The Premier League stands in the way of a good England side

I've been listening to a radio phone-in on BBC FiveLive this morning. From 9am the only topic has been "What's wrong with England?" This after the dismal failure of the England team who lost 4-1 to Germany in the World Cup second round yesterday.

The mood of people phoning was bleak and angry, with solutions ranging from changing the game at grass roots level to sacking the manager.

Personally, although manager Fabio Capello make some mistakes (see below), I think the problme is more deep-rooted than at managerial level. The FA thought the solution upon sacking Englishman Steve McClaren was to bring in a 'show us your medals' soaraway successful foreign manager in the form of Capello. It was patently not the right answer, and papered over the cracks of a failed system.

Capello's main errors were these:

• Took injured players to the tournament.
• Took out-of-form players not even in their club team.
• Failed to change the system when it was evident that playing Gerrard on the left and Rooney with a strike partner was failing.
• Repeatedly played or brought on the worst two players in the squad: Emile Heskey and Shaun Wright-Phillips. Neither should even have been in the squad.

However, the main problem is that the players are not good enough. There is not a large enough pool of good players for Capello to pick from. Let us banish, once and for all, this myth that any of the English players are World Class. None would make it into a Best of the World squad of 23 players.

The reason that there are not enough good English players is that there are not enough English players playing in the Premier league.

Dave Whelan, chairman of Wigan Athletic, was on the programme and said that the Premier League should run the England team. Oh My God! He then went on to say that the England team should have an England manager, and England coach. "England, England, England," he said.

The Premier League is not run by English people. In the main the clubs are OWNED by non-English, the teams are MANAGED by non-English, and the teams have mostly non-English PLAYERS. Indeed, there has even been moves to PLAY THE GAMES on foreign soil! Yet Dave Whelan says the Premier League should run the England team!

The result would be no friendlies, no gatherings, top players not released for some England games. In other words a step so far backwards it would be out of sight.

The real answer is move the other way and insist on English ownership, English managers and Englsih players.

But it won't happen. Because the Premier League (which does already hold most of the power) won't let it. Already it's too late because the owners have no interest in the England team.

Get used it to it - the England national team will be a third-rate team for decades to come.