Ferdinand confirms what we all thought. How refreshing!

I am writing this piece before England’s game in Belarus and therefore realise that if England have been beaten, one of the main points of the article will have blown up in my face!

Chuffed

I was absolutely chuffed to read about how honest stand-in captain Rio Ferdinand has been about the whole England set-up before Fabio Capello arrived. He has voiced what so many fans and journalists have said over the past few years and to hear it coming from a player is utterly refreshing.

Ferdinand has said that he believes, as do so many of us, that the 2006 World Cup campaign, which stuttered and stumbled along until the inevitable defeat on penalties, was damaged by the celebrity culture surrounding the squad.

He said,

“We became a bit of a circus, in terms of the whole WAG (wives and girlfriends) situation. People were worrying more about what other people were wearing and where they were going, rather than the team.”

Ferdinand wore the captain’s armband in place of the injured John Terry when England attempted to make it four wins from four World Cup qualifiers under Capello in Belarus last night.

Atmosphere

Manchester United defender Ferdinand reveals the atmosphere around the England set-up is now completely different to the 2006 World Cup finals in Germany under Sven-Goran Eriksson.

Back then the squad regularly hit the headlines when they stayed at Baden-Baden and were famously accompanied by their WAGS. The football was almost a side-show as the players were reported on as much on the front pages of the newspapers as they were on the back.

“It seems like there was a big show around the whole England squad. It was like watching a theatre unfolding and football almost became a secondary element to the main event. When you step back and look back at that, you think like it was a circus. I’m not going to tell the other players what you should or should not do but I just think that, as a squad, we were a bit too open, going out in and around Baden-Baden, and probably had too much contact with families. You don’t get many tournaments in your career. To give yourself the best chance, you have to be focused. That then transposed itself into the team. This regime is very watertight. If I’m honest, it feels as if we’re going in the right direction. I don’t want to speak too soon but you can see we’re at the start of something and hopefully there will be bigger rewards than what we’ve had in the past.”

Of course, after England’s tame quarter-final defeat in Germany under Sven Goran Eriksson, they didn’t even qualify for Euro 2008 under Steve McClaren.

Professional

As an outsider, it looks as though the Capello regime is much, much more professional than in the recent past. Ferdinand went on to confirm those views,

“It’s a very, very professional regime. Very result-orientated. Very much like a lot of our clubs. The results come a long way before the performances. You see how he is on the training ground, in our meetings, that there’s a winning mentality there. That’s what he’s putting over to the squad he has in front of him. It’s about us taking that on board.”

Ferdinand also compared Capello to his club manager Sir Alex Ferguson in the way they relate to their players and how they see their job,

“Do you really know any managers? I don’t know the real Fergie. When he comes to football, he’s probably a totally different person to when he’s at home with his wife and grandchildren. That doesn’t matter. They’re not here to be buddies, talk about old times or be great friends. They are here to win football matches.”

Capello’s insistence on no mobile phones and no WAGS has been ridiculed in some other countries but there is no doubt that the England squad needed to refocus and get back its discipline. It is great to hear one of the players talking about that and publicly admitting that things weren’t right and that they think things are going in the right direction.

100% winning record

Up until last night Capello had made a 100% winning start to his career in England in competitive games. I hope that he still has that record, as the proof of the pudding, as they say, is in the eating.

Whether we won, drew or lost last night I still think that England have taken a significant step forward in terms of their professionalism, their mentality and in the way they are viewed by the fans. I just hope that they can take an equally significant step forward in their ability to do well in tournaments!