On Friday evening, Rio Ferdinand made headlines around Europe as his chat as part of the BBC's NFL coverage shone light on something that had been bothering English football fans for some time; why did the 'golden generation' of English football fail to achieve anything?
It was an interesting point from Ferdinand, that club loyalties had made the England camp an awkward an uncomfortable place to be, and having revealed that his personal relationship with Frank Lampard had deteriorated as a result, it was clear that he was not the only one who felt that way.
As Lampard joined Ferdinand and fellow former England teammate Steven Gerrard in the BT Sport studio for Liverpool vs Chelsea on Saturday evening, the topic arose once again.
Both Lampard and Gerrard agreed with Ferdinand's assessment, and the chat made for an interesting watch as three players described how awkward things would get at mealtime with players tending to only sit with their club teammates.
Gerrard: I think it was more of respectful relationships at England, rather than a bond, rather than a closeness where there was love there. When I spoke to other internationals when I played, your Coutinhos and stuff, they can't wait to go away with Brazil. It's the best 10 days of their season.
Whereas, you didn't really get that feeling with England. You were looking forward to the games, but everything else around the games was a bit like... *groans*
Ferdinand: The only thing they [England managers] did try and do was the table situation. We used to get four or five tables, you'd have a Man Utd table, a Liverpool & others table, a Shearer and his table, do you know what I mean? It was different, it was weird.
So what they did was make it one table at dinner times, it was one big table.
Lampard: Then there was a Man Utd end to the table!
It sounds fairly grim.
Gerrard also argued that their teams didn't "achieve nothing" as he claimed that they reached quarter-finals and lost on penalty shootouts, something he suggested England fans would take nowadays.
With Ireland, it's absolutely clear that there is a tremendous togetherness about our players, in fact, opposition teams and managers often say it's the one thing that makes us a dangerous team, but while those England sides were blessed with talent, they were always missing something.
