A no-nonsense figure like Fabio Capello was never going to let the issue of one cap for one player get in the way of his thinking.

Although he has trained at Arsenal, David Beckham has not played a competitive game since November and if that had been the case for any other player, they too would have been left out of Capello’s first England squad.

The Italian has realised that a failing England have pandered to the wishes of their top players for too long. One guy getting 100 caps is nothing compared to the future health of the team.

Fellow wingers David Bentley, Shaun Wright Phillips and Ashley Young need international matches under their belt and Capello has wisely opted to pick them for next week’s friendly with Switzerland.

This is totally different to Steve McClaren’s attempt at stamping false authority on the team by dropping Beckham when he took over. This is not a gimmick by Capello, this is a sensible footballing decision.

Beckham may still get 100 caps, but at least he knows he’ll have to work for it.

Mark Meadows

PHOTO: England’s Beckham applauds the crowd following their Euro 2008 qualifying defeat to Croatia at Wembley, Nov. 21 2007 REUTERS/Eddie Keogh

From the cold-blooded capitalism of the leveraged buy-out to a socialist utopia of a club owned by its fans in one fell swoop.

That will be the result if a group of influential Liverpool supporters succeed in getting 100,000 fans of the club to raise 500 million pounds in a “Barcelona style” member share scheme.

England is abuzz with reports that the Share Liverpool FC Group plan to buy out American owners George Gillett and Tom Hicks, who recently completed a 350 million pounds re-financing of the deal that brought them ownership of the club last year.

Whether the group stands a chance of raising the money, and whether the Americans would have the slightest interest in selling up, are questions that will take a while to get answered.

As Tom Dunmore notes at the always excellent Pitchinvasion.net, the people behind the bid are “serious and knowledgeable”. They include Rogan Taylor, a well known Liverpool academic and founder of the Football Supporters’ Association.

The idea is nothing new. Barcelona, Real Madrid and other clubs in Spain have always run on this model, with members electing the president every few years and owning a stake in the club. Fan-owned clubs are also common in Germany. Still, many will wonder why such a scheme was not launched before Hicks and Gillett bought the club.

We’d like your views on whether this would be a good idea for Liverpool. Are fans just being overly optimistic if they think they can buy out the Americans? Isn’t 5,000 pounds too risky an investment for fans to get into? Or is it time a big English club showed there’s another way to go?

I’ve got a feeling Bill Shankly might have been attracted to the idea anyway.

“The socialism I believe in is everyone working for each other, everyone having a share of the rewards,” he once famously said. “It’s the way I see football, the way I see life.”

UPDATE: The Web site supposdly has more details at http://www.shareliverpoolfc.co.uk/ but, interestingly, it seems to have collapsed under the strain.

Kevin Fylan

I bet Spain coach Luis Aragones wishes he only had to worry about whether to give David Beckham a run-out for his 100th cap.

After an impressive end to qualification for Euro 2008, Aragones probably thought he’d have just a little fine-tuning to do ahead of the tournament in Austria and Switzerland.

Instead, the 69-year-old is likely to be juggling names like Albelda, Guti, Raul and Navarro in his head as he tries to solve a host of unexpected selection puzzles before announcing the squad for next week’s friendly against France

The first (and easiest) question is whether he should he call up Barcelona prodigy Bojan Krkic to prevent possible overtures from Serbia, even though the 17 year-old is only in his first season in the top flight and is unlikely to go to Euro 2008. The answer to that one looks a resounding yes.

Then there is the more difficult conundrum of David Albelda.

The Valencia player has always been Aragones’s first call when’s he’s wanted a tough edge in midfield. But Ronald Koeman’s decision to purge the former club captain means he has not kicked a ball, or an opponent for that matter, in anger for two months.

Argentina may have decided to call up Juan Roman Riquelme while he was in the wilderness at Villarreal, but while you might be able to justify the inclusion of a languid player renowned for his touch, set-piece play and passing, it is more difficult to see how a player of Albelda’s characteristics can keep his place without that competitive edge.

Valencia’s dramatic downturn in form must be giving Aragones a serious headache given that the backbone of the squad comes from the club.

Centre-back Carlos Marchena is increasingly unsteady, wingers David Silva and Joaquin look to have run out of ideas and striker David Villa has lost his spark up front. Will he stick with them and hope they pull through under Koeman or will he look for possible alternatives ahead of Euro 2008?

Aragones has become accustomed to fielding a barrage of questions from the Madrid-based press about Raul’s absence from the squad, but this time, and barring a last-minute change of heart, he will have to explain the omission of the in-form Guti as well.

Although inconsistent and occasionally petulant on the pitch,  the Real Madrid midfielder seems to operate on a different plain to the rest. He is a master of the defence-splitting pass and the unexpected assist. With Xavi failing to shine at Barça could it be time to give Guti another chance?

Another dilemma for Aragones is who to bring in as cover at left back. Joan Capdevila looks to have nailed down the first-choice slot after a great season at Villarreal but Atletico duo Mariano Pernia and Antonio Lopez have failed to convince and Aragones may look further afield with Mallorca’s Fernando Navarro now the favourite.

PHOTO: Barcelona’s Bojan Krkic celebrates a goal against Murcia during their league match at the Nou Camp, January 12, 2008. REUTERS/Albert Gea

Kevin Keegan’s early days at Newcastle have not been the most auspicious, with a nil-all draw at home against Bolton and comprehensive defeats by Arsenal in the FA Cup and Premier League. His personal attempt to lure Toon hero Alan Shearer back to the club as an assistant manager was politely declined by the television pundit, at least for now.

So how was he expected to react to news that Newcastle is embarking on a major restructuring of management, including the appointment of Leeds United manager Dennis Wise in the role of Executive Director (Football)?

At first he called it a “distraction”, but now it’s had time to sink in he sounds quite enthused by the idea.

“Dennis will report to me,” he said. ”The way it’s been explained to me is my concentration is on the first team and getting the club right. I welcome the fact that people are going to try and pull this club together because it has got a bit fragmented, a bit disjointed.”

The move seemed to shock a lot of people in England, but all Newcastle are doing is trying to move the team’s management structure to a continental model.

“This is all part of the vision that recently helped us to secure Kevin Keegan’s return to the Club as manager,” Chairman Chris Mort said, in a statement posted on the club’s Web site.

It’s hard to imagine something similar happening at Alex Ferguson’s Man United, or Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal, but look at other big clubs and you’ll see the set-up is pretty common.

Bernd Schuster has Pedja Mijatovic at Real Madrid, Txiki Beguiristain does a similar job at Barcelona, Uli Hoeness manages Bayern Munich and even AC Milan have Adriano Galliani between Carlo Ancelotti and Silvio Berlusconi.

Having a buffer between coach and club president, someone whose job is not under threat every time the team has a bad run of results and can therefore take the long-term view, seems to work well enough at most of Europe’s top clubs. Why not in England?

PHOTO: Newcastle United’s new executive director of football Dennis Wise (2nd L) sits next to chairman Chris Mort (L) during their match against Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium in London January 29, 2008. REUTERS/ Eddie Keogh

Serie A side Palermo have failed in their bid to have Saturday’s 1-0 defeat at AS Roma overturned or replayed due to the actions of a ball boy.

Palermo president Maurizio Zamparini said the boy had broken the rules by placing the ball on the corner spot and allowing Roma to take a quick corner from which Mancini scored.

The Italian league quickly rejected their appeal but did Palermo have a point?

Fabio Capello must be cursing his bad luck as he prepares to name his first England squad.

Lumbered with David Beckham on 99 caps, Capello is grappling with the delicate question of whether to grant him a 100th in next week’s friendly against Switzerland.

The debate over the Beckham milestone is enough to make you forget that Capello actually has a rather more important matter to attend to - transforming a team who couldn’t even qualify for Euro 2008.

If he bows to sentimentality and plays the former England captain in recognition of his service, he will be accused of being weak by those who feel the shake-up of an ineffective team needs to start immediately.

If he leaves the influential midfielder out, Capello could prematurely face the boos and headlines that taunt England managers when results start going wrong. Whatever he does, it seems he cannot win.

What do you think? Should Capello win the fans’ favour by including Beckham despite his lack of match practice, after all it’s just a friendly and the guy has worked hard for his country over the years?

Or should Capello exclude him — as he did at Real Madrid — and concentrate on trying out some new faces who might restore England’s battered pride?

On the subject of new faces, there has been a lot of media speculation that Capello may give a “surprise” call-up to Reading striker Dave Kitson.

While Reading is not the usual place to find England players, it can hardly be a surprise if the England manager calls up the Premier League’s top-scoring Englishman, can it?

Sonia Oxley, London

PHOTO: David Beckham poses at a mobile phone launch in Beijing,  Nov.24, 2007 REUTERS/Alfred Cheng Jin

Real Madrid’s success this season is largely down to last term’s title winners rather than the clutch of new signings.

With 17 games left to play, the nine-times European champions are sitting pretty at the top of the table, nine points clear of arch-rivals Barcelona and 15 ahead of third-placed Villarreal.

Among the new faces, Portugal centre back Pepe and Dutch midfielder Wesley Sneijder have made some telling contributions, but they have by no means been decisive.

Defenders Christoph Metzelder and Gabriel Heinze and former Chelsea winger Arjen Robben have spent more time in the treatment room than on the pitch. Argentine striker Javier Saviola has continued his Barcelona bench warming role while Dutch wingback Royston Drenthe has had an accident prone start to his Real career.

Instead it has been the old guard, who helped snatch the title from Barca’s grasp last season, that have been the secret to Real’s good form.

Iker Casillas has developed an aura of invincibility in goal, Ruud van Nistelrooy remains devastatingly efficient up front, Raul has recovered much of his old spark, and Brazilian trickster Robinho and the mercurial Guti are in the form of their lives.

Real may not be playing the sort of crowd-pleasing football Bernd Schuster promised at the start of the season, but there is no denying that they have been supremely effective.

An early exit from the King’s Cup has come as a blessing in disguise and the players looks fresh and sharp as the team heads into the business end of the season.

Is it Schuster that has brought the best out of these players? Has the German merely reaped the rewards of the legacy left by Fabio Capello? Or is it just that Real look so good because they have no serious rivals in Spain this season?

Simon Baskett, Madrid

PHOTO: Real Madrid’s Robinho celebrates his goal against Villarreal with Guti. Jan. 27 REUTERS/Andrea Comas

Cheryl Cole might disagree, but who says there’s no romance left in English football?

The overly-ambitious money men, the behind the scenes wrangling, the loss of traditions, the dull games, the teenage trade… for 45 minutes on Saturday they were all forgotten.

Havant & Waterlooville’s performance at Anfield was beyond remarkable. They didn’t just have a day out or merely give it a go; they twice took the lead against Liverpool and nearly pulled off the biggest shock in the competition’s history before losing 5-2.

The fact the minor league side are six divisions and 123 positions below Liverpool barely does the achievement justice. You could almost add another tier or two, given the game of ‘haves versus havants’ was against one of the ‘big four’.

The FA Cup has divided opinion on this blog over recent weeks, with some seeing it as an annoying sideshow and others believing it can still warm the heart. The tears of joy in the crowd and the 20 minute post-match celebrations on Saturday certainly did the latter.

It was just a pity only the lucky 42,556 in attendance saw it live. Mansfield and Sheffield United fans may disagree, but in an age where television dictates all, it seemed strange to have to rely solely on radio coverage. Perhaps that made it all the more romantic?

While it’s back to normality with a full midweek Premier League programme, the real action continues next week when Havant travel to Hayes & Yeading in Saturday’s midtable Blue Square South battle.

Padraic Halpin, London

PHOTO: Havant and Waterlooville’s players show a banner to their fans following their FA Cup fourth round match at Liverpool REUTERS/Phil Noble

One of the most refreshing aspects of the African Nations Cup — ignoring fresh allegations of attempted match-fixing – has been an almost complete absence of the gamesmanship which blights modern soccer.

There has been almost no waving of imaginary yellow cards to try to get an opponent booked and no arguments because a team has failed to kick the ball out for an injury.

Very few players have been rolling around in mock agony and clutching their faces after taking a small knock on the ankle.

The tackling has often been ferocious, but in Africa it is accepted as part of the game. Even after the fiercest of challenges, it is common to see players getting straight to their feet and continuing the game, sometimes even with a handshake thrown in.

Why can’t players in the rest of the world follow the African example?

Brian Homewood is covering the African Nations Cup for Reuters. Check out our main soccer site for full coverage.

Inter Milan striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic is every manager’s dream, or at least he should be. He’s tall, good in the air but also skilful on the ground and ruthless in the penalty area.

Inter coach Roberto Mancini knows he has a special player. He rarely rests him in Serie A but makes sure not to risk him in the much-maligned Italian Cup, even in Wednesday’s 2-2 home draw against former club Juve.

“A great player has won it for us at the end,” Mancini said last Sunday after Ibra scored twice in the last few minutes as unbeaten leaders Inter came from behind to edge Parma 3-2. The Swede also netted a brace in the previous week’s win at Siena.

Yet despite being joint top scorer in Serie A with 13 goals and in the Champions League with five, Ibrahimovic does not seem to command the same respect as other top strikers in Europe.

He didn’t even make the list of nominations for FIFA world player of the year in 2007 and Inter fans were furious.

Of course, Juventus supporters hate him after he quit the club following their match-fixing demotion to go to their biggest rivals. However, their anger mainly springs from the fact he is playing 10 times better for Inter than he did in Turin.

He has easily been the best player in Italy this term, smashing them in from all distances and setting up team mates with delightful flicks or passes. Six converted penalties also demonstrates his coolness under pressure. 

He sometimes gets mentioned as a transfer target in Spain but you rarely hear of the big English clubs being interested, and he never seems to be a serious candidate for the top international awards.

Why is that, do you think? Are the Italians wrong to regard him as one of the world’s best? And, for that matter, is there a better out-and-out striker in the world these days? Let us know in the comments.

PHOTO: Ibrahimovic gestures at the Swedish Sports Awards 2008 Gala after being presented with the Jerring Award in Stockholm, January 14, 2008. REUTERS/Fredrik Sandberg/Scanpix