1 August 2007
John Terry: 12th Best of All Time
According to the Daily Telegraph, the current England captain is “valuably quick for a modern game so geared to speed” and earns a place amongst their list of the greatest English defenders of all time.
All this for a player who frankly has still to earn his rightful place in the England team let alone the captaincy.
Contrary to what the Telegraph may say, Terry is far from quick. Indeed he is arguably too slow to be a top class international defender. True, he is strong and has an undoubted presence in defence for Chelsea but his statistics and standing as a club defender can only have been bolstered by playing in the league’s best defensive team with the world’s best goalkeeper and behind two of the finest defensive midfielders of the era (Claude Makelele and Michael Essien).
Internationally, his run in the England team came after England lost to France in the opening game of Euro 2004. In that game, Sol Campbell was partnered by Ledley King - a stong, very fast, cultured centreback - Terry was an unused substitute recovering from injury. By all accounts, King had a superb match (his full debut) and all but nullified Thierry Henry until Steven Gerrard’s ill-advised pass back set him through on goal.
However in that England team and all since, performance in the shirt is not enough to maintain your place in the team and King was dropped for Terry for the rest of the tournament.
To date, King has yet to have a poor match when called upon with the exception of when he was asked to play in midfield against Argentina and mark Juan Roman Riquelme; out of position and against a player at the peak of his power. King has all the attributes required of a great defender and arguable IS a great defender. His only real crime is that he has no Champions League experience, something that seems to be an all-consuming factor for England selection even though the stresses and attributes required for the two competitions are wildly different. This dreadful inherited blight on the England team is why people continually praise Terry, castigate Rio Ferdinand (who has never had a bad game for England) and question why Jamie Carragher never plays when King is arguable the best of the lot AND proven.
Terry in contrast has yet to have a good match for England. It could be argued that his captaincy has also been surprisingly weak. The assumption was that he was cut from the same cloth as Tony Adams yet for a player unable to change the course of a match with his drive and ability such as David Beckham did, it is becoming increasingly worrying that his vocal leadership goes missing when he pulls on the England shirt.
Perhaps he realises that not only does he deserve neither his position in the team nor the honour of the captaincy but that he is presiding over one of the poorest and most derided England teams in recent memory.
Still, he can console himself that even though he is slow, a poor international performer and an even worse captain that someone thinks he is worth paying £135,000 every singe week.
