Can you pick a better England team from those playing every week?

I've been looking at the next England squad for the upcoming internationals in October and there are more and more problems mounting for Roy Hodgson in his future selections. Only ten to fifteen years ago Sven Goran Eriksson would see a player playing for a Champions League team as the main criteria for being selected for the team, if not the squad.

We haven't got a great record in this year's Champions League as it is, especially after last night's poor showing by both Arsenal and Chelsea, but even ignoring that fact we have a very small pool of players that are starters for Champions League teams. For that matter we have very few players that are starters for Premier League team at the moment.

Below are the players that could be possibly considered as England internationals that actually started for their clubs in the last round of Premier League fixtures-

Manchester United
Chris Smalling
Michael Carrick
Wayne Rooney

Manchester City
Raheem Sterling

Tottenham Hotspur
Kyle Walker
Eric Dier
Harry Kane

West Ham United
Carl Jenkinson
James Tomkins
Aaron Cresswell

Arsenal
Theo Walcott

Leicester City
Jamie Vardy

Everton
Phil Jagielka
Ross Barkley

West Bromwich Albion
Saido Berahino

Crystal Palace
Scott Dann

Liverpool
Nathaniel Clyne
James Milner
Daniel Sturridge

Aston Villa
Scott Sinclair
Jack Grealish

Southanpton
Ryan Bertrand
James Ward-Prowse

Swansea City
Jonjo Shelvey

Chelsea
Gary Cahill

Newcastle United
Jack Colback

Stoke City
Jack Butland

Now, of course this is a snapshot and it ignores players such as Joe Hart (slight injury worry) and the likes of Phil Jones, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Keiran Gibbs that suffer with rotation at their clubs.

I'd like to think that being first choice for your team is a pre-requisite for selection for the national team, and based on that criteria here is my England team for the next internationals, whilst looking to the future.

Jack Butland
Nathaniel Clyne
Gary Cahill
Scott Dann
Aaron Cresswell
James Milner
James Ward-Prowse
Jonjo Shelvey
Raheem Sterling
Jamie Vardy
Harry Kane

I know that there's a lot of attacking intent in this team, and I'd look to a 4-3-3 formation with Vardy and Sterling working back along the wings to provide cover for the midfield three of Shelvey, Milner and Ward-Prowse. I think that we need to get over the early hurdles at European Championships and World Cups and this consistent failure is because of a few reasons-

Too little competition then too much competition
We have gone through many qualifying competitions where we've had no real opposition to stretch us and make us think about how we approach games and play the game. WE then go from this straight into a competition where we play good teams and fail. The FA has tried to deal with this for the upcoming European Championships by setting up friendlies against Spain and France and reports of friendlies against Germany and the Netherlands. I think that's all we can do as a nation to prepare. But we need to take the friendlies seriously and out out our best team, play competitively and try to win.

Not enough preparation time
This is a problem that's brought about by the popularity of the game and the money-making activities of the Premier League and the Premier League clubs. Chasing the dollar by having post-season tours, pre-season tours and friendlies does damage the quality of the product by increasing the quantity. This is going to have to be part of a root-and-branch review of the game at the top level and something will have to give - either the FA Cup, the League Cup, the Europa League, dropping the number of teams in the Premier League or limiting the off-season activity of clubs. I can't see any of these things happening.

Picking players that play
This is the idea from the list above. I have looked at players that play football for their clubs week-in, week-out as potential representatives of their country. There are 27 players in my list above and they would make a reasonable international squad. More importantly they would make a squad of players that are playing football at the top level in the country and you can filter the 27 down to the 11 with the best form to move the country forwards. I always liken the situation to the way Greece won the European Championships in 2004 with a team of "nobodies." But they were a team that worked hard together, knew their game plan and won by playing to their strengths.

We can do this with the work-rate of Vardy, the speed of Sterling, the goals of Kane and the possession of the midfield 3. If Greece did it, then why can't we?

Deadline day approaches - what does it say about the fans?

I blogged much earlier in the Summer and said that it was the start of the silly season. As the last season closed and teams were deciding what players they would discard and where the holes were in their squad, it felt like the silly season. As 1st July came around and clubs could officially announce their new signings, it felt sillier. I have no word to describe the period that's about to arrive - transfer deadline day. The business that's done in the last day, as clubs engage in brinksmanship - whoever blinks first loses money - is amazing.

In a world where players have no concept of the type of salary that the fans live on, they and their agents fight over the extra few grand a week or a better goal bonus that eventually makes little difference to their existence. Clubs that squander millions of players that turn out to be flops, squabble with other clubs about the different valuations each carry for a player. The selling club overvalues heavily, the buying club undervalues heavily and the player can get left in the middle. Where else would you force someone who doesn't want to work for you to stay and "become part of out future" or "stay and fight for your place." Not that the players are slaves to the clubs - far from it.

So we head towards the final day and Sky Sports are already hyping it up, with talk of world record, British record and club record transfers. With some heavy spending by the two Manchester clubs, Chelsea and possibly a big deal to come from

Arsenal the spending this Summer may top £1 billion. Is this the way that the world wants to spend it's money?

But after all that we, the fans, love it. We love the drama of the transfer window, the speculation about who we are going to buy, who might be in for one of our players or who we might have just missed out on. The figures seem to pass over out heads. A player that we have booed relentlessly when they played for another team is suddenly one of our heroes and the short sales go through the roof. The word that is often attached to football fans is "fickle" but I see it as something different to that altogether.

At any club, the average time a player or a manager stays there is probably now down to under 3 years. A fan is there for life, and has to adapt to the changes in chairman, director of football, manager and players. The fans will often support the club that their father and grandfather and so on supported. The lineage often goes back as far as the club itself. This is the opposite of fickle - this is long-term dedication from people that work hard all week to put their hand in their pocket for a few goals, a pie and a pint.

As the silly season gets to it's silliest point, I ask the clubs to keep their fans dreams alive. It's often these dreams that get us through the rest of our lives.