Seriously Fabio, no Ashley Young?!

Fabio Capello yesterday named his England squad for the friendly against the Czech Republic, but the HUGE surprise for me is the omission of Ashley Young.

By way of punishment to you Fabio, I’ll display a picture of you in your pants! Ha! Take that! He won’t mess with me again, will he?

The full squad is as follows:

GK:
Joe Hart
David James
Paul Robinson

DF:
Rio Ferdinand
John Terry
Glen Johnson
Wayne Bridge
Ashley Cole
Wes Brown
Jonathan Woodgate
Matthew Upson

MF:
Joe Cole
Frank Lampard
Steven Gerrard
Stewart Downing
Gareth Barry
David Bentley
David Beckham
Michael Carrick

FW:
Wayne Rooney
Emile Heskey
Jermain Defoe
Theo Walcott

Gabriel Agbonlahor is also not in the squad, but I’d have to say I agree with that. Gabby is a excellent rising star and could well go on to great things, but he’s not yet ready for international football. But he’s still young and, most importantly, still improving, so I think his day will come.

Curtis Davies is the other absent Villan who has been included by Capello in the past, but his inclusion in the first place surprised everyone (even Davies!). Again, he’s young and working very hard, so his day could well come too.

But Ashley Young’s failure to be included is inexcusable. Am I just too much of a staunch Villa fan or do England managers hate picking our players? How long did it take Gareth Barry to get the recognition he deserved? Far too long, that’s how long. Barry is an exceptional player who completely changes a game single handedly. He’s eventually become part of the furniture, so now the FA’s man has to ignore our other serious candidate.

Ashley Young had a magnificient season for us last season and has continued his great form in pre-season, so a place in the England squad should be rightfully his now. I’m not unrealistic, I don’t expect him to play. But come on, Stewart Downing is better than Ashley Young? I don’t agree.

I’m not knocking Downing (and many other people do, he’s not Mr Popularity for England), I do think he’s a good player for Middlesbrough, but he is eclipsed by Young. He has also failed to make a good impression on his ample chances for the national team.

Crossing: OK maybe this areas a draw, Young can cross a mean ball, but so can Downing.
Creating goalscoring chances: Now this is where Young thrashes Downing (or in fact most players) because Ashley Young creates chance after chance after chance. He can terrify defences, he doesn’t just leg it to the corner flag with his head down, he cuts inside, causes problems and passes the ball very nicely and accurately.
Scoring: About the same, both players get a generous helping of goals from their attacking midfield positions.
Form: Again fairly similar, but I’d probably say that our Ashley just pips it in this category.
Off the ball movement: Same again, Downings good but Youngs better.
Team play: Probably a tie.

As you can see, I’m not saying Downing’s shite and Young is God, I know there isn’t much in it, but I do maintain that Young is the man for the job as the next in line to fill an England flank. When he gets his chance I’m confident he live up to all I’m bigging him up to be.

OK then, fire away with the comments now. Villans get behind me and Middlesbrough fans tell me how little I know about football and that I’m talking out of my arse here.

Category: Misc