England at the 2006 World Cup
England’s ‘Golden Generation’ dominated so much of my early(ish) football following years that it’s weirdly hard to pin down exactly what tournaments this legendary group of players missed out on. 2002 World Cup? No; no team featuring Danny Mills as first choice right back deserves to be called golden. 2004 and 2008 Euros? No; Rooney was too callow in the first and in the second England graciously absented themselves from the tournament so as to allow other countries to have a go (yes, that is what happened and any attempts to say otherwise are nothing but lies and deception). 2010? 2012? 2014? Really, the less said about those the better — albeit that in 2010 the team was really screwed over by a bunch of issues, injury and captaincy related, which were kind of outside of the staff’s control. 2016? I think you’ll find that there was no tournament that year — no, I don’t know why either.
The eagle-eyed of you will have noticed that the tournament I’ve skipped over above is the 2006 World Cup and it’s there that I’ll be focusing on. (Although, as things turned out, if England could’ve fluked a way past Brazil in 2002 they would have been favourites with a semi-final line-up of Turkey, South Korea and a poor Germany.) Looking back, that tournament sticks out as one where England had a cadre of some elite players (backed up by some perfectly fine ones). In that sense they’re about the same as the Italian squad of that time: the only difference being that the Italians had the tactically sophisticated Marcello Lippi whereas England were stuck with Sven-Goran Erikssen, whose respect for senior players and commitment to a 4–4–2 was a drag on England’s chances.
So, in the spirit of not having anything else to do with my days, this is the squad I would’ve taken to the 2006 tournament and how I would’ve had them line up. To keep a level of verisimilitude, I will be taking players’ injury status at the time into account when I pick them.
Goalkeepers
An obvious area of weakness for the team. Paul Robinson was the man in possession at the time and was just coming off a season where he had narrowly missed out on a Champions’ League finish with Tottenham (in, it must be said, hilarious circumstances). In terms of what England wanted from a goalkeeper back then, he was perfectly fine: good in command of his box and a fine enough shot stopper. Quite a lot of his kicks reached the opposition goal too, which is kind of neat. So he’s in as number one.
David James had been the understudy IRL for the past three years too and I don’t have a problem with him carrying on these same duties here (although he might, but that’s a different question). He does have a rick in him, famously, but with goalkeepers I don’t have an awful lot of choice. The same goes with the third choice keeper: IRL it was Scott Carson, the Liverpool understudy on loan at Sheffield Wednesday, who came in after Rob Green got injured in a warm up friendly. I think Green was probably a better keeper at this stage but, you know, it’s a third choice keeper selection so let’s not overthink it.
Fullbacks
An area of clear strength here, at least from the point of view of the first XI. Both Gary Neville and Ashley Cole were coming off injury hit seasons but both were probably still among the foremost full backs of their generation. Easily fitting our modern conceptions of the role — providing both defensive cover and attacking width — they will be key to how I want the team to play.
Backups are slightly more complicated. At right back, there’s part of me that would quite like to pick Glen Johnson for his attacking energy but he only made eight appearances in all competitions for Chelsea so I really can’t justify that. IRL, Eriksson picked Jamie Carragher as a 4th choice centre back/2nd choice right back, which I can see the logic of. But in the system I’ll be using we’re going to put a lot of reliance on the fullbacks in attack and defence and I don’t think Carragher can realistically provide that. Alternatives like Tony Hibbert, Nicky Hunt, Liam Rosenior or Danny Mills don’t exactly inspire confidence either. So I’ve plucked for Gary’s brother. Phil is just coming off a very solid season for Everton, albeit one where he’d mostly been deployed in midfield: I think he’ll provide the necessary energy (not as talented as his brother but as hard working) if called on and is flexible enough to come into the team in a variety of positions if it comes to that.
As a backup left back, my choices really narrow down to either Wayne Bridge, Stephen Warnock or Leighton Baines. Bridge has come back from a bad injury and is probably already past his best by this point but he performed fine enough on loan at Fulham in the second half of the season. Baines offers the kind of energy and attacking intent I want from my fullbacks and is probably the most rawly talented of the three. But in 2006 he’s not played for the full England side yet and only has one season of top flight action under his belt. I’m not averse to bringing along uncapped players but, even in my fantasy world, I’m not sure I can justify that kind of choice. Warnock is, well, Stephen Warnock: he’s been in and out of the Liverpool side all season but he’s played well when he’s been called on and Rafa Benitez has trusted him in some important games. He’s obviously a million miles behind Cole on a technical level but, then again, so was just about every left back in the world around this time. And his hard work could maybe provide a useful facsimile of Cole if needs be. So in he goes.
Centre backs
Three names go in straight off the bat: Rio Ferdinand, Sol Campbell and England’s Brave John Terry. Ferdinand was approaching what would be his imperious best in 2006–10 and, although we don’t quite know this yet, he’s still one of the first names on the team sheet: able to provide all the usual good defender stuff with an added ability to intelligently build play from the back. Campbell was coming off probably the worst season of his career at Arsenal but he still had that perfect combination of technical quality and physical strength that I prize in a centre back. England’s Brave John Terry brings a slightly more rudimentary game to the table but, whatever else you think about him, it’s pointless to deny that at this time he was one of the best defenders in the world. I’d be concerned if I didn’t have a more technically adept player to pair him with but he won’t let me down if called upon.
My self-imposed rules mean that I can’t pick either of Ledley King or Jonathan Woodgate because of injury, which is a shame as there’s a decent chance that both would be in the squad and King would probably be in my first choice pairing with Ferdinand if I could. King apparently did make himself available IRL but Erikssen decided against bringing along a half-fit player and I’m inclined to go along with this view.
Beyond these guys, the obvious name that sticks out is Jamie Carragher, who makes up for his lack of pace with clever positioning and a never say die attitude. My worry is that if we lose one or both of Campbell and Ferdinand then we’re going to be short on technical quality at the back so I briefly consider some other options such as Gareth Southgate, Wes Brown and Anton Ferdinand but I decide not to overthink it and pick Carra as my fourth-choice.
Midfield
This is where the riches really flow: the pearl of the Golden Generation but also the biggest problem. Can Lampard and Gerrard play in the same team? Repeated failures to answer this question in the affirmative is why the Golden Generation imploded and it’s the one I must deal with.
The other thing to note at the beginning is that Paul Scholes won’t make the team because of an eye injury that at the time made him think he was going blind. A huge loss because he absolutely would’ve been in my first team if he was available.
Lampard and Gerrard are without a doubt the first two names in the squad. A lot is going to depend on how I set up the team (more on that below) but, as with Terry, it’s pointless to deny that they were amongst the best players in the world at this time, even if their personalities make that a somewhat tempting thing to do. Lampard’s shuttling and goalscoring threat is going to be a major part of how we play and Gerrard’s chaos agent abilities can be a great asset if harnessed correctly.
I hummed and hawed over whether to include Beckham in this squad. On the one hand, he had a great range of passing, was genuinely popular in the dressing room and is extremely handsome. But on the other hand, he’s coming off a poor season at Real Madrid, is too slow to do what I want him to on the flanks and doesn’t have the match experience in the role to be thrown into playing what I think would’ve been his best position: deep-lying regista. In the end, I decide that it’s just improbable that he would’ve been left out and throw him in.
Completing my consideration of the IRL midfield quartet, Joe Cole presents less of a dilemma than Beckham. A player that his various club and national sides never quite worked out what to do with (with the weird exception of his 2015–16 spell at Coventry, but I digress), Cole has come off another season of being hazed by Jose Mourinho at Chelsea and might be thankful for the slightly more relaxed atmosphere of the England camp. (A sentence that nobody else has ever said…) Despite the bad rap it’s gotten in subsequent years, the wide playmaker role Erikssen deployed him in actually worked quite well and I think I have an idea for how to get the best out of him.
Moving on, the other easy names to put down were Michael Carrick and Owen Hargreaves. Carrick’s excellent range of passing makes him a no-brainer, as does Hargreaves’ tackling. The latter had had an injury-hit season at Bayern but is going to be an important part of how I want to play and I have no doubts about including him. Carrick is similar, although his 2005–06 with Spurs gives a better indication of his abilities.
With six midfielders already in the squad, the rest of the slots are all about building out my options. With that in mind, I plump for the heterodox trio of Stewart Downing, Gareth Barry and Kevin Nolan. Hear me out. Downing is young but his performances in Middlesborough’s run to the UEFA Cup final includes some of the best crossing of that season. Not to mention that his natural left foot offers us something a bit rarer (for an England national team at least) and can provide us with important natural width. In the end it came down to a choice between him, Shaun Wright-Philips and Aaron Lennon for this ‘emergency orthodox winger’ role and I plumped for him because of his more consistent domestic season.
Barry and Nolan are, I admit, some more out there picks but make sense in their squad context. Barry is another example of me not wanting to get caught with my pants down, as his tactical versatility allows him to fill in in defence, full back or on the wing if need be. But his real role will be to back up Hargreaves in the ball winning midfielder role. I also considered Scott Parker for this but Parker’s glandular fever towards the end of the season rules him out.
Nolan is included mainly for his hard work but also because I envision him effectively as the understudy to Lampard in my system. His shuttling ability, as well as his ability to get on the end of knock downs, is something my England squads really value. Without getting all John Bull about it, I think him playing for an unfashionable Bolton Wanderers side really caused people to overlook both how good he was at what he was asked to do but also how high his technical qualities were. He’s not in Lampard’s class, obviously, but I think he can do a passable impersonation if he’s asked. Other players I considered for this role were Nigel Reo-Coker, Jermaine Jenas and Kieran Dyer but I didn’t feel that any of them offer quite the same level of box-to-box coverage I’m looking for.
(As an aside, I do feel bad for Dyer, as I join the long line of managers who didn’t value him as much as they should.)
Forwards
Only one name is an auto-include in this squad: Theo Walcott. Sorry, the ghost of Sven took control of me for a second. I meant, of course, to say Wayne Rooney. Although a metatarsal injury curtailed his season, he was superlative before that: his combination of finishing and creativity really hinting at what we all hoped he’d develop into. I’m going to not play him until our final group game against Sweden to help his recovery (again, more on that below).
For my next slot, I want a goal poacher. The obvious name, I suppose, would be Michael Owen. This is a guy who, after all, won the Ballon d’Or only five years ago and actually had a pretty good goals per minute ratio during his season in Madrid. But he had an injury-hit and underwhelming season for Newcastle and, given I’m already taking a fitness gamble on Rooney, I don’t feel I can burn another slot in the hope that he might roll back the years. Instead I’m going with Jermain Defoe. He’s also been in and out for his club side this season but at least this was because of a rotation policy rather than injury. In theory this might leave him fresh and will at least have got him used to warming the bench and coming on as a supersub. The other players I considered for this role — Darius Vassell, Dean Ashton, Andy Cole and Darren Bent — were all either over the hill or too inexperienced to merit serious consideration. I also considered Andrew Johnson but I don’t want to include a guy who’s played second-tier football domestically in the previous season unless I have too.
That leaves one more slot, which I’ve been holding open for the proverbial ‘Plan B’, by which I mean a big ugly centre forward we can hit direct balls to if and when we need it. IRL, Peter Crouch was selected for this role and, to a point, performed admirably. But I’m less certain. I’m not the first person to observe that — much as Brad Pitt was a character actor trapped in a leading man’s body — Crouch’s height made everyone assume that he was a target man when in fact he was probably best suited to a deep-lying role akin to one Teddy Sheringham had performed a decade previously. (In fairness, Rafa Benitez understood this at Liverpool, deploying him as a technical non-scoring striker that allowed Gerrard to flourish.)
The other obvious choice for this role would be Emile Heskey. Even though he hadn’t played for England since Euro 2004 by this point and had become something of a punchline, he had had a good season doing heroic work up front for Birmingham even as they went down. And his intelligence at making space for other players was seriously underrated at the time. He was very unlucky to play before the advent of sabermetrics in mainstream football discussion as they would’ve made his qualities more obvious.
However, I’m not going with Heskey. Instead, I’m going to pick Kevin Davies. Cut from the same cloth as Heskey, Davies had a marginally better season with Bolton and is also marginally more of a bastard, which we really shouldn’t discount. He also has a good link up with Nolan, which could prove useful on the margins.
So, here’s the squad:
Tactics
As I mentioned above, I plan to not play Rooney for the first two games to give him as long as possible to recover. Indeed, ideally I’d only play him as a sub against Sweden in the last group game. This is good because the primary tactic I want to play with in the knockout games would probably be less useful against teams like Paraguay and Trinidad & Tobago, who defend deep and in numbers. With that in mind, my starting lineup will be a bit different for these first two games than afterwards.
England (4–4–1–1): Robinson; A. Cole, Campbell, Ferdinand, G. Neville; Downing, Hargreaves, Lampard, Beckham; Gerrard; Davies.
It is conventional wisdom that to have a better chance of scoring you should have more forwards in the box to score. This is wrong. If you have more players in the box then even players shooting from good areas have less of a chance of scoring because of the number of players between them and the goal. (This, by the way, is how Burnley consistently outperform their xG conceded.) This formation gets around this by stretching the play laterally. With Cole, Downing, Neville and Beckham all providing good crossing options from wide, we will pin back the opposition wingers (at this time both Paraguay and T&T played a 4–4–2) and force their fullbacks wide to guard against our overloads. Davis will be our focal point in the box, providing a target for knockdowns to Lampard and Gerrard, who I anticipate being our primary goal threats. The former will shuttle up and down the pitch while the latter has more of a free role behind Davies, hopefully getting the best out of both.
Defensively, my trio of Hargeaves, Ferdinand and Campbell all have the intelligence, pace and tackling ability to throttle off counterattacks, as well as the passing range to start new attacks down the flanks when we recover the ball. I also anticipate Joe Cole and/or Defoe coming on as subs later on in the game, especially if we’re chasing.
And, yes, this all really is just me spending a long time saying we’re going to get it wide and hit it into the box for the big man to nodd down to the little man. Hey, I never claimed this would be complicated.
For the final group game and the knockout matches against Ecuador and Portugal, I think a change of approach might be needed. So with that in mind out go Downing, Davies and Beckham and in come Rooney, Joe Cole, Carrick and a change of formation.
England (4–3–2–1): Robinson; A. Cole, Campbell, Ferdinand, G. Neville; Hargreaves, Carrick, Lampard; J. Cole, Gerrard; Rooney.
The basic idea is to create multiple possible overloads across the opposition defence. A lot is going to be asked of Ashley Cole and Neville, who are going to need to cover the flanks both defensively and offensively. As I mentioned when picking the squad, if one or both of them get injured or suspended then this becomes a lot more of a risk but as long as I’ve got them both I’m reasonably confident. While I don’t imagine them crossing as much — at least not as much as in my other formation — their pace and directness will occupy opposition full backs and their pull backs will remain dangerous for my army of late-arriving attacking midfielders.
Rooney starts up front alone but really he’s a false 9, dropping deep and drawing opposition defenders out of position. This will then create space for Joe Cole, Gerrard and Lampard. The former two will start notionally out wide but in reality play more of a free 8 role, dropping into the half spaces between centre backs and fullbacks and exploiting the room that Rooney will create. Cole will be more of a creative playmaker and I anticipate Gerrard being more of a direct goal threat.
Lampard in midfield is the final piece of this attacking puzzle. Alongside Hargreaves and Carrick, I’ve done my best to replicate the Tiago-Makelele-Lampard trio he so flourishes in at Chelsea. He will shuttle up and down the pitch, making late runs into the box effectively in the centre forward space that Rooney will have freed up. Hargreaves and Carrick are key to how we set up defensively, the former with his tackling and the latter with his passing range. In combination with Ferdinand and Campbell (not to mention Neville’s and Cole’s speed on the recovery), they will block off counter attacks and recycle the ball intelligently to attack again. This is the kind of aggressive, front-foot football that allows me to play all my best players and get the best out of them — all the while staying true to England’s mythical ‘football heritage’.
(In this universe I’ve also got Rooney on some kind of sedative so no ball-stamping for him.)
The potential semi final against France raises a new problem, namely the generational talent of Zinedine Zidane and his sudden decision to play well again after a couple of years of not really bothering. With that in mind, we have another slight change of formation and personnel.
England (4–1–3–1–1): Robinson; A. Cole, Campbell, Ferdinand, G. Neville; Barry; Hargreaves, Carrick, Lampard; Gerrard; Rooney.
Basically the idea is that we can continue to play our system in an attacking sense while also focusing on nullifying Zidane. Going forward, Rooney will continue to drop deep and frustrate defences, creating space for Lampard and Gerrard. The latter keeps his place over Joe Cole basically because of the extra chaos agent sparkle he brings. Ashley Cole and Gary Neville will provide the width while Carrick controls the tempo from midfield.
Defensively, my plan is effectively to take out the Pritt Stick and glue Gareth Barry to Zidane. This man-marking job will then, in theory, allow Hargreaves to continue with his normal duties of providing cover to the fullbacks and mopping up opposition attacks. Given that some of France’s ‘lesser’ attacking threats include Thierry Henry, Franck Ribery and Florent Malouda, this is going to be no mean feat. In particular, a lot is going to be demanded of my fullbacks on the counter and I anticipate them being more defensive than in the previous games.
For the final, I would return to my 4–3–2–1 formation. The role of Francesco Totti in Marcelo Lippi’s 4–2–3–1 is a big concern but I think Ferdinand and Campbell will be able to handle that with Hargreaves shielding. This is because I’m not too concerned about the threat of their pivot of Pirlo and Gattuso going forward. Let me explain what that means in more detail. I am obviously very concerned about the possibility of them breaking up my attacks and building their own. What I’m not worried about is either of those two breaking into space vacated if, say, Ferdinand follows Totti deeper for a bit.
What really differentiates my system from the others deployed during this tournament is my aggressive use of Lampard and Gerrard from deep. Hopefully this will occupy Gattuso, giving more space for Carrick to dictate play with his passing. If Gerrard and Lampard get past Ringhio, then all they have to do is outsmart the centre-back pairing of Fabio Cannavaro Marco Materazzi. No problem, right? Well, maybe that is. But in that case we then have Rooney and Joe Cole providing creativity in the half space between midfield and attack. I also think that Ashley Cole and Neville will ask questions of Zambrotta and Grosso, hopefully pinning them back or exploiting the space behind them.
But what about the other way? Our big problem will be Luca Toni’s presence up front, Totti’s creativity and the threat of Camoranesi, Zambrotta and Grosso from the wings. Also, let’s not forget the potential for Iaquinta and Inzaghi to magic up goals from the bench, something I definitely don’t have to the same extent, however much I otherwise like Jermaine Defoe and Kevin Davies. I definitely anticipate there being a danger of us being turned on the flanks on the counter and I think I’m just going to have to bank on the quality of my fullbacks overpowering their’s. It’s possible.
Final Thoughts
Would this squad and tactical setup have won the World Cup? Well in all likelihood no, just based on the fact that most the teams that enter the World Cup don’t win it (eat your heart out Statsbomb). But I think this set up would get around what was the major problem that afflicted the England team from c. 2003–2007. Namely a sense of laziness, an idea that just stuffing the best players on the pitch will get us far enough, whereas the reality of good team building at international level is to identify your best players and exploit what they’re best at. And I appreciate that’s a very (perhaps overly) simple thing to say but it is something which sometimes gets lost in this era of super-coaches and managerial philosophies.
And who were the jewels in the crown of England’s Golden Generation? Unquestionably it was Lampard and Gerrard, the only two players in England’s squad (excepting Ferdinand and Ashley Cole) who could reasonably be discussed as the best players in their position in the world. I appreciate that Gerrard’s reputation has taken something of a nosedive since his retirement, not least because of the impression that modern sabermetrics would probably show him up as not really as good as his highlight reel would suggest. And that’s fair enough up to a point. But there was still an enormous raw talent in there which just needed to be harnessed correctly (witness his stellar 2008–09 season for proof). I don’t think my formation would be the final word in how to use him but it does create a base to free him from as many defensive responsibilities as possible, while keeping him away from people who might get in his way.
Lampard is an altogether different beast: one who, conversely, would probably be held in even higher regard had he lived in the age of advanced stats. Because they were both players identified as ‘AM’ on Football Manager, the impression always was that he and Gerrard offered variations on the same thing, hence both the argument that “one should sit and one should go” or that England should “pick one of them.” In fact, Gerrard was far less tactically disciplined, while Lampard offered less in terms of sheer drive. What Lampard offered was disciplined, hard-working shuttling and an excellent goal return. Again, this system is hardly the final word on how to best deploy Lampard but it does allow him to perform his shuttling runs and, with Rooney playing in a withdrawn role, he will hopefully have ample space to exploit up front. And if he gets tired then hopefully Kevin Nolan will be able to do a passable cover version for half an hour.
One of the things about the 2006 World Cup that made it so fun was that there wasn’t a single outstanding favourite: France were on a slight downward trend; Brazil were tactically dysfunctional; Argentina, Germany and Spain weren’t quite there yet. And the team that did win, Italy, are weirdly like England in many respects: a couple of players who are genuinely among the best in the world — Buffon, Cannavaro, Pirlo, Totti; a few who are very, very good — Gattuso, Materazzi, Zambrotta; and others who were not necessarily legends but had hit the form of their lives — Toni and Grosso.
If we do the same thing to England — some among the greatest in the world (Ferdinand, Ashley Cole, Lampard, Gerrard), some who are very, very good (Rooney, Hargreaves, Campbell) and others hitting great form (Davies, Downing) — then they don’t come out massively different.
But what was different was that Italy were coached by Marcelo Lippi, who was very good at those simple tactical things like identifying what his players’ strengths were and what system best utilised them. Erikssen had his strengths as a coach but while he was with England he evidenced not just a failure to set up the midfield and forward line well but a seeming lack of interest in solving the question. Yes, a knock out tournament like this is to a great extent a matter of luck and, indeed, I’ve not addressed here the squad harmony issues that might be raised by dropping Beckham and England’s Brave John Terry, not to mention the recurrent problems caused in the camp by the infamous WAGs that summer. But maybe with this slightly different squad and tactical setup, England might have been able to push the odds slightly in their favour.
