And now the biennial self-flagellation begins once again.

Another exit from a major football tournament and another round of beating ourselves up over the fact that England have failed yet again to put up a decent showing.

Given the wailing and gnashing of teeth in some quarters the only way that Greg Dyke and the Football Association’s band of blazer wearing board members will get out of this with any credibility is by dressing up as Brother Maynard and the monks from Monty Python’s ‘Holy Grail’ and wander around Wembley chanting “Italy et Uruguay domine, England squad requiem”, while hitting themselves over their heads with Brazil 2014 souvenir tea-trays.

However, what we are hearing really is the same old same old.

Everyone from junior league coaches to primary school teachers, local councillors to government ministers, and even the professional football clubs and the FA have been cited as acting as counter-productive agents in the nation’s efforts to produce a successful England team.

Also we were treated to a re-run of Chris Waddle’s rant from 2010 when England were eliminated from the tournament in South Africa.

Sadly the 2014 version was nowhere near as good and if the same pattern of progress applies to his penalty taking one can only assume his efforts from 12 yards now go about 100 feet over the crossbar.

So if we the English are really as bothered as we make out about how the national football team performs in the World Cup and European Championships every two years, then we need to stop covering the same old ground and bring in a new manifesto.

These are my suggestions for a more radical approach.

For a start the government should provide funding for a birth pack for every child born in this country.

At the birth of their offspring parents should be given a pack with some pampers, an industrial sized tub of baby wipes, a parenting guide, a football and a copy of Eric’s Harrison’s Coaching Tips.

While most people associate Eric with producing Manchester United’s talented youth teams of the 1990s, I always like to think of him as a Halifax Town legend – all the same it is essential reading.

Once a week assemblies in primary schools should be replaced with a video of a World Cup or a European Championship finals so that youngsters begin to understand the fine line between success and failure – and the gaping chasm between the England team and success since 1966.

In secondary schools students will be sent to play football on fields (could whichever government it was who took them away please give them back now?) rather than on X-Boxes, Wiis, Playstations or whatever.

As the Premier League is unlikely to change its spots any time soon and players from abroad will continue to populate our successful teams, I suggest that designated breaks for international friendlies should no longer be used for playing other international teams.

As we have so many players from other countries in our leagues, I would expect that we have plenty of chance to learn from them on a weekly basis, so my suggestion is borrowing an idea from rugby league.

The ‘international’ break weekends should be used to play a ‘State Of Origin’ between North and South.

It would make for a series of very competitive matches between two squads of England players and let’s face it who would not pay good money to watch John Terry try and kick Wayne Rooney to bits and watch those in direct competition for places like Stevenage-born Jack Wilshere and Liverpool’s Ross Barkley battle it out – and with this method that boring argument about whether Steven Gerrard or Frank Lampard should play in midfield for England that rambled on for years could have easily been nipped in the bud.

And finally, as the plethora of radio phone-ins have shown, there are a lot of people in England who believe they know how to run the team better than the England manager.

My solution to tapping into this previously untapped font of knowledge is not to remove Roy Hodgson as boss, but to replace his assistant Ray Lewington.

Lewington’s assistant role would be filled by members of public who will be selected on the same basis that the courts manage jury service.

Just as with jury service, chosen individuals must do ‘England Assistant Manager Service’ when they are asked.

When you’re sent an ‘England Assistant Manager Service’ form you must complete it and return it within seven days and once your ‘England Assistant Manager Service’ is confirmed, you must turn up on the agreed start date – if you don’t, you could be fined £1,000.

‘England Assistant Manager Service’ will be unpaid but those called up can claim for food and drink, travel and loss of earnings – great if England are away somewhere exotic but those qualification trips to Azerbaijan could be a pain, though at least it’s better than being at work!

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