Home is not where the heart is for Capello

Tuesday evening sees Fabio Capello’s Three Lions look to all but secure their qualification to the European Championships next year in Poland and Ukraine. It will be England’s first Euro Championships since 2004 in Portugal after their spectacular failure to qualify for the competition in 2008 which led to the Sun Newspaper claiming that the ‘summer was cancelled.’

A lot has changed since that fateful night under Steve McLaren as England was humbled in front of their home fans against Croatia. There is still one thing that seems to be hanging around from that night and that is England’s ability to perform at Wembley in front of a home crowd.

Granted that England qualified for the 2010 World Cup with a 100% home record, but recently doubts have started to creep in about England’s home performances as they look for their first win in five games at the national stadium, the last being nearly a year ago to the day.

Draws against Montenegro, Switzerland and Ghana as well as a defeat to France has left England supporters feeling hard done by. Granted that the games against Ghana and France were friendlies that allowed Capello to test new players, although the Three Lions supporters still would have expected to get their money’s worth.

Although Wembley has hosted some wonderful nights already since it’s opening four years ago, including all of the 2010 World Cup qualifying campaign, defeats to Germany and France as well as other shaky draws against the Czech Republic means questions are still being asked about England’s ability to perform in front of a partisan crowd at Wembley.

Some people will blame the players not having the experience to perform in front of large crowds regularly, one that I would dismiss myself. I feel the main reason for England’s lack of decent displays at the national stadium remain at the fault of a mix of pressure from a crowd that expect so much from their national side and also the prestigious occasion that Wembley brings with it meaning that the opposition make it so much harder for England to beat them.

England showed just what they can do with a sensational 3-0 win in Bulgaria on Friday night and the same performance against Wales on Tuesday will not only all but secure a place at Euro 2012, it will go a long way to getting rid of this monkey on their backs about playing at Wembley.

Why do you think England struggle at Wembley? Do you think people are looking at it too much? Let me know what you think.