After yet another early World Cup exit the media post mortem will again draw up the conclusion that they had the players to go all the way, but just couldn't live up to their potential on the field. And no matter what sport you think about, at some point these words could've been applied to the England National team (or players). Tim Hennman in Tennis never won a grand slam and was heavily noted for doing so. In the last 50 years, depite possesing some of the greatest footballers, we have failed to win a Football World Cup. Only recently have we lived up to our potential in cricket, although the one day world cup was a bit of an issue.
After years of watching England go into tournaments with far higher expectaitons that results, it has become very clear that all of them suffer from the same problem. They're all afraid of playing their own way. Sometimes it's not even the players fault, but the sporting associations themselves. After the 90's the Sampras era over Wimbledon was waining, and Britain had themselves the best serve volleyer in the game in the form of Tim Henman. For those of you who remember dear old Tim getting knocked out again and again and are probably pulling a face to the tune of 'as if he was the best', Sampras had said it himself. So this was Britains chance to get a Grand Slam hero for the first time in ages. Instead the All England Club slowed both the courts and the balls down to help baseline play, not exactly what Tim was after. However it was good timing for a little chap called Federer to bring in another era of grass court domination, no chance for Henman anymore. But the governing bodies of sport aren't usually to blame.
Since the start of the Premier League in the 90's it has been heralded as the most competetive top League in the world, with many teams battling for honours and European spots, and very rarely have there been a definite bottom three. There are also more British players in this league than any other, so logic would dictate that England would be regularly challenging at major tournaments. Wrong. Year after year we have all watched England try and play a style of football that we just don't suit, posession football is just not in a English players nature. The fans have demanded fast frantic football with fast wingers and counter-attacks at every opportunity, and the Premier League has provided, but the National team has not. Recently we have started to play more of the football we see week in week out, but watching how other teams play and trying to copy wont work, we just become poorer versions of those teams. Brazil had the samba football their street football upbringing gave birth to, the current Spain and the Netherlands of the past have their 'total football', and in a different way Italy had their stone wall defensive pay, and their players love it because it's the style they want to play, and they get results that way. If we want sucess, we have to play our own way.
The same goes for Rugby. 8 Years ago when Martin Johnson led the English team all the way we had a rock hard defence, a disciplined team, and a well thought out kicking game. Watching the game against France was painful, because we were sloppy, left holes in the defence and the only person willing to put boot to ball was the scrum half, who's box kicks we never won back and didnt gain any ground from. The All Blacks and the Aussies have always goaded us for being a kicking team afraid to take the ball on. But it worked. Our brilliant kicking game allowed us to play most of the match in their territory, and our discipline meant that when the game broke down we usually had more of a chance of leaving their half with 3 points than not. It's great to have line breakers in our team like Tuilangi, but after 6 attempts the French knew what was happening and we got nowhere.
In conclusion, British sport needs to grow a pair and do it's own thing, and not be sucked into whats working for others, every sport would benefit from it.
