What can English football learn from English cricket?

Whilst the English football team flounder, the cricket team are in the form of their lives. Cricket has a very different policy towards international squads. Where England football selection is fickle and inconsistent, cricket, whilst conservative, ultimately has a long term outlook.

It is hard work breaking into an England Cricket side. You have to prove yourself over and over again at county level and then once you are given an opportunity to play at an international level, you have to get off to the best possible chance. You don't have time to muck around and get used to the greater standard of cricket. However, once you have excelled on the international scene and you are offered a central contract, you are into the fold and that is where England's success stems from.

As was the case with the Aussies when they first introduced them, central contracts tie players to their international side and not their county. They are nurtured by the best coaches, and train alongside the same people week in week out. Of course it still remains important for them to work at a county level as well, but it is viewed as practice for a more important challenge.

In recent years, the ECB selection commitee has selected a few choice young talents from the county scene and has developed them. The first is James Anderson, who many agree to be amongst the finest swing bowlers in the world. Stuart Broad was the next to be brought in. He has almost entirely been bred by the England system and, as with Anderson, has turned out to be another great success. Most recently the ECB have opted to bring in the 21 year old Steve Finn. There's no doubt that he is a formidable talent but there are plenty out there who could do just as good a job as him.

The key for the ECB is his age. They have found a very young (by cricketing standards) bowler, suited to bowling on hard, Australian like wickets, and they're now bringing him into the team for full development. He will learn his team mates' games and train with them over the coming months. As a result of this attitude, they have built a team. They know each other and most importantly understand each other. This is not the case in football as most people are aware.

Footballers main priorities remain with their clubs who pay their wages and ensure their fitness. Admittedly an exact replica of the cricket system would not be possible in football, there's far too much money for central contracts to be introduced. What would be good to see though is a system that brought the team together far more often, not just when they have matches to prepare for. We have all seen the benefits of a team understanding each other this world cup. The Spainish squad that went on to win the competition, 19, of a 23 man squad, played in Spain. Ofcourse the English squad had a similar make up but the key was that 13 of them either played for Barcelona or Real Madrid. Even more significantly, of the starting 11 in the final, eight of them played for Barcelona and now, because of David Villa's €40 million move to Catalonia, that number has been increased further. They were team mates and knew how each one of them played played his game.

England have an opportunity to repeat this success. They have a number of talented players moving through English football. Some are young and some are not but with many of England's alledged stars are getting towards the end of their careers and most probably won't see another world cup. They need to use this new generation to really build a side. Despite Theo Walcott's poor form, he could be taken now and turned into a fully-rounded England player. Take others like Micahel Johnson, Aaron Lennon and Joe Hart and develop them so that they suit the English set up. Maybe even glance further into the future and start looking at players like Jack Wilshere. Through this a squad will grow up together and develop into a team.

It may not work, it may be a complete failure, cricket is a very different game to football. With the current state of our national sport, however, it must be worth a try.