England’s New Crop (and how we can undermine their potential)

Following a disastrous World Cup campaign England began to show signs of resurgence early on in their Euro 2012 qualification campaign. However, Adrian Chiles couldn't help but tempt fate in the build up to England’s home 0-0 thriller with a Vucinic-less Montenegro by stating that we may be looking to continue our recent tradition of breezing through qualifying and collapsing in the finals. This worry was soon dispelled as we huffed-and-puffed and failed to break down the Montenegrin door. The only shining lights of the night were a lively and full of confidence Adam Johnson and the resurgent Steven Gerrard. Each of which would have been allowed to make more of an impact in the 4-3-3 which has been serving Capello well. Unfortunately the 4-4-2’s flatness was again on show as Capello reverted to his old setup. It was testament to how little Capello has learnt that Shaun Wright-Phillips even made it into the squad let alone onto the pitch against Montenegro. The better choice could have been the biggest shining light in England’s latest generation, Jack Wilshere. The 18 year old is a great point of debate at the moment as we try and discover how to get the best out of the slight, talented play-maker.

The main task ahead for England is to usher in our new generation of talent through by providing them with regular club football and possible call ups to the national side. Utilising Wilshere will be important, as he could be the future of the English centre of midfield. Players of Wilshere’s ability and more importantly for some, size, are often treated as luxury items in this country and are subsequently shunned out onto the left hand side, where their ability to unlock stubborn defences is stifled. Two examples of this are Joe Cole and, most tragically, Paul Scholes. Possibly the greatest passer of a football this country or even the world has produced (the great Zinedene Zidane described him as “the greatest midfielder of his generation”) was wasted out on the left hand side of the English midfield for most of his 66 caps. We must hope that Capello doesn’t succumb to the temptation to waste Wilshere’s talents in this way.

In the longer term there are many more extremely talented young English players waiting in the wings. Micah Richards is starting to fulfil his potential at right-back this season and could easily provide a replacement for the increasingly unpredictable Glen Johnson. Other future defenders could have to wait a tad longer for their opportunity due to the primacy of Terry, Ferdinand and Ashley Cole. However, the promise of the likes of Phil Jones, Chris Smalling and Kieran Gibbs paint a strangely familiar picture for the future England backline. Jones is a no nonsense centre back very much in the John Terry mould. Smalling, gifted with pace and the composure to bring the ball out of defence, could also be seen as a young Ferdinand. Kieran Gibbs is yet another small pacey left back off the Arsenal conveyor belt which has produced Cole, Clichy, Traore and now Gibbs. And let’s not forget Everton’s Jack Rodwell who could well be the perfect partner for Wilshere in the centre of the English midfield in coming years provided he continues his development.

In more forward areas Marc Albrighton has burst on to the scene at Aston Villa and is getting a consistent run in the first team so far this season. Andy Carroll is another young Englishman showing promise early this season, with the burly front man scoring four goals in three appearances so far. Daniel Sturridge is the most problematic of this current batch of players. With the right coaching and a decent run in the Chelsea first team he has the potential to be a world class front man for England with his explosive acceleration, skill on the ball and composure in front of goal. However his cocky attitude may cause issues in the future and hamper his career.

This talent on show in our youngsters is exemplified in their qualification for a third consecutive European championship with a 2-1 aggregate win over Romania last week. However, England need to pay close attention to the German model of development for our youngsters. Players such as Ozil, Muller and Neuer have been given greater responsibility in the German first team alongside a core of more experienced performers. A core of Terry, Ferdinand, Gerrard, Lampard and Rooney supplemented with the talent of the likes of Wilshere, Adam Johnson, James Milner and Joe Hart, to name just a few, would allow for us to develop as a unit in a more effective way and pave the way for a potentially brighter future for England. The only remaining problem is that, perhaps, the stubborn Capello isn’t the man to do this.

Review: Inception

On walking out of Christopher Nolan’s most recent masterpiece, Inception, I found myself tragically plunged back into reality as the sticky floor of the cinema foyer reminded me exactly where I was. It was the pain of this realisation which verified for me that Nolan had achieved the primary goal of the filmmaker, to entirely envelop your audience into your own imaginative vision. Nolan’s film is not only a fantastic bit of Cinema, with its slick aesthetics, clever and well executed dialogue and edge of your seat action sequences, it is the accompanying thoughtfulness which sets him apart from his peers. Nolan’s conception of dreams and reality in the film become a self reflexive meditation on the nature of cinema itself, as it goes about allowing the audience to completely escape reality and slide into his own seductive and exciting dreams. After all, what is an audience but a group sitting together in room and sharing a dream, receiving a message, an idea, from the creators of the film?

In the build up to its release Nolan told The LA Times that he was influenced by the school of science fiction films which sprung to prominence in the 90’s. With the popularity of the Matrix setting off a trend of movies which ask the audience to question their conceptions of reality and the veracity of the world around us, Nolan goes about asking us: does the spinning top ever stop?:

“I think ours is of an older school, ours is more of The Matrix variety and the concepts of different levels of reality,” Nolan said. “The whole concept of avatars and living life as someone else, there’s a relationship to what we’re doing, but I think when I first started trying to make this film happen it was very much pulled from that era of movies where you had The Matrix, you had Dark City, you had The Thirteenth Floor and, to a certain extent, you had Memento too. They were based in the principles that the world around you might not be real.”

In terms of the film itself the cast are as good as they look on paper. The emerging talents of Ellen Page, Cillian Murphy, Tom Hardy and the ever well dressed Joseph Gordon-Levitt match up well with the more established big hitters of DiCaprio, Nolan’s increasingly ever-present lucky charm Sir Michael Cain and the hauntingly beautiful Marion Cotillard. Page and Murphy especially seek to break typecast as the former exudes a new maturity in an attempt to escape her quirky roots and the latter bringing a new vulnerability to the screen which is distant from his previous Nolan role of the Scarecrow.

By now there is little need for me to review this film in a traditional way as everything that can be said about it, glowing or critical, already has. However, one thing which has really irritated me in a lot of reviews of Inception and of Nolan himself is the comparisons with Stanley Kubrick. They are both vastly different filmmakers who deserve to be regarded independently for their achievements in the field (although Nolan’s career is still a fledgling one). Kubrick was a master across genre, with each of his films warranting a seminal place in their respective genres, for example 2001: A Space Odyssey as sci-fi and Full Metal Jacket as a Vietnam War movie. Nolan’s films fit more into a genre which is indefinable in their originality and imaginative breadth, allowing for him to leave a legacy entirely of his own. It is truly sad that these two directors have to be compared simply on the grounds that they make big budget, Hollywood movies while maintaining artistic, emotional and intellectual integrity. Nolan has embraced and utilised the technology available to him to create stunning special effects that bring something exciting and also cerebral to his pictures. This can be opposed to the cheap thrills of most big budget Hollywood films being made today which seek only to distract their audience with more loud bangs and bigger explosions (Yes Bruckheimer I am looking at you). These two directors seek to maintain the pillars of what cinema should be, entertaining AND thought provoking and many in Hollywood should look at their example. Christopher Nolan is producing films which maintain my faith in the Hollywood model of filmmaking and in Cinema on the whole as it looked to be declining into an endless cycle of remakes and adaptations of already established material.