We all know the media in this country like to build people up and knock them down as soon as they fail to meet their exacting standards. The thing is with some canny management we really could have won that tournament.
Neville-Ferdinand-Terry-Cole was the best defence in the world in international football by some distance, all of them nailed on starters for clubs making serious annual impacts on the Champions League. Beckham, Gerrard and Lampard all available, the latter two near their peak, Becks still playing regularly for Real Madrid. Hargreaves in the squad, regular for Bayern. You just needed to find a system that wasn't 4-4-2. Ok, we got unlucky with Rooney and Owen being injured in the run up to the tournament but had we not wasted a pick on 17 year old Walcott we could have got away with it. It wasn't a tournament of great quality, Germany were still very much in development, Italy were not vintage winners, Portugal performed no better than us, France spluttered their way along, carried by Zidane in his last hurrah and were very beatable. Sven messed it up I'm afraid, and I say that as someone sympathetic to his time in charge.
