Paul Merson has told Roy Hodgson not to start Harry Kane up front on his own in Italy.
Quite right !
Merson says that could set the lad back three years.
Merse never let England down because he was good enough to play on his own and invent the game from moment to moment.
He’s seen a lot of centre forwards come and go.
Hodgson likes Fabian Delph, and so do I.
But he’s no Paul Ince, that’s for sure.
Delph is a tempo player, like Jordan Henderson, but it’s very, very hard to find a balance between pressing and possession against an Italy, a Spain , a France,.
That’s why Ian Wright and Michael Owen often struggled at national level: they lost the ball far too much.
Wenger was asked a question in French by a reporter from L’Equipe and he replied in French and his reply was printed in French yesterday.
He was answering the following question: “Arsenal hasn’t gone past the round of 16 for 5 years. Does this bother you?”
His full answer: “Yes, but we were sometimes beaten by teams which went to the final. Perhaps it’d be better if we didn’t go past the group phase and played the Europa League instead, if [the end result] is to be kicked out of [the Champions League] at once. We’d have more chances to win it. Now, more than anything, we hope to surf on that positive wave until the end of the season.”
( Translation by Philippe Auclair, who says it was a tongue-in-cheek answer. Fairly flippant. So that’s that sorted out. Thanks, Philippe.)