| Always deemed by England coaches to be too much of a luxury player to adapt to England's work ethic on the international stage, Southampton's loyal playmaker and talisman Matthew Le Tissier was nevertheless given a handful of opportunities, even though Paul Gascoigne's awful run of injuries in the early 90s, which had left his country desperately short of creativity, had finally come to an end. Le Tissier's importance to Southampton and football in general can never be overestimated, but there was always a feeling that he was a little too much of an individual for a team based on collective responsibility, and that he would be found out when playing alongside against men of equal stature within their own positions on the park. Le Tissier's stop-start England career ultimately became a nonentity. He started by coming on as a sub for Gascoigne against Denmark in 1994 in Terry Venables' first game in charge and made two more ineffectual sub appearances before an experimental team was put out by Venables at the end of the year against the Romanians (see photo above). A 1-1 draw was satisfactory but Matt still looked a little out of place. As his club form continued to hit heights few would ever be able to match, Venables kept trying him, but Le Tissier's big chance on a big scale was blown by the riotous England fans in Dublin who forced an abandonment. Venables didn't pick the Southampton man again but successor Glenn Hoddle, maybe seeing something of his own frustrated England playing career within the mistrust of Le Tissier's talent, gave him a start in his opening game in charge and he responded well as England overpowered Moldova 3-0 in the first qualifier for the 1998 World Cup. England won their next two qualifiers without Matt, but the deep thinking of Hoddle calculated that the Southampton star was a worthy replacement for the unavailable Gascoigne when Italy rolled into Wembley for the biggest qualifier of the lot. England lost 1-0 and the inquest into the defeat involved much finger pointing at Hoddle for selecting an individualised footballer in Le Tissier against a team blessed with too much invention to take for granted. England still qualified for the World Cup but Matt had finally been marked up as a player whose laconic, indisciplined style didn't suit the very highest level of the game, and he wasn't recalled. (Matthew Rudd) |