DOHA: England are 15 years behind other nations in developing their players, Dutch football legend Ruud Gullit said yesterday.
The Euro 1988 winning captain was speaking at the ‘Star Chat’ discussion along with former England midfielder John Barnes and Spanish manager Rafa Benitez at the Aspire4Sport Congress at Aspire Dome.
“The problem with England is that everything is based on school-like football. The coach of the team just wants his players to win,” said Gullit.
“He would have one big guy at the front, two tall guys at the back and would hit the ball long,” the 50-year-old added.
“Now English clubs and the FA have realised that is not the right way of playing football. The clubs have started to build academies but England are 15 years behind other nations,” he added.
Barnes, who scored 84 goals in 314 appearances for Liverpool, agreed. He said that players in the English leagues get bored practising movements and tactics in training.
“They just want to play 5-a-side football,” he said.
During Gullit’s coaching stint in England as manager of English Premier League (EPL) clubs Chelsea and Newcastle United, he said ‘some players did not like’ the training methods.
“As a coach, I applied technical training methods to my players and some did not like it. For those players aged 25 and over, it is hard as they are used to their own techniques,” he said.
As coach, he admitted that Chelsea fans did not like the continental playing style that he implemented, and it ‘took three months’ for them to accept the decision.
England, who have only won the World Cup once in 1966, have failed to reach a major semi-final since 1990. And Barnes believes the wait will be longer.
“It will take a while for England to win the World Cup,” said Barnes, who made 79 appearances for the three Lions between 1983 and 1995.
“The problem for England is that players like Danny Welbeck (Manchester United and Rahim Sterling (Liverpool) who play for top clubs, are not playing regularly enough,” he added.
He cites Germany as a perfect example to follow, with most of their national players playing for the top teams.
Gullit, who became the first non-British manager to win a major trophy in England with Chelsea in 1997, believes that it will be difficult for English players to play regularly due to the number of foreign players in the EPL, which was formed in 1992.
“You look at the spine of the team of all the top 5 teams in the EPL and there are many foreigners in that squad. It will be difficult,” the Dutch said.
Speaking on Liverpool, Benitez called Steven Gerrard a ‘legend’.
After spending six years with Liverpool, the former Valencia manager added that he would like a job in the EPL as his family have settled in England.
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