Franz Beckenbauer has hit out at how England play football or don't play football and has said that English football has gone backwards into the "bad old days of kick and rush" football.

The thing with Herr Beckenbauer is, he'll say something completely different next week and last week he was saying how he thinks England are one of the teams that can win the World Cup.

"What I saw of the English against the USA had very little to do with football. It looked to me as if the English have gone backwards into the bad old days of kick and rush." Beckenbauer said in South African newspaper The Times.

"I am not sure if the England coach Fabio Capello can still change much there. The English are being punished for the fact that there are very few English players in the Premier League as clubs use better foreign players from all over the world."

There is no doubting the man has pedigree. He was a fantastic defender who pretty much won everything in his playing career and didn't do that badly as a manager - winning the World Cup with Germany and the Bundesliga twice as well as the UEFA Cup, but these days he is best knows as a football politician and while you have to take notice of what he has said, there might very well be a reason why he is saying it.

England have played one game and nobody can sensibly base an opinion on England on one game, but is he right or is he just squaring up for a bit of free publicity?