• International football

Where would England finish in the Premier League?

Wayne Rooney led San Marino a merry dance, but there is a sub-standard feel to international football © Getty Images

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A quarter-century back - perhaps less - international football was the superior form of the game: no weaknesses in any position and every player a star. To go from club to country was the great step up in a footballer's life, in terms of responsibility, exposure, and above all, courage and ability.

The England team that won the World Cup in 1966 would have cruised to the top of the old first division; the England team that reached the semi-finals of the World Cup in 1990, driven by the inspired Paul Gascoigne, would have beaten all domestic opposition if Gazza could have kept it up.

But these days international football is the poor relation. Club football has become international - international football is now parochial. The top clubs across Europe are packed with global talent. In the leading teams there's no weakness in any position and every player is a star. As a result, many England players aren't cock of the walk at their own clubs; many aren't even the first choices for their best position, starting with the captain, Wayne Rooney.

And so the English people have become alienated from the England football team. The root cause is not, as commonly supposed, their poor showing at the last World Cup. It goes much deeper. The fact is the team has lost half its constituency. People with only a passing interest in sport used to watch England games, and practically everyone switched on for the big tournaments. But these days the names of the England players have no resonance. Non-football people haven't even heard of half of them. So they don't bother. Watching England has become rather a chore.

So has playing. At your club you're loved and cherished and usually forgiven; play for England and while there's no hope of glory, there's the ever-present danger of getting blamed for national disappointment. That's what happened to David Beckham after he was sent off in the World Cup of 1998.

The England team is no longer special. It's a step down. They serve champagne every week in the Premier League, but on the gala days of international football they give us prosecco. And something has gone out of national life as a result. The Premier League divides. It divides the nation into people who like football and people who can't be bothered with the stuff; it divides football people into their constituent tribes.

Paul Gascoigne used to put a smile on England fans' faces © PA Photos

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But international football unites. Or used to. Club football brings us Manchester Divided, but in the high days of a great World Cup we used to watch England United. Everyone had a share in the crazy dramas and the ridiculous spell of hope and dread. Everybody watched, everybody talked about it, everybody had a view, everybody shared the joy, and the shared pain of eventual defeat was also a joyful thing in its way because, for a moment, we were one. That's gone. The closest we get these days is a television programme like The Great British Bake-Off.

The ever-rising standards of excellence in club football have been a wonderful thing to behold; at least they have been for those of who like a bit of football in our lives. But it's come at a price, and the price is the football that unites us.

This is exacerbated by the fact that the staple of international football is the qualifying tournament: a format that seems to be constructed with tedium as its principal aim. The only justification for San Marino, England's first opponents of last week's double-header, is in the votes all these minor football nations carry for those who run the game.

Any domestic league programme is full of local derbies and ancient rivalries: a qualifying tournament has few fixtures with this added meaning. England's current group has no history behind it; England v Switzerland is hardly one for the neutrals, not even if you count the Swiss.

And so, during last week's England matches - the other one was against mighty Estonia, and England struggled in a clodhoppingly predictable way - I started to have Bad Thoughts.

How would England do in the Premier League?

England just don't look right for the top end of Premier League. We're used to a regular diet of top club football, so we're used to a certain standard - and England aren't it. A little rough around the edges. Above all, they lack wit. They lack the stuff that keeps bringing you back to football: the pass that changes reality like a eureka moment, the one-two that makes you believe in telepathy, the shot that seems to defy the laws of physics and biomechanics.

It's been years since England last had this quantum of magic. The last time England showed it was in Portugal in 2004 with Rooney a teenage revelation. And yet you find it every weekend among the top clubs in the Premier League. England v Manchester City? If duty had you cheering for England you'd fear for their chances.

I can't see England making a top-four finish in the Premier League when they laboured to break down Estonia, even when Estonia were down to 10 men. The Champions League places look beyond their reach. The fact is, you can coach footballers to defend but you can't coach imagination. Estonia and San Marino both lacked this great quality - and so alas did England. They could offer nothing out of the ordinary. This wasn't a performance that would have Arsenal quaking in their boots, still less Chelsea.

England would be scrapping for a Europa League place and falling a bit short, though probably never in danger of relegation. Good, decent mid-table stuff: stuck in the middle with Aston Villa, Hull, Leicester, hoping - like Villa - to scramble up a place or two, hoping - like the other two - not to fall off the pace. All in all, a thoroughly worthy, hard-working side, salt of the earth, football wouldn't be football without them - but not a team you'd cross the road to watch. Not for pleasure, anyway.

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