Manchester United fans will doubtless be pleased by Wayne Rooney’s latest comments pouring cold, or at least lukewarm water on the idea that he might move to Barcelona, or anywhere else for that matter.

Good news for United it may be, but I’m not so sure it’s in England’s interests for so few of the country’s leading players to try their luck abroad.

Whenever this subject comes up, I can’t help but look to the great strides made by Spain at international level, progress that must have been aided by the far more adventurous attitude taken by some of their players in recent times.

Spain used to have a similar reputation to England in this regard, with virtually everyone happy to stay at home and enjoy the riches available from clubs swimming in cash from huge TV rights deals. Heading into the 1998 World Cup, every member of the Spain squad played for a Spanish club, while four years later Gaizka Mendieta was the only export (and he was about to come home, after confirming a lot of prejudices in a nightmare season with Lazio).

Fast forward to Euro 2008, where a Spanish squad featuring Pepe Reina, Alvaro Arbeloa, Xabi Alonso, Fernando Torres (all Liverpool) and Cesc Fabregas (Arsenal) swept all before them.

Perhaps it’s a coincidence, but I suspect not. In the past, tensions always seemed to rise in the Spanish camp as long tournaments wore on (I covered them at Euro 2000, the 2002 World Cup and at Euro 2004) but last year there was a new confidence about them.

Wouldn’t it be beneficial for England if their better players spent some time abroad, learning new languages, experiencing different cultures and absorbing new ideas?

I’m not specifically talking about Rooney, who I’m sure will go on and achieve even more at United. But would it really be so bad if players like him followed the example of Steve McManaman and David Beckham and tried something different.

PHOTO: Steve McManaman lifts up the European Cup at Madrid’s landmark Cibeles fountain May 25. Real Madrid beat Valencia 3-0 in the Champions League final at the Stade de France in Paris May 24 to secure their eighth European title.

Imagine the scenario … there are 10 minutes to go in the World Cup final and England are 1-0 down.

Fabio Capello can choose between Michael Owen and Darren Bent to come off the bench and rescue England’s World Cup dream. Who will he turn to?

A man with 40 England goals to his name and bags of international experience who has played for three of Europe’s biggest clubs? Or a striker with four caps, no international goals and a reputation for blowing hot and cold?

It seems Capello, the man credited with dragging England out of the doldrums and restoring their battered reputation, favours the latter.

The England manager effectively banged another nail in Owen’s World Cup coffin by selecting Sunderland’s Bent ahead of him for his squad to face Brazil on Nov. 14th.

And while the Italian says the England door remains open for Owen, his habit of leaving the country’s fourth highest international goalscorer kicking his heels means the above scenario in which he is forced to choose between Owen and another striker is unlikely to occur.

The Italian, who recently described the former Real Madrid and Liverpool poacher as his ‘tormentor’, has frequently re-iterated that players who are unfit and not firing for their clubs will drop out of contention.

While the principle is no doubt grounded in common sense, the question of whether or not Owen merits being an exception to his iron rule just won’t go away.

Owen would be many fans’ choice to come off the bench and grab a goal should England find themselves in a spot of bother at a crucial point in next June’s tournament.

But Capello is no gambler and remains reluctant to wager one of his 23 squad places on a player who may only be able to make a decisive contribution in short, sharp bursts.

“The players with us in South Africa will be all fit,” Capello said recently. “It’s impossible to wait for one player. Little things are okay, but bigger problems and they will not be there.

“If you have to recover someone it’s no good. When we go it will not be the warm season, when it’s easier to recover. It will be cold in South Africa.”

The England manager worries the wintery conditions could lead to an injury crisis that would deprive him of his first-choice frontline.

And few could blame him for refusing to trust Owen’s hamstrings to hold up should the forward be required to fulfil more than a cameo role.

But let’s imagine another scenario … Wayne Rooney, Peter Crouch and Jermain Defoe are all ruled out through injury or suspension during the tournament. Could England realistically win the World Cup with Bent leading the line?

This question is perhaps at the heart of Capello’s decision to give the Sunderland frontman a chance to impress before the squad for South Africa is finalised.

PHOTO: Manchester United’s Michael Owen (L) scores against CSKA Moscow’s during their Champions League soccer match at Old Trafford in Manchester, northern England, November 3, 2009. REUTERS/Phil Noble

Should he fail against Brazil, the case for taking a gamble on Owen, Capello’s bête-noir, will only be stronger.

So, once again, England qualify in style. The garages can start stocking up on plastic flags of St George, the breweries can breathe a sigh of relief and the tabloids can start their gradual shift from cautious support to the crescendo of expectation that will accompany Fabio Capello and his squad to South Africa next year.

But is there any evidence that “this time, more than any other time, they’ll do it right“?

Do England really have a team capable of getting beyond the quarter-finals, let alone winning the thing?

Points in favour:

1. The rest of the world aren’t so hot at the moment. Brazil, Spain, Germany and the Netherlands are going along pretty nicely but Argentina, France, Portugal and even Italy have got problems. None of them looks unbeatable.

2. Wayne Rooney, Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard. These are players truly deserving the “world class” tag and when fit and on form provide England with a deadly attacking triangle capable of undoing the very best of defences.

3. Capello. The Italian’s calm authority has permeated a squad previously drowning in its own self-satisfaction. There shouldn’t be any idiotic selections and once in South Africa this squad will be focused solely on the task in hand — and that won’t be accompanying their wives on shopping trips to Sandton.

4. A winter World Cup. England haven’t played in one since 1962 in Chile. For all the high-tech kits they roll out ever two years and for all the efforts and intervention of foreign coaches, England’s all-action approach is not suited to boiling temperatures.

5. It’s about time.

Points against.

1. The number one problem. Capello says David James is his first choice goalkeeper but even if the 39-year-old year old regains fitness and has a great season his history of high-profile calamities will be in the back of everyone’s mind as England advance.

England have suffered previously from hanging on too long to ageing goalkeepers, with the concrete boots of Peter Shilton (1990) and David Seaman (2002) leaving indelible images of inaction.

The back-up cast of Robert Green, Paul Robinson, Scott Carson, Ben Foster and Joe Hart all have their talents but none inspires total confidence.

2. Second striker. Emile Heskey seems the current first-choice partner for Rooney but few teams win a World Cup with a forward who is allergic to goals. Jermain Defoe has staked an early claim to replace him but sharp finisher though he is he does not link well. Carlton Cole is surely not the answer. Peter Crouch offers all sorts of options, scores goals, has great control and an incisive pass and defenders don’t like playing against him. However, he does not seem to be Capello’s favourite, which leaves an extraordinary amount of pressure on Rooney.

3. Defence. Ashley Cole is superb and the John Terry/Rio Ferdinand partnership has proved reliable, even if showing worrying signs of positional wanderings of late. However, Glen Johnson looks like a winger forced to borrow a number two shirt and opposition coaches will attack him mercilessly.

4. Strength in depth (lack thereof). England, without Rooney in Portugal and Germany, were a team heading home. Another injury or red card for the maestro will again end their hopes at a stroke. The squad players generally look a short on class and World Cup finals are rarely won with the 11 players a manager would have pencilled in at the start of a tournament.

Maybe Capello has enough about him to craft a team able to triumph in 10 months’ time but, as ever, it looks an extraordinarily difficult task.

Michael Owen missed four glorious chances in Manchester United’s 2-0 friendly win over Valencia but the very fact that he was there to miss them signals a real chance of the former Liverpool reviving his career for club and country.

Owen’s failure to find the net was described as a wasted opportunity by some, given that England coach Fabio Capello was there watching him, but consider … playing for Newcastle at the end of last season, when did he look in with a chance of scoring even one?

Here’s what Alex Ferguson said about Owen’s display:

“Michael showed marvellous movement. He should’ve scored four, but he was unlucky with the first one that he just chipped it over the goalkeeper’s shoulder and by the post. He deserved at least one of them.”

Whether he deserved to score or not is beside the point, which is that playing in this United team he can expect to have chances every time he plays. He scored four on United’s tour of the Far East and if he fluffed his lines on his Old Trafford debut he can safely reflect that it was only a dress rehearsal for the new season after all.

As for England, the fact that he is playing for United alongside Wayne Rooney will only help. Assuming he starts scoring in the Premier League, and given the sheer number of chances he can expect that seems inevitable, how long before Capello decides to translate the United forward partnership to the England set-up?

PHOTO: Manchester United’s Michael Owen reacts after a missed opportunity during their friendly soccer match against Valencia in Manchester August 5, 2009. REUTERS/Nigel Roddis

Marco Tardelli is famous for that crazy goal celebration as Italy won the 1982 World Cup.

He loves his country so much that he is ready to whisper the Italian national anthem at Bari on Wednesday despite the fact he is now assistant coach to Ireland boss Giovanni Trapattoni. 

At least he is honest, but it’s doubtful the thousands of green-clad Ireland fans making the trip to Italy’s heel for the World Cup qualifier will appreciate his words. It will be April’s Fools day after all.

I don’t remember Sven Goran Eriksson’s lips moving when the Swedish anthem played before his England side faced his homeland in the 2002 World Cup.

Current England boss Fabio Capello would certainly keep his mouth shut if Italy ever visit Wembley while Trapattoni may well cringe when he hears the Italian anthem given he has such bad memories from his spell in charge of the Azzurri.

The debate over the nationality of international coaches had seemed to have disappeared before Tardelli’s comments.

But if he dances down the touchline flaying his arms about when Robbie Keane scores the winner on Wednesday, the Irish fans will surely forgive him.

PHOTO: Marco Tardelli sits with fellow Ireland assistant coach Liam Brady at a press conference in Dublin, May 1, 2008. REUTERS/Russell Cheyne

Quite how far Michael Owen’s career has nosedived was underlined at the weekend when the Newcastle United striker was again overlooked for his country despite the lack of attacking options for coach Fabio Capello.

Capello watched three of his squad strikers hobble off at Wembley on Saturday during the 4-0 friendly victory over Slovakia with Emile Heskey and Carlton Cole both ruled out of Wednesday’s World Cup qualifier against Ukraine.

With Peter Crouch also carrying a knock, surely the time had come for Capello to get on the telephone to Owen, a player with 40 goals in 89 appearances for his country and who was voted Europe’s best player in 2001.

Instead, Capello bluntly dismissed the case for Owen, saying he felt the striker was not playing well enough for his club. Capello turned to the much-maligned Darren Bent, a willing runner but hardly a finisher in the same class as Owen.

It is hard to see where Owen now fits into Capello’s plans. The Italian appears to favour a big target man playing in tandem with the versatile Wayne Rooney. Owen’s penalty area prowess is clearly not enough for Capello.

At 29, and after a series of injuries, Owen does not have the explosive pace that was once his trademark and he can look hesitant in front of goal. He has scored just once in his last 10 matches for relegation-haunted Newcastle and it is a year since he last played for England.

So is there any hope of an international return for the former Liverpool man? A move away from St James’ Park would be a first step but any journey back to the top of European football looks like being a long and painstaking one.

HAPPIER TIMES: Michael Owen poses alongside Fabio Capello at the launch of the England team’s new away kit, February 4, 2008. REUTERS/Eddie Keogh

Italy coach Marcello Lippi probably expected to be grilled for again overlooking Antonio Cassano, but England counterpart Fabio Capello may not have foreseen the furore surrounding him actually picking a player.

Tottenham Hotspur’s Ledley King has a chronic knee problem which prevents him training yet Capello still deemed the centre back good enough for an England squad recall for the friendly with Slovakia and World Cup qualifier with Ukraine.

“It’s mad. It’s pointless at best,” blasted Tottenham boss Harry Redknapp in the Sun.

King has now returned to Tottenham and will not be involved in either game.

Capello, whose side were easily beaten by Spain last month, may have been trying to show who was boss by taking a look at King first. The decision, though, does look a little odd.

Lippi, a World Champion, also has the same imperious air as Capello. However, the Italians are not happy that he has ignored Sampdoria’s Cassano despite the cheeky playmaker’s wonderful performances this term.

Being a soccer reporter, I don’t often have to pay to see football but I would certainly buy a ticket to watch Cassano, who is a magician at times.

He got a reputation for being childish at Bari, AS Roma and Real Madrid but he looks more mature in every game. No wonder Juventus and Inter Milan are interested.

Any defeat in Montenegro on Saturday or at home to Ireland will only increase the calls for Cassano’s inclusion after he was also ignored for February’s limp loss to Brazil.

Are Capello and Lippi losing some of their invincibility?

For more blogs on other sports than soccer, check out http://blogs.reuters.com/sport

PHOTO: Tottenham Hotspur’s Ledley King (L) fights for the ball with Udinese’s Fabio Quagliarella during their UEFA Cup match in Udine, Oct. 23, 2008. REUTERS/Daniel Raunig

Like political pundits on local election night, football reporters can’t help reading too much into the results of international friendlies.

Pretty much the least interesting thing about England’s error-strewn 2-1 win over Germany in Berlin on Wednesday was the result, but there was food for thought in the performances of two under-strength teams.

1. England seem to bat quite a lot deeper than they used to, with a number of the players coming in doing good jobs. Barry and Carrick easily won their midfield battle with Rolfes and Jones, while Wright-Philiips was probably the best player in the pitch. Time for the Gerrard-Lampard partnership to be definitively retired?

2. England have never been short of confidence in the ability of their players as individuals, but what seems to be developing now is a collective confidence, which showed itself in the patient way they exercised control in the first half. (more…)

Germany’s friendly against England at the Olympiastadion later on Wednesday will have the feel of a B international, given the absence of so many familiar players.

England are without Beckham, Gerrard, Rooney, Ferdinand, Heskey, Owen and a couple of Coles, and Theo Walcott has now joined the injured list. 

Germany are without four of their best known and most experienced players from the World Cup and Euro 2008 in Ballack, Lahm, Frings and Lehmann.

My colleague Martyn Hermann takes a look at the whole issue over on our main website. Martyn says the friendly has been rendered “almost meaningless” by the absentee list.

I think the qualifier “almost” is a pretty important part of that sentence.

I agree it’ll be pointless reading much into the result, but playing this sort of match at a venue like Berlin’s Olympic stadium is always a worthwhile exercise.

As Fabio Capello said at his eve-of-match press conference, it will be very interesting to see how the newcomers take to one of the more intimidating stages in European football.

When Germany played England at Wembley in 2007 the likes of Ballack and Frings were missing then too, along with senior players like Podolski, Klose and Schweinsteiger.

England had a more experienced and supposedly superior team yet players like Christian Pander, Piotr Trochowski and Thomas Hitzlsperger performed above their reputations to wrest control from a complacent England and claim a 2-1 win. Trochowski and Hitzlsperger are now fixtures in the team, and only injury is keeping Pander out.

Are there unheralded England players who can take their chance tonight? We’ll see…

PHOTO: Fireworks explode above the Olympic Stadium in Berlin, following Italy’s victory over France in the World Cup final, July 9, 2006. REUTERS/Toby Melville

If David Beckham’s loan move to AC Milan goes through, one of the options coach Carlo Ancelotti has in mind is to use him as an alternative to Andrea Pirlo as a deep midfield playmaker.

It’s an interesting possibility which could help Beckham edge towards Peter Shilton’s record of 125 England caps as a protagonist rather than the bit player he is at the moment.

Beckham certainly has the passing ability to take on Pirlo’s ‘quarterback’ role. If he adapted to it successfully, the switch might help him seize a regular place in Fabio Capello’s side because pace is less of a premium there than it is in his usual position on the wing. Indeed, Pirlo is no Asafa Powell.

Sceptics could counter that Beckham played in the centre of midfield for a while during his time at Real Madrid with mixed results.

But then it was more of a stop-gap measure than a full-blown career move that would require commitment from the player and patience from coaches and team mates as he acquires the vision to dictate from deep.

What’s more, a loan stint at Milan would give him the chance to learn from Pirlo, the game’s undisputed master quarterback. (more…)