I promised not to formulate a final opinion on Steve McClaren until after this little spell of international football. Well, the spell is over. And, in my mind, his career as England manager should be too.

It’s quite obvious from the displays against Israel and Andorra that what we have here is a man who is severely out of his depth. And it is equally obvious from his reaction after the Andorra match – storming out of a press conference and sitting alone and miserable on the team coach – that the pressure has got to him. He is starting to crack.

However, as much as I think he is the wrong person to be running team England, I equally can’t see any way on earth he can be replaced before the end of this qualifying campaign.

Unless he jumps ship there is no way the FA will push him. Admitting they are wrong is not something that comes easy to the FA and firing a man they only appointed a few games ago would be a real admission of guilt.

And, despite the tension taking its toll on him, McClaren doesn’t look like the sort of man who has any intention of quitting while he is behind.

There is, of course, another point which needs raising. Should McClaren go, who the devil will replace him? It’s one thing fans clamouring for Steve to be fired, it’s quite another when you ask them who should replace him.

“Erm, whatsisname would be good, mate?” was about the most intelligible answer Sky News managed to conjure up on Thursday.

No, I think that whatever we may feel or believe we are stuck with McClaren at least until the end of the year when we will either have qualified for the finals or be making plans for a quiet summer in.

So, with that in mind, maybe we should all get behind him until then and see if, with plenty of support and encouragement, we might not be able to make him the right man for the job.

Maybe not…

Fair play to Malta

They may have lost to Greece on Wednesday night but they were certainly nowhere near humiliated.

In fact, I would say it is a good measure of how far our national team has come in recent months that we can actually feel robbed that we didn’t at least take a point off the European Champions.

The rebirth, if you like, of Maltese football has been a long time coming. But, seeing the stadium nearly full and confidence flowing through the team and the fans has been worth the wait.

I just hope against hope that the current run of form is continued long enough for supporting the national team to have become a habit rather than special event.

Andorra and football

I have to take this opportunity to get something off my chest: Andorra have no place in football and should be kicked out without further delay.

If Malta are currently a shining example of all that is right about small nations playing the beautiful game, Andorra are the perfect example of all that is wrong.

It’s not that they lose just about every game they play and most by a large number of goals – you would expect that from part-timers drawn from a country with a population of just 40,000.

No, the problem is the way they lose.

I don’t think I have ever seen a team adopt such blatantly obvious spoiling tactics before. From the word go against England they were out to annoy, aggravate and act their way through the 90 minutes.

If they weren’t deliberately hurting the England players, they were pretending they had been brutally attacked by men wielding Samurai swords every time an opponent went near them.

Their number 9 – and I won’t even bother doing him the honour of looking up his pathetic name on the internet – was singularly the most disgusting, cheating, annoying footballer it has ever been my misfortune to witness.

According to Andorra’s coach – who has just signed a new four-year contract God help us – this is the only way they can keep the scores down to respectable levels against the bigger nations – by diving, feigning injury and generally winding up their opponents.

If that’s the case then let’s put them out of their misery and kick them out of international football. Stick them in the Spanish 7th division where they deserve to be.

I am all for small nations having a go. I’m Maltese so it would be stupid of me to think otherwise. But not when having a go means abandoning all football principles.

UEFA simply has to take a look at the video of Wednesday night’s game and take some retrospective action against those players who made a mockery of the spirit of fair play.

Otherwise Andorra will just keep playing the beautiful game in the ugliest of ways.

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