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Originally Posted by unitedfan
Italy and England have very different coaching mentalitys though.
In England, you see players coming to their prime very early on, as early as 20 in Michael Owen's case. Players are encouraged more at a younger age in England. Now that's all well and good (the old, "if you're good enough, you're old enough" philosophy is a good one), untill it goes to far, and those young players are thrown into matches twice every week, and not trained adequately for these circumstances. As a result, England produce more players who skip U21 level and go onto the Senior squad.
Italt, on the other hand, often take a mentality of players under 22 similar to that the English take on players under 17: they're not ready, simple as. They focus on readying the youngsters for the rigours of Senior football, later on. They are used sparingly in matches, to keep them fit for the good of prolonging their careers, beyond 29, where some English clubs (Arsenal comes to mind) would just chuck out that player. So, as a result, Italy produce players, through the system, going through U21 level and then, often very, steadily on to Senior level. Think Luca Toni, getting through U21s and then standing around for a while before beng accepted as a regular for the NT.
All in all, it means Italy ultimately end up with more quality players in each position than the English because, while the English are putting up their youngsters and then burning them out early whilst neglecting the U21s and older talents (and couldhavebeen talents), the Italians are reaping the rewards of patience by steadily churning out balanced, brilliant talents from the "system," neglecting no older talents, and getting the best, albeit eventually, out of each individual. Italians then get more competition for each position in the squad.
The English are currently content to blame this on the amount of foreign players in their top-flight league, an idea which has spread very far, it seems.
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