Lets be grateful, that England have several international quality strikers to call upon to partner the world class Rooney and not have to choose from mediocrity like Kenny Miller or Kris Boyd:laughing:

There's nothing more pathetic than a whining scot moaning about the England team.

Why shouldn't England fans go into the world cup wanting to win it?

We're consistently a top 8 team in the FIFA rankings most of the time, we have a few decent players. A bit of luck and a kind draw and any team with those things is capable of winning.

It's not always the best teams in it that win anyway.
Nobody gave Italy a hope in hell at the last world cup, they managed to win it by having a strong team ethic rather than having individual stars in every position. France managed to win the tournament in 1998 with no strikers.

I'd like to see England win it but I'm not going to rant & rave and look for people to blame if we don't. In fact I'd say most people don't.

The only time I criticise England is when I think they play far too negatively. If they play a team like Brazil I'd much rather they lose 3 . 0 trying to win the game than lose 1 . 0 having 10 men constantly behind the ball doing nothing.

Adding to this, Greece had no-one I (or most people) would call a world-class player in 2004, yet they beat France, the Czech Republic and Portugal (twice) on the way to winning the European championship, and this year's their first world cup finals appearance since '94.

Still, I won't be too unrealistic. In fact, I'm gonna put £20 on England getting to last 8 again with a mate later...

last eight is a cop out, if you think your league is T.B.L.I.T.W.and you have an abundance of strikers, you should be looking at the final at least, truth is you know deep down it will end the same as always, class is permnament not temprorary, england bottle it, thats the truth, yes you do have talent, but Spain, Argentina, Brazil, Italy, deliver more often than not, and thier talent some how always looks more comfortable, on the ball than Englands, in the big tournaments thats class....

The only people who seems to be saying that is you & SKY TV

The reason they deliver more is because they`re latins and latins have a superior touch than most northern European players (player per player here) and as footballers they develop differently than their northern European counterparts, and this is the reason why they look more comfortable on the ball and nothing to do with English players bottling it!!! If you wanted to make an intelligent comparison then Germany or Holland would have been a better choice than Brazil or Argentina etc.

Just because a country has the best league in the world, often doesn`t mean that their national team is going to be the best in the world, surely you can see that. The only statistic here that is consistent, is that the Scottish Premier league, Rangers football club and the Scottish national team all have one thing in common...............they`re a load a shi*e.

I feel your pain, Holland perfect example, their northern European, they have an exquiste first touch, henrick larrson, the laudrup brothers, jonas thern, gudjohnsen, i could be here all night, poor excuse, the world cups not even started yet and your rolling out excuses, except it your bottlers...

Lets dissect this, firstly Holland have never won the World Cup so their great first touch is not the be all and end all!!!

As for the players you mentioned, which all come from different countries so its hardly a fair comparison.These following players all come from the same country and are/were world class: Rooney, Gerrard, Keegan, Gascoigne, Beardsley, Hoddle and Brooking to name just a few, in fact I could be here all night too.

Of the players that you mentioned, only the Laudrup brothers were world class talents, the others just good international players.

If you want fair comparisons then Holland's population isn't a huge amount more than Scotland.

How many world class players have they bought through since Scotland's last world class player in Kenny Dalglish?

charlie adam blackpool, a wand of a left foot...