The small matter of who is going be next England manager is being discussed the length and breadth of the country so I figured I would give my 50 cents on the subject.

I have never been that much of an admirer of Sven and his actions since he has been in the job have not impressed me one bit. His talks with Chelsea were an absolute disgrace and his subsequent affairs have diverted attention away from the main failings of his term, which for me have been his tactical incompetence in crucial games.

Most notably the games against Brazil in 2002 and France and then Portugal in 2004, taking the Brazil game first. England went one nil up and looked comfortable until a lack of concentration in defence allowed Brazil to equalise just before half time, and then go ahead though a fluke goal from Ronaldinho who then got himself sent off in a rather calamitous fashion. After this England had the numerical advantage to go all out and attack a Brazilian defence that is clearly not their strongest area. Yet for some reason we did not create a single worthwhile attempt on goal after the Ronaldinho dismissal.

Eriksson has since claimed that he felt that players were fatigued after a long season, during which they did not have a break. Could it not have anything to do with Eriksson insistence on picking a clearly unfit David Beckham, which meant England were not at their attacking best? Moving onto the France and Portugal games, Eriksson tactical failings were again evident. Against France, England opened the scoring and looked a superb team who could score at any time, but then something changed and we retreated and defended deeper and deeper allowing France to take control of the game and eventually go on to win the game. Of course England did have chances to wrap up the win against France long before France could have got back into the game, the penalty miss being the obvious one. Against Portugal, though this was not the case after going one up against the host nation and seeing Wayne Rooney depart, England had no attacking ability whatsoever. Sven looked as jaded as his players and once again the excuse of fatigue was used.

Despite this, I do actually believe that England have an excellent chance of winning the World Cup. We now posses a core of world class players, in Lampard, Gerrard, Owen and Rooney. Our defence however is clearly the weakest link, only Terry, Carragher and King are in any sort of form amongst the main central defenders, but Eriksson seems reluctant to play King or Carragher ahead of Ferdinand.

Moving onto who should succeed Sven Goran Eriksson, I feel, that despite my criticism of Sven, another foreign coach should not be ruled out.

Looking at the main contenders we have seen the following managers named mentioned.

Sam Allardyce is the favourite amongst the bookies, but I feel that his style of football is not attractive enough for the England job. Do we really want to see England turned into an effective yet dull team? Would Kevin Davies be drafted into the team? I hope not.

Alan Curbishley, for me, does not have the right credentials for the job. Whilst he has done a brilliant job at Charlton and established them as a Premiership team, does no else feel that the frequent blips in form that Charlton go through each season after they achieve their goal of safety suggest that Curbs not have the necessary motivational skills?

Steve Bruce is another Englishman linked with the job but surely his record of walking out on clubs in times of trouble should rule him out.

Martin O