Captainal Punishment

I am going to paint a little picture for any good person reading my blog. This is a magical picture; a fantasy of all football fans. This summer I want you to imagine England winning the European Championships. Banish the pain of Southgate ’96 conquer all Europe and become the incumbent best on the continent. It’s a quite astonishing vision in your head when you close your eyes. Wasteful confetti and overzealous pyrotechnics fill the sky as the player’s parade the trophy around the running track at the Olympic Stadium in Kiev and the opportunity for iconic pictures such as Bobby Moore lifted aloft amongst a sea of heroes, legends of the English game. Bobby Moore the captain, an icon, an established immortal of the game.

This wonderful and poetic moment however, until some point yesterday could have been ruined; because the captain lifting the trophy could have been John Terry. Let’s just establish what the issue would have been with that detail. The man lifting the trophy would be days later sitting in front of a judge for a racially aggravated public order offence. He could even have played in that game at centre back with the older brother of the man he ‘allegedly’ insulted. A man whose captaincy was stripped in order for John Terry to be given the honour to adorn that armband on top of his white shirt for the second time after he had it stripped for sleeping with the partner of a international and club team-mate. He could have been the man to lift that trophy first and proudly do so with that trademark Cheshire smile I have come to hate. This is a scenario that could have genuinely happened and in some peoples mind is a scenario that is in fact acceptable. In this world by the way, this is reality not some crazed, imaginary world where all the rules are backward and people go around doing what they want without consequence.

Innocent until proven guilty is a very fair repost. Currently John Terry has not been convicted of a thing, but failing to prepare is preparing to fail and this scenario above would have been a cataclysmic horror show for the FA. Could you imagine the merry go round of speculation, anger, sympathisers? Sure if it was a claim from some potential money/attention grabbing but this is a complaint for racial abuse against Anton Ferdinand. A premier league footballer whose brother has played a heap of games alongside John Terry; It just smacks of a bad idea and for once the FA have got it right in this respect. Fabio Capello on the other side is struggling for support. He could have been authoritative enough to strip the captaincy of John as soon the situation became apparent. Yet, on the other hand he is just a coach, a very well paid coach but nonetheless a coach. His job is to win games as the coach of this team and he obviously feels John Terry is the best man, attributably, to help him achieve these goals. A social, moral compass doesn’t on the face of it seem applicable to John Terry yet some people would like to see him lead out our country. I personally don’t want to see him in the team at all until he is cleared of all criminal charges. Rio Ferdinand was banned for 8 months and missed the Euros in YEAR for missing a drugs test. Yes it is fair to say drug cheats are an important issue and must be eradicated but Rio was hung out to dry as a very public example of what will happen to anyone else stupid enough or guilty enough to miss a drugs test. Like a head on a mast at the tower of London the FA paraded Rio as their poster boy for their ruthless punishment and that is there right as the association that runs our national game. To not do the same to John Terry smacks of hypocrisy; their hands have been forced to strip his captaincy by external pressure but a more prolific act would have been to strip him of the honour to play for England at all until after he faces the charges.

Is he needed, is he necessary. Is the dressing room such a boys club of old mates playing towel flicks that without JT’S trademark wit and warmth (sense the sarcasm) that without his presence it would fall apart without him. I don’t think so, he divided the team in South Africa with his bizarre mono press conference showed him for the self assured, pompous, arrogant and selfish person he quite obviously is. I also don’t particularly rate him. He goes sideways more than a crab, is out of position more then he’s in it, his marking is questionable and his decision making is often poor.  Ricardo Carvalho carried him during his glory years as the understated star performer of that Chelsea back line and he seems to get away with it in the same way the most overrated footballer of all time Jamie Carragher has been, dining out on one brilliant performance as he stumbled and tripped over the last 5 years of his career.

One thing about John Terry that has been missed however is his passion. Undoubtedly I don’t think there are many players in that dressing room who wearing an England shirt means more to. I think JT will go out play for England and leave absolutely nothing out there and that is a commendable and desirable commodity to be the captain of this country but John has had once chance, maybe even two and a third seems almost unbearable to think about otherwise England could have had a Euro winning captain who would later that same month, would be a convicted racist. Think of the headlines on that?

Quick end thought

Who should replace JT? Gerrard, Lampard and Barry are the obvious candidates and in fact if Stevie G stays fit he must be the favourite and the best choice for the job but a sidewinder, howitzer of a shout is to give the armband to Joe Hart. A potential first teamer for the next decade and potentially the best keeper in the world at the moment would be a good leader for years to come. Goalkeepers can’t be captains? Oliver Kahn, Dino Zoff, Peter Shilton, Iker Casillas. I will stop.