Subject: »[NT] group play game 2: Lietuva

People want bigger challenge. USA has even better potential, than England imo. Not a worse team at all. Maybe has even better players. And England have been in semis in last two World Cups, that might be one reason there are so few people interested. English managers expect more from their team, that puts the new coach under pressure too. Of course those who might be interested, those more known managers know that it`s really hard to get elected in England.

Finally, at least for me it`s no fun to be a NT coach of a strong country. The main reason is that qualification phase is boring. Where`s the fun beating i.e Singapore 15:0. If I finally decide to run anywhere where is a strong team, then only after qualification season. That`s more difficult though.

I tend to agree, England have consistently over-achieved over the past six seasons. We have reached the world cup final & now under my reign two semi-finals.

Any new manager taking on the England role knows that they are going to be fighting a losing battle to keep their reputation intact. They have to reach the semi-final or further in the world cup against better sides in order to compare favourably.

However, in the USA the situation is reversed. With what would appear to me to be a stronger set of players USA have never really performed in the world cup & are certainly lower than they should be in the world rankings. The appeal of entering the USA NT with relatively low expectations is certainly higher, all you can really do is improve.

more like youre more comfortable with an NT where the bar is set unbelievably low that its a win-win situation for you =P

we used to do well before the grimy fribbage came.

Nah, where is the fun if I would take Eesti to World Cup semis for example. Everybody already expect Eesti should go very far. But with New Zealand I can keep low profile and it`s bigger challenge to play against favourites:)

right, no one blames you for a loss but all the credit in the world for an upset