From today's Guardian.
Is Jamie Carragher England's best defender?
"Jamie Carragher is the supporting actor who keeps stealing the film. And yet the Academy refuses to acknowledge him in an appropriate fashion. No matter how many times Carragher defies the world's greatest attackers, the praise he receives remains resolutely patronising and faint - as if the only reason he excels is because Liverpool's defensive nature means he is given a showy role as the backs-to-the-wall hero.
If it was that easy, everybody would be doing it. All evidence gathered over the last three seasons of the Champions League, football's most relevant genre, suggests that Carragher is a defender of the truest substance. Paradoxically, he is one of the best defenders in Europe and yet only the fourth-best in England, behind John Terry, Rio Ferdinand and Jonathan Woodgate (or, before him, Sol Campbell). Carragher has always lurked in the shadow of Terry, apparently the Stuart MacGill to his Shane Warne; even in 2005, when he inspired Liverpool to the Champions League, it was Terry who was won Uefa's Best Defender award. Yet his performances against the very best sides have been of a consistently higher standard.
Terry was poor at Euro 2004, modest at last year's World Cup and, while Carragher is neither in credit or debit internationally due to lack of exposure, his performances have been more three-dimensional, more sentient, in Europe: Terry, so happy taking up his position at the front post and heading balls away all day in the Premiership, has been given the runaround on more than one occasion, particularly by Barcelona, and even famously lost a battle of strength with Ronaldinho at the Nou Camp in Chelsea's aggregate defeat a year ago.
Last night, Carragher won the battle of strength - physical and mental - so emphatically that he had broken the will of the world's best attacking unit inside the game's first quarter. He does not have pace, but then nor does Terry, and his combination of sixth sense (there is a reason he makes so many last-ditch challenges, and it's not only because he's slow), psychological resolution, furious concentration acute tactical awareness and - yes - backs-to-the-wall heroism make him a truly formidable opponent.
Indeed, given the concentration lapses which continue to compromise the superior talents of Rio Ferdinand, there is an increasingly compelling argument that, at the very, very highest level, Carragher might just be the best English defender around. But the cognoscenti - and the England management - are unlikely to ever recognise him as such."
I know who i'd rather have in my team.
Carra
Is Jamie Carragher England's best defender?
"Jamie Carragher is the supporting actor who keeps stealing the film. And yet the Academy refuses to acknowledge him in an appropriate fashion. No matter how many times Carragher defies the world's greatest attackers, the praise he receives remains resolutely patronising and faint - as if the only reason he excels is because Liverpool's defensive nature means he is given a showy role as the backs-to-the-wall hero.
If it was that easy, everybody would be doing it. All evidence gathered over the last three seasons of the Champions League, football's most relevant genre, suggests that Carragher is a defender of the truest substance. Paradoxically, he is one of the best defenders in Europe and yet only the fourth-best in England, behind John Terry, Rio Ferdinand and Jonathan Woodgate (or, before him, Sol Campbell). Carragher has always lurked in the shadow of Terry, apparently the Stuart MacGill to his Shane Warne; even in 2005, when he inspired Liverpool to the Champions League, it was Terry who was won Uefa's Best Defender award. Yet his performances against the very best sides have been of a consistently higher standard.
Terry was poor at Euro 2004, modest at last year's World Cup and, while Carragher is neither in credit or debit internationally due to lack of exposure, his performances have been more three-dimensional, more sentient, in Europe: Terry, so happy taking up his position at the front post and heading balls away all day in the Premiership, has been given the runaround on more than one occasion, particularly by Barcelona, and even famously lost a battle of strength with Ronaldinho at the Nou Camp in Chelsea's aggregate defeat a year ago.
Last night, Carragher won the battle of strength - physical and mental - so emphatically that he had broken the will of the world's best attacking unit inside the game's first quarter. He does not have pace, but then nor does Terry, and his combination of sixth sense (there is a reason he makes so many last-ditch challenges, and it's not only because he's slow), psychological resolution, furious concentration acute tactical awareness and - yes - backs-to-the-wall heroism make him a truly formidable opponent.
Indeed, given the concentration lapses which continue to compromise the superior talents of Rio Ferdinand, there is an increasingly compelling argument that, at the very, very highest level, Carragher might just be the best English defender around. But the cognoscenti - and the England management - are unlikely to ever recognise him as such."
I know who i'd rather have in my team.
Carra
RAFA 
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