British soccer suffering major set-back
By Vic Mills
LONDON (JP): In yet another dismal, depressing excursion into Europe for British clubs recently, the country that invented the game could barely manage to string a couple of passes together.
A point hammered home by the headlines: British teams still refusing to learn lessons -- Everton hustle to no effect -- Blackburn's European nightmare continues -- Italians brush aside feeble challenge from Rangers.
The cream of British soccer has curdled and all in the space of just a few short weeks.
The glory days of Tottenham, Liverpool, Leeds, Nottingham Forest and Celtic are long gone. No longer the trendsetters, British soccer is an embarrassment, technically deficient and tactically naive.
Languishing pointless -- a statement as much about its play as position, in Group B, arguably the easiest in the Champions Cup -- Blackburn continues to stumble from one European failure to another.
The humane thing would be to let FIFA stop the contest and save the British champion further embarrassment.
There are those who say that, but for Cantona's suspension last season, Manchester United would have strolled to the title.
The problem with such reasoning is that United has itself failed to progress beyond the opening round of European competition in the last three seasons.
Its latest Continental odyssey ended abruptly at the hands and feet of the little known Rotor Volgagrad.
With European competition a regular event at Ibrox, much was expected of the champion of Scotland. Rangers against Juventus, however, was little more than ninety minutes of cringing humiliation.
Unsophisticated in approach, incapable of apparently of passing to a team member, the Scots had little to offer but crunching tackles and aimless clearances out of defense.
Having disposed comfortably of Monaco in the previous round of the UEFA Cup, thanks largely to a first leg Tony Yeboah hat trick, Leeds United looked set for a lengthy run in Europe.
This was not the way the Dutch master PSV Eindhoven saw matters, as yet another chapter of lofty ambition ended in tatters as Leeds conceded five at home!
A clue to the current malaise within British soccer can be gained from the comments of Blackburn manager Ray Harford on returning Poland.
"There's still hope," he said. "I was quite pleased with our shape. We looked like the Blackburn of the old, we kept a rigid shape, we were very difficult to beat."
With a point in its group, and the manager continues to eulogize on the avoidance of defeat. As if not part of the equation, there is no mention of winning.
Rigid -- this too was a give-away. For the team is the very mirror image of the product -- steel -- that directly, through industrialist millionaire Jack Walker, bought Kenny Dalgish, a team and its success.
The thesaurus lists various alternatives for "rigid" -- "unbending", "uncompromising", "unyielding", "inflexible" and "narrow-minded" -- all very Blackburn.
When it began its Champions quest last month, Harford had said: "There is no question of adapting our game to suit that of the Europeans."
An unforgiving game, soccer. Little wonder that Blackburn now languish at the bottom of Group B, their performances exposing British soccer for what it is -- second division and decidedly second rate.
The need for change, then, is beyond question. Responsibility for this lies with all free-thinking managers and coaches. For it is they who must stress the simple virtues of passing, possession and control, alongside those of self-expression, subtlety and improvisation.
That the Premiership now boasts a host of European players, with Brazilian, Juninho, waiting in the wings, can only be of benefit. The Italian game stands as testimony of improvement beyond measure following the introduction of foreigners.
The one ray of hope in a series of otherwise bleak European performances is that of Liverpool. Against both Spartak Vladikavkaz and Brondby it has displayed the necessary skill, patience and ability to keep possession, so lacking in the performances of Rangers and Blackburn
And this from a young and largely inexperienced side; a side built with a decade of European soccer in mind.
Early days, then, but the signs, at least on Merseyside, are encouraging. And they need to be, too, for the last four weeks in the life of British football has taken on the appearance of a video nasty, with the top club sides cast as the nightmare actually happening.