England's Squad for Euro 2016.
Now the soccer season or football season in the UK is over for the summer there will be three British nations representing the UK at this years Euro 2016 football competition and overall about 24 European nations including Germany, Italy and France taking part.
The British nations taking part are England, Wales and Northern Ireland with Scotland yet again unfortunately not qualifying. The fact of Scotland the second biggest nation in the UK not qualifying is weird when you consider that Scotland has produced many good football coaches like the retired Alex Ferguson who coached Manchester United for a very long and successful period. It is strange in my view he has never been asked to coach Scotland unless he was offered the job and preferred to stay with Manchester United or turned the job down.
As an Englishman however I am here to promote the English side which will kick off their game literally against Russia in June. English football fans and the media are very unforgiving if a team crashes out of a tournament as they did at the last World Cup but Roy Hodgson kept his job. If England God forbid crash out of this tournament will Hodgson be given his marching orders or will he act as a caretaker coach until someone else is appointed? Lets hope for Hodgson's sake and the England squad selected by Hodgson that they avoid the English curse as I call it of crashing out of football tournaments prematurely.
To be fair England have had a few losses along the way but Roy Hodgson has been pure magic in many ways as a coach for England with many wins under his belt for England. Of course its not just the coach who makes a good football team its all the other staff and back room people that make it happen. Then there is the players who we hope are passionate enough for England to deliver on the day against an opponent team a good victory or are they more concerned about the clubs they play for day in and day out in the Premiership where they earn in some peoples view obscene amounts of money.
Any way here is the nominal squad Hodgson has picked for the Euros starting on 10 June:
Goalkeepers:
Fraser Forster, Joe Hart, Tom Heaton.
Defenders:
Ryan Bertrand, Gary Cahill, Nathaniel Clyne, Danny Rose, Chris Smalling, John Stones, Kyle Walker.
Midfielders:
Dele Alli, Ross Barkley, Fabian Delph, Eric Dier, Danny Drinkwater, Jordan Henderson, Adam Lallana, James Milner, Raheem Sterling, Andros Townsend, Jack Wilshere.
Forwards:
Harry Kane, Marcus Rashford, Wayne Rooney, Daniel Sturridge, Jamie Vardy.
The tournament games of all the European sides competing including England will be coming from:
Saint - Denis, Marseille, Lyon, Lile, Paris, Bordeaux, Saint - Etienne, Nice, Lens, Toulouse.
The England squad features the two top scorers in the Premiership this season namely Jamie Vardy whose side has won the Premiership this season Leicester and Tottenham man Harry Kane. Also in the squad a youngster who has really found his form this season and come from no where is one Marcus Rashford an 18 year old wunderkind if ever there was one playing for Manchester United. Of course captaining the squad will be stalwart Wayne Rooney a player who you either love or hate.
I personally am looking forward to this tournament not only because I like watching the international games and because I can get behind my country but I'm hoping and praying England might just go all the way this time but how many times have we said that before?
Well we have a young and talented squad who on paper I think who can take on most of the teams they are facing and our first game will be against Russia. Here's hoping we can get a win under our belts for a platform to build on which will give our lads the confidence they need to knock down all opponents before them and win the tournament.
