Hodgson Backs Zamora For England

[rijit]

No 1 , for me has to be james. Cant see anyone else capable of the job.

And with Rooney probably Heskey. he has got his issues, but at the moment, for me, He's the best of the biggies.

Im not 100% happy with either of them but they both really do seem to be at the moment the best of the bunch.

[rijit]

Dont think hes gone backwards, just had a few injuries and missed the early part of the season. However hes got the jersey back now and although fabi boy is ok, cant see him dislodging him.

I do, you don't....

Who would you have as England's number 1 & Rooney's Strike Partner ??

Only saw the 1st half yesterday, , so I don't know alumina what he was like in the second half, but from what I

saw, he didn't particularly inspire confidence. So you maybe right, and it may take him a while to get to where he was b4.

[Jockstar]

If he qualifies to be an English ( British ) National then why wouldn't we utilise it ??

It's not as if we're blessed with a great group of Keepers, but i think he's gone backwards as a Keeper to this Year..

I think you find that there is actually an agreement between the home nations of the UK about this. It was brought up recently about Nacho Novo playing for Scotland. I'll see if i can find it.

[Jockstar]

England National Football Team Player Eligibility

The concept of national team eligibility continues to elude some fans. Take this exchange, for example, on TalkSPORT’s Scottish phone-in when goalkeeper Antii Niemi still played for Hearts (borrowed from Jason Burt’s “The Sweeper” column in The Independent, 1 January 2003):

“Caller: I'm a Hearts fan and, fair enough, Stephen Pressley gets a game for Scotland but what I can't understand is why [national coach Berti] Vogts never picks Antii Niemi.

“Host (former footballer Arthur Albiston): Eh? Sorry?

“Caller: Why does he never pick Antii Niemi for Scotland?

“Host: It's because he's Finnish.

“Caller: What?

“Host: Antii Niemi is Finnish.

“By now enraged caller: He's not Finnish! He's only 28!”

Several famous footballers played for more than one national team in the old days. Italy’s World Cup-winning sides of the 1930’s featured the so-called oriundi, South American players who had played for the national team of their native land but whose Italian ancestry also made them eligible to play for the azzurri. Later, in the 1940's and 1950’s, Alfredo Di Stefano, indisputably one of the two or three greatest players of the century, played for three national sides—his native Argentina, Colombia after his move to the renegade league in that country and Spain after he joined Real Madrid, although the Colombia matches were deemed unofficial because the Colombian association was on the outs with FIFA. Di Stefano’s Real Madrid teammate, Ferenc Puskas, starred for his native Hungary in the 1940's and 1950's and then went on to play for Spain in the early 1960's after the Soviet suppression of the Hungarian Revolution in 1957 led to his exile from his homeland. And Ladislao Kubala, a forward of wonderful skills voted the greatest player in FC Barcelona's history in 1999, appeared for three national sides from the late 1940's to the early 1960's--Czechoslovakia, his native Hungary and Spain.

We’ve posted a list of the four England players who have appeared for other national sides in official international matches elsewhere on this website. The list also includes four other England players who made appearances for national selections in unofficial matches.

In the early 1960’s—we’re still looking for the precise date--FIFA put an end to this era of relatively free country-swapping. It enacted what became Article 18 of the Regulations Governing the Application of Statutes. Article 18, which has itself been replaced effective 1 January 2004, provided:

“1. Any player who is a naturalised citizen of a country in virtue of that country's laws shall be eligible to play for a national or representative team of that country.

“ 2. If a player has been included in a national or representative team of a country for which he is eligible to play pursuant to §1, he shall not be permitted to take part in an international match for another country. Accordingly, any player who is qualified to play for more than one national association (i.e. who has dual nationality) will be deemed to have committed himself to one association only when he plays his first international match in an official competition (at any level) for that association.

“ 3. The only players exempt from this provision are those whose nationality has been changed not voluntarily but as the result of an international decree either granting independence to a region or ceding part of one country to another.”

Two things are noteworthy here. First, FIFA leaves the question of naturalisation to the laws of its member nations. If the player is deemed a citizen under a particular country’s laws, he is eligible to play for that country’s national side. FIFA does not care if a nation grants citizenship on the basis of parentage regardless of place of birth. Nor does it care if a country refuses to grant citizenship on the basis of parentage alone. To that extent, then, eligibility for a country’s national team is left up to the naturalisation laws of the particular country. Second, the custom has been to regard "official competition" as excluding friendly matches even though all games between the senior teams of two countries are regarded as official matches and certainly constitute competition. But once a player has participated in a competitive match as so defined for one national team, he is not free to play for another national side in the absence of the special circumstances set forth in section 3, which was designed to cover situations like the breakup of the former Soviet Union, Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia.

FIFA made a wholesale revision of its statutes and regulations at its Extraordinary Congress on 19 October 2003. It rewrote the entire article on "Eligibility to play for Association teams," renumbered it and provided a procedure for players to change their national team affiliation. Article 15 of the Regulations Governing the Application of the Statutes, which took effect on 1 January 2004, now reads:

"1. Any person holding the nationality of a country is eligible to play for the representative teams of the Association of his country. The Executive Committee shall decide on the conditions of eligibility for any Player whose nationality entitles him to represent more than one Association.

"2. As a general rule, any Player who has already represented one Association (either in full or in part) in an official competition of any category may not play an international match with another Association team.

"3. If a Player has more than one nationality, or if a Player acquires a new nationality, or if the Player is eligible to play for several Association teams due to his nationality, the following exceptions apply:

"(a) Up to his 21st birthday, a player may only once request changing the Association for which he is eligible to play international matches. A Player may exercise this right to change Associations only if he has not played at “A” international level for his current Association and if, at the time of his first full or partial appearance in an international match in an official competition of any other category, he already had such nationalities. Changing Associations is not permitted during the preliminary competition of a FIFA competition, continental championship or Olympic Tournaments if a player has already been fielded in a match of one of these competitions.

"( Any Player who has already acquired eligibility to play for one Association but has another nationality imposed upon him by a government authority, is also entitled to change associations. This provision is not subject to any age limits.

"4. Any Player who wishes to exercise this right to change Associations shall submit a written and substantiated request to the FIFA general secretariat. After submitting the request, the player is no longer qualified to play for his current Association’s team. The Players’ Status Committee shall decide on the request. The committee’s decision may be brought before the Appeal Committee. The Regulations for the Status and Transfer of Players contain more detailed provisions.

"5. Any Players who have already had their 21st birthday at the time of implementation of these provisions and who fulfil the requirements in par. 3 (a) are also entitled to submit such a request to change Associations. This entitlement will expire definitively twelve months after implementation of this provision."

The major substantive change was designed to deal with repeated complaints that players had made irrevocable commitments to a particular national team by taking part in international youth tournaments when they were too young to make an intelligent decision on such an important matter and when their tender age rendered them peculiarly susceptible to pressure from others. The new provision seeks to rectify this problem by allowing a national team change in limited circumstances. It contains five limitations preventing country-shopping: the player must not yet have reached his 21st birthday when he makes the request to change his national team, he must already hold the dual or multiple nationality when he makes his first appearance in a competitive international match, he must not have appeared for the A or senior level national team of his current association, he may change his national team only once and he may not change his national team during a preliminry competition in which he has taken part. FIFA waived the age limit for making the request for the first year of the new rule's existence, thus allowing players already 21 or older to change national sides during that one-year adjustment period provided they are otherwise eligible to do so.

These general rules apply to all countries, although there is room for differences between countries because national team eligibility depends on nationality or citizenship, which, in turn, hinges on a particular country’s own nationality or citizenship laws.

The national teams of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are, however, a special case because these four “home countries” are part of one national state, the United Kingdom. There is no such thing as English, Scottish, Welsh or Northern Irish citizenship.

The associations of these four countries entered an agreement regarding international eligibility in 1993 which provides that a player holding a British passport is eligible to play for the country of his birth, the country of the birth of either of his natural parents or the country of birth of any of his natural grandparents. If the player, his natural parents and his natural grandparents were born outside the U.K., he may play for the home country of his choice. Our understanding is that once a player has played for one of the home countries, even if it is only a friendly match, the 1993 agreement precludes him playing for another home country. The FIFA rule change for players under 21 must be followed in the U.K., however. Under U.K. law, a player (or anyone, for that matter) who was born abroad becomes eligible for a British passport after five years of lawful residence in the country, and he thus becomes eligible to play for one of the home countries provided he has not played for another national side in official competition.

It remains to be seen whether the second sentence of paragraph 1 of new Article 15--"The Executive Committee shall decide on the conditions of eligibility for any Player whose nationality entitles him to represent more than one Association"--carries any effect on the U.K. arrangement. Under old Article 18, FIFA left nationality entirely to the laws of its member nations, but the new Article 15 seems to reserve a measure of power in FIFA's Executive Committee where a player's nationality entitles him to play for more than one national side.

The football associations of the home countries have long allowed young players to appear at schoolboy level for the national side of the home country in which they live regardless of whether they would be eligible to play for that country's national side at a higher level and then to switch to another home country's higher level national side provided they are eligible. Ryan Giggs, for example, played for England Schoolboys because he lived in England although he was not eligible to play for England at a higher level. Later he played for Wales' senior side, for which he was eligible through both his own birthplace and family ancestry. And Bob Wilson, the old Arsenal goalkeeper, played for England Schoolboys but later was capped at senior level by Scotland, for which he was eligible through family ancestry although he was born in England and thus could have played for England had he ever been selected.

____________________

PY

[Jockstar]

Heres an article i read a while back.

Nacho Novo should not wear dark blue of Scotland, says SFA president George Peat

The Scottish Football Association have found themselves at loggerheads with the Scottish Executive on Rangers striker Nacho Novo's eligibility to play for George Burley's team.

By Ewing Grahame

Published: 7:41PM GMT 27 Oct 2008

Blue is the colour: Nacho Novo has said he would happily play for Scotland Photo: PA

Novo, 29, would qualify for Scottish citizenship if he chose to apply, having been a resident for more than the statutory five years required by law. The Spaniard was born in El Ferrol and had no Scottish relatives when he signed for Raith Rovers from Huesca in 2001. He then moved to Dundee before joining Rangers in 2004. A cult hero at Ibrox, he claimed last week that he would consider taking Scottish citizenship if he had a chance of being selected for the national team.

The player went further at the weekend, saying that if he gave his word to play for Burley then he would turn down his native country should they attempt to select him, although no one is expecting Spanish coach Vicente Del Bosque to dispense with Fernando Torres or David Villa in order to accommodate Novo.

SFA president George Peat stressed his opposition to Novo wearing the dark blue of Scotland and was surprised to discover it was even a remote possibility.

"I think it has been blown out of proportion," he said. "The SFA policy is that there is a bloodline going as far as grandparents. After a period of residency, a player can qualify for a British passport and become eligible but that would be up to the coach.

"To be honest, I thought there was a gentlemen's agreement between the four home nations that it would go no further than the grandparents. I was surprised when I was told the other part was still there.

"We have had no suggestion that any of the other countries want to go down the passport route. I would prefer it to be by bloodline only, without a doubt. Personally, I would not go beyond the grandparent bloodline.

"It would be up to the coach but I think the general view of the SFA would be that we are not interested. I haven't even spoken to George about it. It's a matter of opinion whether it would improve the team but I can understand [our other players not being too keen on it]."

The Scottish National Party's Sports Minister, Stewart Maxwell MSP, who had helped conduct the draw for the third round of the Homecoming Scottish Cup at Hampden yesterday, vehemently disagreed.

"My view is that anyone who is a citizen of Scotland, whether they are born here, whether their parents or grandparents were born here or whether they have become naturalised citizens should be treated the same way," he said. "They should be treated fairly, they should be treated equally. If someone is a citizen of Scotland, then it is a case of whether the manager wants to pick them on the basis of their ability and experience.

"People come here from all over the world. Many of us have parents, grandparents or great-grandparents who moved to Scotland. Not all of us have lineage going back a thousand years.

"I don't believe in that kind of nonsense. I think if you pledge your allegiance to Scotland, whether it's because you were born here or whether you are a naturalised citizen, that's entirely reasonable. Everyone should be treated the same way."

When it was suggested that players who weren't good enough to represent the nation of their birth could exploit that loophole, Maxwell replied: "I'm not interested in people who want to do it for those reasons.

"It should be about people who come here, live here and decide to settle here. It should be about people who want to be part of Scotland.

"There is an issue there – but I think it would be very difficult to exploit it given the length of time you have to be in the country before becoming a citizen. It's a long-term commitment.

"The only alternative is that people are treated as second-class citizens and I don't think that's reasonable. Whatever you want to do in Scotland, you should have equal rights.

"To say that one part of our country is reserved only for those who happen to have been born here, or whose parents or grandparents have been born here, is unfair.

"In terms of equal access to the rights and responsibilities of being a citizen in Scotland, everyone should be treated the same way, whether they come here for sporting reasons, employment reasons or because they are fleeing persecution.

"Obviously it's important we get a Scottish team which is committed to the cause, people who are out there fighting for the jersey and for their country. I just believe that every Scottish citizen has equal rights and that should apply in all aspects of life."

[bangkok blue]

Just seen the Fulham Manyoo highlights.... Zamora looks class! Made one and scored one. He seems the perfect partner for Rooney, quick, lays the ball off welll and good in the air! Fabio simply has to give him a shot on this form!

[MSingh]

He was awesome yesterday, his hold up play was superb.

[rixalex]

He was awesome yesterday, his hold up play was superb.

Sadly have to agree, although not sure how much trust i would want to place in a player who so many times throughout his career has put in mediocre/poor performances. Suggests to me that either his confidence is too fragile or he lacks motivation - possibly both.

Another question is can he step up? Can't help but recall another Fulham player who was setting the league alight with his goal scoring form and whom we (United) poached in the transfer window some years back. He never did step up - not to the degree that was expected anyway. Would Zamora be any different in an England shirt i wonder?

[whichschool]

Surely on this seasons performances Bent would have to get a game before Zamora, Bents been prolific all his career Zamoras had just a few good games of late, but if you play for a London club it does help your cause.

Agbonlahor has scored a few this season he looked ok when he played for England, and he has lots of pace something England lack.

[MSingh]

Surely on this seasons performances Bent would have to get a game before Zamora, Bents been prolific all his career Zamoras had just a few good games of late, but if you play for a London club it does help your cause.

Agbonlahor has scored a few this season he looked ok when he played for England, and he has lots of pace something England lack.

[whichschool]

Surely on this seasons performances Bent would have to get a game before Zamora, Bents been prolific all his career Zamoras had just a few good games of late, but if you play for a London club it does help your cause.

Agbonlahor has scored a few this season he looked ok when he played for England, and he has lots of pace something England lack.

Tim Sherwood was speaking about this on TV last week, he never got a look in after winning the title at Blackburn but got straight in when the Yids signed him.

[MSingh]

Surely on this seasons performances Bent would have to get a game before Zamora, Bents been prolific all his career Zamoras had just a few good games of late, but if you play for a London club it does help your cause.

Agbonlahor has scored a few this season he looked ok when he played for England, and he has lots of pace something England lack.

Tim Sherwood was speaking about this on TV last week, he never got a look in after winning the title at Blackburn but got straight in when the Yids signed him.

Maybe so, but i'm not having it..

Sherwood was picked because of a new Manager ( Keegan ) & only went on to win 3 or 4 Caps anyway..

[whichschool]

Surely on this seasons performances Bent would have to get a game before Zamora, Bents been prolific all his career Zamoras had just a few good games of late, but if you play for a London club it does help your cause.

Agbonlahor has scored a few this season he looked ok when he played for England, and he has lots of pace something England lack.

Tim Sherwood was speaking about this on TV last week, he never got a look in after winning the title at Blackburn but got straight in when the Yids signed him.

Maybe so, but i'm not having it..

Sherwood was picked because of a new Manager ( Keegan ) & only went on to win 3 or 4 Caps anyway..

The press are based in London and big up London players more so then anywhere else in the country, plus the managers live there due to FA headquarters being there so inevitably its easier to watch London players, this is a well known theory outside that uncivilised city.

Hence the situation here where it was news for a few days about Zamora for England when Bent has been far better this season but lives in woolybackland where nobody wishes to visit, incidentally Roy Hodgson never said Zamora should get picked for England he said he was misquoted.

[MSingh]

Tim Sherwood was speaking about this on TV last week, he never got a look in after winning the title at Blackburn but got straight in when the Yids signed him.

Maybe so, but i'm not having it..

Sherwood was picked because of a new Manager ( Keegan ) & only went on to win 3 or 4 Caps anyway..

The press are based in London and big up London players more so then anywhere else in the country, plus the managers live there due to FA headquarters being there so inevitably its easier to watch London players, this is a well known theory outside that uncivilised city.

Hence the situation here where it was news for a few days about Zamora for England when Bent has been far better this season but lives in woolybackland where nobody wishes to visit, incidentally Roy Hodgson never said Zamora should get picked for England he said he was misquoted.

I'd say it was clutching at Straws for people outside of the civilised City ...

Bent hasn't been FAR better this Season either & was picked & played in Capello's last Game, in Doha, anyway...

Don't think the Press have any influence on Capello either, no matter where they are based.

The living aspect is of course just what it is & natural, there are also 25% of Prem Clubs in London remember with excellent access to the rest by Train, Motorway or even Air too...

[whichschool]

Don't think the Press have any influence on Capello either, no matter where they are based.

Youve got a point there, but im not backing down on 2 threads in one day.

[MSingh]

[carmine]

I have'nt read the rest of this thread yet...i've only just realised there's a football forum

Zamora is not good enough to play for England and in the domestic top flight, apart from a good run recently has never IMHO proved himself to be anything more than slightly above average at best.

Play Defoe with Rooney. Their speed combined with Lennon will cause any team problems.

Don't rate Crouch, even though we lose the height option. I am a Tottenham supporter by the way.

Forget Heskey and Owen aswell and go for braver options......there's another debate on the way!

Fortunately, unlike Sven, Don Fabio is his own man and will not be influenced and hopefully continue to make the correct decisions