Not a great fan of Graeme Souness, but he makes some very thought provoking noises in the following clips from his pundits position on RTE Television in Ireland.
He even goes on to suggest he has inside information that he is not prepared to discuss regarding the monumental error made by the England medical staff in preparing for altitude.
In a nutshell, Souness believes that England will be at their lowest physical point come the time of the Slovenia game, rendering them useless.
He does speak from experience, considering he played at a World Cup held at altitude in Mexico.
See what you think….
OMFG that is mental, we are out.
it makes sense in a way, i’m searching out more sources to back up his claims on google, but souness is not the type to make such wild allegations!
lets just hope slovenia lose their bottle.
Fascinating find String. I wonder if it will be picked up by the British media.
What price are Slovenia to win?
thanks RL
I am sure they will use this after the event.
Slovenia are best priced 7/1 to win the match with the draw being 7/2.
Like the draw price myself, can easily envisage another 0-0.
Draw will see Slovenia through and England out.
what excuse next time?
jab, we are not looking for excuses, just explanations of why these players, who all perform so well at the highest club leve, in CL etc, cannot reproduce anywhere close to that form on the world cup stage.
this theory from souness holds much thought provoking weight, for me anyway.
stringhawke they are not as good as you think this is the truth you can believ or no.
Jesus jab piss off. Ur startin to get on my nerves and he is Scottish this is not our excuse. Please use another blog ya brazil nut you
And brazil have never thrashed us just only beat us FACT
Souness and Brady seems like a better panel than most of what we get offered over here.
RTE also have John Giles and Eamon Dunphyalong with Didi Hamman.They are all excellent, but it’ds probably easier for them to be objective about games. If the BBC orITV pundits speak out of turn they can be acccused of disloyalty etc. On Souness theory, there has to be some truth in it otherwise he wouldn’t dare say it..he hints at knowing more than he is willing to admit.If it’s correct it’s a disaster for England and someone has to pay for it.
what the feck are the BBC up to employing greedybayor, he is totally incoherent with his chat.
and never answers the question asked.
token black african player on the panel as the world cup is on the continent.
surely there was a better option?
A 5 year old would of been a better opion
What you will get with the pundits on RTE is honesty. They are not afraid to tell it like it is, unlike the British equivalent.
goonerpower i make you angry you know the truth you are por football players.
just admit and live nice.
defo john
the RTE panel have a very good level of respect from the wider media aswell.
nice set up.
jab, we get the picture, chill out.
and i hope eboue smacks a 40 yarder in tonight
Souness has a very valid point. It would definitely explain the lethargy in Englands performances so far. Too late to put it right now though. England were not going to win this World Cup anyhow, but it is a pity that their preperations seem to have made absolutely sure of that fact.
fair play for those links stringfellow
that makes huge sense to me
they did look totally fried throughout both games
jesus, means our world cup is very nearly over.
thats my thinking too jay.
makes so much sense.
i wonder who the mole in the england set up is that gave souness the heads up.
brazil 2 cote divore 0
kaka to be best player with goal
could be another tight game for both sides, ivory coast cannot afford a defeat, and brazil can get through with a draw.
0-0 not out of the question or a sneaky 1-0 for either side.
Another very good, inventive, out of the usual blog norm, post, Mr Hawke.
Souness certainly makes some wonderful points, his views are backed up by most in the medical world, as you did, I also have googled his suggestions.
Makes for some incredible learning, the advisor’s to the team have royally mucked up.
However if they do scrape past Slovenia, the Souness theory suggests they will get fitter and sharper as they progress.
Interesting times ahead, thanks again for the heads up.
I have a great dislike for Souness.But his claim does makes sense.
The main problems with ENGLAND is the coah play wrong line up .
i would like to line up as below
James
Caragger
Terry
King
Cole
Lampard
Gerrad
Cole
Ashley young
Rooney / Defoe
This is the line up should be played by the coah
if not ENGLAND will be bye bye this worlds cup
believe me i m england fans very frust with line up after 2 match
like idiot
tonight is the time the one show who is the real god.Our choosen one will bring a message of doom to the brazilian
All hail Eboue
Eboueeeee hohohohooo
Eboueee hohohohoooo
he come from africa
he is better than Kaka
Look at Souness managerial track record – he is not a man to be trusted when it comes to football.
souness is a decent manager admin but he fell out with too many people with his big mouth and his ego.And he is not my cup of tea either
Talib-I think you’ll find Ashley Young missed the plane!
Anybody else heard about fisticuffs between Rooney and JT this evening?
Bloody good show, if true.
ow noo.this is getting worse..this lot are becoming a laughing stock if true..surely do not deserve t represent the country do they..also HWAK do you feel the captaincy issue might be coming to boil..I mean once it was taken away from Terry may be few others like Lmapard Rooney wanted it too and not getting it affected their ego as well Terry’s press conference I thought was a bit strange ..saying everything he said seem to be putting the blame straight at the manager and may be his way of having his revenge
Dilshan – totally agree, Terry puts on a nice smiley face for the cameras, but we all now by know that this is not a nice person.
he is the spawn of the devil.
there is a split in the camp with terry leading the souther revolt against his northern contemparies in gerrard, carragher (previous history involving brothers and mothers, google it) and rooney.
bascially the cockneys versus the scouers.
and it all stems from Terry’s undermining both manager and cpatain – not him, but gerrard – he apparently still struts around like the main man.
how much its his defensive cock up that costs us during this world cup?
will just about top off his year.
I done some research om Souness and his altitude theory. His comments are accurate.
“They postulated from this that training at altitude may be so physically stressful that the athletes become exhausted and therefore unable to react positively to the altitude training stimulus.”
Says it all really. No wonder the Enjland players have been so knacjered and scared, they cannot work out out what is going wrong with their bodies The fuck up with England started with their stupid idea to train at altitude Blame the FA not the ageing crocked and frankly piss poor team
The RTE Panel are excellent.
The reaction from the RTE panel just after the USA match. Far better analysis than any of the UK channels.
Part 1
Part 2
Didn’t they prepare at altitude in Austria before flying out to South Africa?
Interesting sure, but we don’t look to Souness for his scientific background.
England aren’t the only team living and training at altitude, it seems almost everyone is, so I don’t think you can explain their relative poor performance on it.
Here’s a piece on the subject form the New York Times, which I think refutes some of his arguments: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/16/sports/soccer/16altitude.html?scp=1&sq=%22world%20cup%22%20%22south%20africa%22&st=cse
Besides, these guys aren’t running around at 5000 meters, 3000 ft doesn’t turn elite athletes into pub leaguers.
nice link, ben.
Don’t want it to sound like I don’t think is completely wrong, there is sense in the way the Americans trained at sea level first to get completely fit, so their bodies don’t have to recover while acclimatizing. And it could help explain why England have looked flat in their first few games.
But I think ultimately any ill effects from the altitude can’t account completely for England’s lack of form in the first two matches. They arrived early enough to adjust, and they should all still be in incredible shape after finishing their domestic and international club competitions not long ago.
Souness has a strong case. I recall reading an article about the opposing decisions taken by the US and England medical teams about how best to prepare for altitude weeks before the world cup kicked off.
Watching the lethargy in the performances so far has been breathtaking, I have to believe it’s not ’cause they are too rich to care. Watching them try to run against Algheria it was like they were running through soup. Suddenly that all makes sense.
The allegations of a north south divide are probably true also; smacks of way too much ego and way too little in terms of discipline and firm management, despite the lines we are being fed.
Capello still appears not to have fixed the problems of old, which in any case are magnified in a training camp environment.
@ Gerry T
“they also have Giles and Dunphy, they are excellent”
Are you having a laugh? Seriously? They’re the punditry equivalent of the chuckle brothers.
Dunphy who is the most hypocritical analyst in the world
and John ‘in my day’ Giles who offers about as much insight as the average fella down your local.
Blimey, just been checking the stats for the site, we have had around 2000 visitors from the guardian website, so somebody obvously linked this article up there.
then we have had hundreds of liverpool, barsnley, leicster, manure, derby and pompey fans coming over from their club forums.
a big hello, and up the arsenal
Blimey, just been checking the stats for the site, we have had around 2000 visitors from the guardian website, so somebody obvously linked this article up there.
..
congrats mate…..it really is a quality blog! nice one!!
cheers, mike.
This jt/capello affair has nightmare ending written all over it.
What a right royal mess!
I did not check the brevity of jt’s press conference yesterday, astonishing choice of words.
Well done to fabio for his retort tonight.
Surely jt is now dropped?
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Souness was a thug on the pitch and a managerial disaster (outside of Scotland) off it so I wouldn’t listen to too much of what he says.
The main reason for England’s failure is a) Most are simply not technically up to international level and b) the size of the egos flying around the team. They are just a few steps behind a France style meltdown in this respect. The big players bring with them the hatreds, rivalries and salary jealousies to the England camp and they simply can’t operate as a team.
The other problem is Capello. It’s typical of the FA to choose such an uninspiring, defensive, dull and boring manager to save England. Alarm bells should have been ringing the moment he left Walcott out of the squad and refused to play Joe Cole in the first match.
English football is in dire need of grassroots reform. Its soul and foundations have been sold to Sky TV and the Premiership and the situation won’t change until this is recognized by the FA.
Having done a very small amount of research into this theory, i have discovered that both ITALY & SPAIN are also training at altitude like England and have also suffered as a result.
some science to the debate..
http://www.sportsscientists.com/2010/06/altitude-arriving-and-adapting.html
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