Football Daily | Pass the smelling salts: home nations go long in search of World Cup success

Sign up now! Sign up now! Sign up now? Sign up now!Purveyors of monster riffola such as Pantera, Mastodon and Anthrax ensured that most of the capacity crowd lucky enough to have tickets for the previous occasion Villa Park threw open its doors to outsiders left with their ears bleeding. But on Saturday, those fans unfortunate enough to sit through the first England men’s international staged at the ground since 2005 were left with metaphorical blood pouring from their eyes. While England got the job done against Andorra, Saturday’s match made for grim viewing and for all the home side’s efforts to prance, tippy-tap and triangle their way through the massed hordes of the Andorra defence, it did not go unnoticed that both of England’s goals came from the more Jurassic era approach of unceremoniously hoofing crosses into the opposition box. “The last one was more classic than the first one,” honked Thomas Tuchel of two goals that are unlikely to cross the radar of this year’s Puskás Award jury. “The last one was from the sideline, with the right foot to the second post and our No 10 arrived – Declan. I tell you the long throw-in is back, as well.”I loved Van Gaal, he was so funny. We had a lunch with all the players, wives, girlfriends, staff. He came up to Coleen and said ‘your children, they look very much like the father … he has very strong sperm’. That was the first time he met her!” – Wayne Rooney adds another dynamite Louis van Gaal anecdote to the archive via his BBC podcast.Didier Deschamps says he has cut down his France team-talks due to players being distracted by their phones. I get his point – my boss is always on about his staff paying attention and not being on their phones all the time. Hold on, he’s saying something else now too” – James Vortkamp-Tong.In case any readers were wondering how 54-year-old Terry Dunn got on in goal for Dorking Wanderers (Friday’s Football Daily), wonder no more. He didn’t play. Having been lined up to start and issued a squad number (54), Dunn missed out as the club secured an emergency temporary loan for Barnet goalkeeper Joe Wright on Saturday morning. Wanderers went on to beat AFC Totton 2-1, while we all wonder what might have been” – Ian Castle.A doff of the cap to Tommy Tuchel. I genuinely never thought a manager could exceed the boredom level achieved by Gareth Southgate but he has somehow done it. Apropos of nothing: in the first half away to Turkey on Sunday, Spain scored more goals and had more shots on target than England managed in the whole game at home against Andorra – and they didn’t rely on long throws” – Noble Francis.This is an extract from our daily football email … Football Daily. To get the full version, just visit this page and follow the instructions. Continue reading...

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