he wasn't playing for a glamorous London team, he wouldn't be.

[garyshawsknee]

Not that i really care, but Sterling in the squad ? I know we dont have too much depth, but how he can get the nod ahead of Gabby is a joke. Keeps them fresh for us i suppose. UTV

[Boz]

Woy will be gone within a couple of months when England fail to qualify & he'll deserve it. Never liked the sour faced cnut anyway.

Hodgson only looks a his favourite clubs and players and none are in the Midlands. You have to be in London or the North West or a media favourite, so that rules out Villa players.

[thick_mike]

What worries me is that young promising players may be attracted to our club because they know they will get a chance in the first team (e.g. Okore). If the England manager doesn't recognise the talent of our young English players, then they may be tempted away earlier to a "higher profile" club.

When MON was at villa, his media friends were pushing for the likes of Barry/Milner/Young to be included in England squads. The pressure to move on was less...in fact you could say moving to Man City adversely affected Milner's England career.

Now, Delph may be looking around and thinking "what do I have to do to get an England call up" and his agent might whisper in his ear "move to a higher profile club"

[Dante Lavelli]

Now, Delph may be looking around and thinking "what do I have to do to get an England call up" and his agent might whisper in his ear "move to a higher profile club"

...and the players will hopefully think "hmmm, I'd better start playing better as the higher profile clubs (that I wanted to join anyway) only sign the really good players."

Sorry for being flippant but we can do worse than having players in the squad that have a genuine chance of playing for a top 4 club.  Similarly, hopefully all of them aspire to being that good.

[eamonn]

Maybe Woy's spell at the Hawthorns has coloured his opinion of us.

[Dave]

And Andros Townsend?! Ridiculous.

He's probably been Spurs best player so far this season and was very good for QPR at the end of last.

There are plenty more players in this squad more worthy of ridicule than Townsend.

My point is, Andre Townsend shouldn't be anywhere near the England squad, and if he wasn't playing for a glamorous London team, he wouldn't be.

Why shouldn't he? For the last nine months or so he's been comfortably the best English player in his position. The fact that he's been doing that for QPR and Spurs is irrelevant.

If he were playing as well as he is for a different team and not being picked (like say, Delph) then there's cause for grievance.

Picking players in form is exactly what should be happening and in this particular case it actually is happening.

[ozzjim]

Townsend fair enough, and the original point was more if they have been noticed then why has he not. Looking at Sterling though, who has hardly kicked a ball for Liverpool in months, it just seems odd. I think he makes some very strange decisions, and much of them are media driven personally. He has not been as strong a man as I hoped he might since taking the job.

[Grande Pablo]

Perhaps the way to get noticed is to keep yourself in the FA's minds eye. 

When I was a kid it was always the naughty or slow learners that were whisked off on residential stays & nice trips. 

Sterling & Townsend certainly fall in this bracket with recent misnomers.

[PeterWithesShin]

Townsend is worth of a place, i've been very impressed with him. Some of the other selections though are just plain shit.

Sterling for example. His last 3 league Liverpool appearances:

He played 18 mins v Stoke,
13 mins v us LAST season (yep, back in March)
6 Minutes v Zenit late Feb.

How the fuck does that qualify for an England place?

Then again, he did play the full game against Notts County tonight........

[Dante Lavelli]

I think Sterling is been identified as the "next big thing" so given as much exposure to the England Squad as possible, similar to Walcott way back whenever.

Personally I think this tactic is wrong.  Give him a game in order to prevent Nigeria grabbing him (I think that is who he is also eligible) but he and the other youngsters should be serving their time in the U21.  Germany keep their players in their age groups as long as possible - building a team dynamic - and then promote them in groups. 

I'd have thought Roy would have agreed with the German philosophy as I understood that one of the reasons that Southgate and Roy were appointed was because they bought into the whole idea of rebuilding the structure of English football.  By selecting Sterling, Roy is effectively undermining Southgate.

[PaulTheVillan]

I think Andros Townsend has been very good. Just think it's a little soon, he's not completed 90 minutes for Spurs yet.