When Guus Hiddink takes his seat on the touchline
at Wembley on Wednesday night and glances across at the England bench,
he will see the ghost of Euro past.
Terry Venables is to Hiddink what Marley was to Ebenezer Scrooge, and
he is coming back through the mists of more than a decade to haunt the
manager who is foretelling England's doom.
Hiddink has been making a lot of presumptuous noise about how his adopted
Russians will eliminate England from the European Championship before
next summer's Finals in Austria and Switzerland.
His first sight of Venables at work since he last brought a team to Wembley
is more likely to make him shudder.
Hiddink came to the 1996 edition of this continental tournament brandishing
Dennis Bergkamp at the sharp end of a high-class Holland team. He left
Wembley chastened by a 4-1 defeat which ranks as the most stunning performance
by England in the old or new Wembley since the World Cup glory day 30
years before.
When it was over, the Dutch master-coach sought out Venables and congratulated
him on being the first rival tactician to outwit him so comprehensively.
Coming from one of the most formidable egos in the international game,
that was an extraordinary compliment. Hiddink went further in public,
expressing astonishment that the man who took England to within a penalty
shoot- out against Germany of reaching the Euro '96 Final had been discarded
by the Football Association.
Hiddink has his own score to settle with the FA, who bungled their approach
for him to succeed Sven Goran Eriksson. However, the return of Venables
as Steve McClaren's No 2 will disturb his memory.
On his subsequent travels to World Cup semi-finals with his native Holland
and Korea, followed by his run with Australia to Germany 2006, where only
a referee's decision denied him an historic upset of Italy's eventual
champions - Hiddink has favoured a system based on a back three plus two
attacking wing backs.
Venables blew that defence wide open - and with it the illusion that Hiddink
was a practising disciple of the Dutch religion of 'Total Football' founded
by the great Rinus Michels.
Challenged by an unexpected conundrum, Hiddink's Holland did not have
the flexibility to find a solution. Venables stretched them by keeping
Steve McManaman out right, unhinged them by alternately shunting Teddy
Sheringham deep or wide on Alan Shearer's left. England's SAS strikers
scored two goals apiece.
Not that Hiddink can be certain that England will utilise the same ploy
this time. A wily old fox, as Venables acknowledges him to be in his newspaper
column, Hiddink has modified his basic strategy to suit players less gifted
than the Dutch. This week's Russians are technically superior to the Koreans
or Australians, but not good enough for their manager to take his chances
in an open game against England.
They will play it tighter than his old Dutch side. Rather than gamble
by attacking heavily along the wings, Hiddink asks his central striker
to make angled runs out wide. This enables him to keep the core of his
team focused into an intense midfield.
Nevertheless, the key for England turns on compelling Hiddink to retreat
from a back three into a back four by using three outright forwards. Shaun
Wright-Phillips, by accidental good fortune, is more of a natural than
David Beckham for pushing up from the far right of midfield to do a McManaman.
Emile Heskey, however, was tried unsuccessfully by intervening England
managers in the Sheringham role against Holland, and he may be better
continuing in a more orthodox central striking partnership with Michael
Owen.
One way of turning the screw is for Steven Gerrard to keep driving on
from midfield into the hole behind the strikers. It would have been better
if Owen Hargreaves had been fit to drop anchor in front of John Terry
and Rio Ferdinand.
Gareth Barry put in a promising creative performance on Saturday, but
he was not put under the same time and space pressure by a Wembley-awed
Israel as a Hiddink-prepared Russia must be expected to apply.
Much depends upon how extensively England's head coach is willing to draw
on his assistant's memory bank. As El Tel writes in his weekly column:
'It is not about Venables v Hiddink this time, it is about McClaren v
Hiddink.'
Having profited against Israel from the most solid, balanced performance
of his uneven tenure thus far, McClaren must feel inclined to stick with
the basic 4-4-2 formation which delivered a 3-0 win from an impending
crisis.
To reproduce a copy of the Venables masterpiece will require absolute
belief in that creation.
If McClaren needs convincing he might contemplate an unusually pale Hiddink
as the apparition of Euro '96 reappears before him.
What haunted Hiddink did next
HOLLAND (1994-1998):
After being knocked out of Euro 96 in the quarter-finals, Guus Hiddink's
team beat Yugoslavia and Argentina at the World Cup two years later before
defeat on penalties against Brazil in the semi-finals.
SOUTH KOREA (2000-2002):
Hiddink led World Cup hosts South Korea to the semi-finals after impressive
wins against Portugal, Italy and Spain.
AUSTRALIA (2005-2006):
Led the Aussies to their first World Cup for 32 years after a shootout
win against Uruguay. Beat Japan in the group stages before falling to
eventual winners Italy in the second round.
RUSSIA (From 2006):
Unbeaten so far in Euro 2008 qualifying.
,
11.09.07
Russian ladies dream about happy marriage.
Click on a photo...
