Darren Bent Goes To Qatar But What About South Africa?

By Luke Edwards on Nov 12, 09 04:22 PM

What is with those oil rich nations in the Middle East? I mean anyone would think they believe they're at the centre of the earth. Oh hang on a minute, I guess geographically they are.

Actually, my rant isn't really directed at the dubious political regimes with the uber-rich oil sheikhs and burgeoning tourist industries.

It's with the England Football Association for signing up for an international friendly against Brazil just before the busiest spell of the domestic season in the seating heat of Qatar.

Normally, the prospect of an international clash with the Samba Boys, friendly or not so friendly, would be an thrilling one, but this just reeks of stupidity and greed.

England wanted Brazil to be the first visitors to the new Wembley, Brazil agreed but insisted England came to play them in the Middle East in return.

Now that would have been just about explainable if it happened at the end of the season, but in the middle of the season when winter's cold grip is starting to tighten and the more sensible leagues across Europe decide to hibernate for a few weeks until the worst of the weather has past? Ridiculous.

By my reckoning, Qatar is a seven or eight hour flight from London and considerably further from Rio De Janeiro.

I'm sure it will be wonderful spectacle for the Qatar people and the television companies will have few complaints about it either, but what about the players?

This is a World Cup year, in case we have forgotten, and the last thing we need to do is put any extra strain on our top players by asking them to sit on a body-draining long haul flight to play in an Exhibition Match so that their Football Federations can get paid!

Anyway, at least someone in the England squad will be happy about the prospect. Darren Bent's call-up is richly deserved given his excellent form for Sunderland so far this season. In short, he has made it impossible for Fabio Capello to ignore him - at least for now.

But Alan Shearer was right this week. Bent is competing with Carlton Cole, Gabriel Agbonlahor, Peter Crouch, Emile Heskey and possibly even Michael Owen for two places in the squad, three at a push.

By my reckoning, Heskey will get one of them if he is fit as Capello loves him, even if he can't score for toffee (yet another expression I fail to fully understand).

You suspect Crouch is also ahead of Bent at this stage and so is Cole, so Bent is going to have to do something pretty spectacular between now and June to gatecrash the World Cup party.

And scoring lots of goals for Sunderland may not be enough. I feel Bent needs to score against Brazil to keep his place in the squad and given that he probably won't even start the game, that's a mighty tall order.

If he doesn't, he'll need injuries to one or two of his rivals to still be there the next time Capello calls a little get-together.

The door is still open, but only slightly and it could very easily be slammed into his face faster than you can say "but I didn't really get a chance to show what I can do Mr Capello.