OK so I'm sure you scoffed when you saw that title but hear me out. First of all these are in no particular order, I don't think England have the best chances of winning the World Cup but I think now is a good opportunity to install a little confidence into English International football. For the first time in my lifetime expectations are low. The English media have not been plotting the way to the final in every paper and lumbering pressure on Rooney or Gerrard or Beckham to save our nation and bring home our trophy and this is certainly an enormous relief to the players. I honestly believe that the England squad travelling to Brazil is in perfect condition to take to a World Cup. Any successful squad requires level headed experience and youthful fearlessness. If Gerrard can continue his wonderful Liverpool form and hook up with Danny Sturridge just a couple of times, or if Rooney drops deep and threads an eye of the needle pass to any of the mouth watering forward runs of Jay Rodriguez or Adam Lallana, England could actually surpass expectation! Look at the additions to this World Cup in comparison to the last: - Ross Barkley is fast tracking his way to the England captaincy - Lallana, Sterling, Townsend, Rodriguez & Sturridge will be bursting at the seams to impress on the worlds biggest stage - Danny Welbeck. Don't laugh. Although he may not be an out and out goal scorer his hold up and link up play is almost perfect, and in games where getting the ball forward (against Spain for example) players like Welbeck are an almighty asset to keeping the ball - Luke Shaw & Leighton Baines are keeping Ashley Cole on his toes (why does England produce such brilliant left backs?) -Roy Hodgson was an excellent tactician at West Brom and has international experience. Lets see what he can do with 2 full years of preparation. I expect most of the comments to be negative towards England's chances this summer, but lets be optimistic. England have landed a mightily difficult group, Italy will be very difficult to break down but they didn't offer much of an attack against Spain this week, and even with Suarez, Forlan & Cavani, Uruguay are a weakening team! If we survive the group who says we can't keep going? Fire your opinion at me in the comments below. I know I've missed off teams like Portugal, Italy, Netherlands, Uruguay, Colombia & France, let me know if you think they'll win it!
I'm Aaron from England and I've got for football what Russell Brand had for sex and heroin. I follow Celtic & Barcelona religiously and spend hours watching the majority of televised games. Kinda depressing when you write it down but i'm happy with my existence.
