Ever since the World Cup, Fabio Capello has been transformed from the saviour of English football to a lame duck manager who people can’t wait to see the back of. Capello is ferociously vilified in the press and some sections of English support, still furious at the appalling display given by some of the supposedly best players in the world at last summer’s World Cup. But is this really Capello’s fault? Has he really done a bad job?

Let’s not forget the state England were in when Capello took over at the start of 2008. Having humiliatingly failed to qualify for Euro 2008, Steve McClaren, hopelessly out of his depth as national team boss, was unsurprisingly shown the door. The England team was in the gutter. The fans had fallen out of love with the team, the players had fallen out love with themselves.

But even more problematically for the FA, there was no credible replacement for McClaren, certainly no-one willing to throw their hat into the ring to take on football’s toughest job. No-one except Capello. Jose Mourinho briefly flirted with the job, before further digging exposed his “interest” as nothing more than gratuitous self promotion. With no plausible English candidate with sufficient experience or success, the FA turned to Capello.

With his impeccable club record, having won a plethora of national titles in Spain and Italy, Capello was also the only manager to publicly say he wanted the England job. There was scepticism. The fans and media were wary of another foreign boss given the controversial off the field antics from previous England manager Sven Goran Eriksson. However, with the more principled disciplinarian of Capello at the helm, there would be far fewer private life exposés on this England manager. That is one area that Capello should but isn’t commended for. His off the field antics are barely noted, the focus, quite rightly is on the football.

And in the first 2 years, Capello was a hit. England were revitalised, cruising through their World Cup qualifying group in impressive style, with 9 wins and just a solitary defeat coming at the end of the campaign, when qualification was already assured. Most impressively, England thrashed their Euro 2008 nemeses, Croatia, not once but twice. The manner of England’s victories whipped the press and public into a friendly. By the time the World Cup came, ecstatic fans were delirious in their optimism. There was a real feeling England could be a force to be reckoned with, and that 44 years of pain and misery were coming to an end.

Except, it didn’t. England were a lacklustre shambles in South Africa, edging out of what should have been a simple group, before being shredded by an embarrassingly superior Germany. Various reasons were banded about as to England’s abject failure.

Capello claimed his players were too tired. This has some credence; given that many of England’s players had 40 or 50 games in their legs already this season. But these are professional players, they play football for a living. So fatigue shouldn’t be an excuse, the players should have been extra prepared for last season, knowing that it would be extended by a few months. The FA should take heed from this and start the season a couple of weeks early in the season’s of a major championship.

There were other reasons, though, as to why England failed to deliver. The press slammed Capello’s authoritarian approach in South Africa, saying players were unsettled by the draconian rules imposed during preparation. Yet was it not the press who months earlier had been praising the strict nature of Capello’s regime, saying it instilled much needed discipline to England’s ranks.

There was also criticism of Capello’s stubbornness and unwillingness to change tactics when England were struggling, most notably in the turgid goalless group stage draw with Algeria. Capello came under fire for insisting on using the 4-4-2 system, a supposedly outdated formation. But this formation had been successful previously. Undoubtedly, Capello was slow to react when England struggled. Yet he was persevering with a formation that had brought success in the 2 years previous, it was perplexing for it all of a sudden to fail in South Africa.

Yet, what has happened since South Africa? Capello has dropped the 4-4-2 for the moment, although injuries to strikers has maybe enforced England to use just one man up front. Results wise, England haven’t done too badly, with impressive victories in Switzerland and Denmark showing promise.

Inept performances against an ultra defensive Montenegro and a rejuvenated France have fuelled the anti Capello bandwagon, yet this is as low as England have sunk since the World Cup. In fact, Capello has done sterling work giving young players their chance in an international jersey. Joe Hart is now established as England’s number 1 keeper, whilst Jack Wilshere is being given the platform to demonstrate his superlative, precocious talent.

It seems strange that Capello can go from being England’s saviour to the man fans can’t wait to see leave, purely on the back of a horrendous World Cup. The players to must carry the can. Capello will step down next year at the latest, although his head maybe turned by an offer of escape from another club, perhaps in his Italian homeland.

Whilst he continues to take flak from all sides, let’s not forget just how bad things were when he took over. Fabio Capello has restored some of England’s credibility and is now at least laying the groundwork for a future England generation. He made mistakes, but then find me a manager who hasn’t, and it seems sad that, barring a massive success in Euro 2012, Capello will not get the full the credit he deserves.

By Chris Sykes