WASTE of space or invaluable exercise?

Whether you side with Alex Ferguson (I refuse to call him Sir) or Sven Goran Eriksson in regard to last week's England friendly, wasn't it great to see David Dunn finally win his first senior international cap after months of speculation?

It's made my blood boil to see second rate midfielders like Trevor Sinclair, Frank Lampard and Joe Cole (on the evidence of his last couple of performances) all get the chance to showcase their 'talents' ahead of Dunny in the international arena over the last 12 months.

It's no coincidence, is it, that each of the above three players all play for fashionable clubs in the London area.

Their cause has been trumpeted by the southern-based (or should that read biased?) media and the powers-that-be in Soho have all been taken in by it.

For all the hype surrounding Cole, can someone tell me exactly what he's done at international level to justify all the press attention?

Yes, he has a few tricks in his locker but so does Paul Daniels so maybe we should call him up for the forthcoming European Championship qualifier in Slovakia.

As far as I'm concerned, he's nothing more than a circus act at this moment in time and until he starts producing the goods week in, week out he should be discarded from the squad altogether in favour of a proper midfielder.

The same could also be said for Lampard, too.

When I looked up his international record yesterday I was astonished to read he had already won seven caps because I can't for the life of me remember him doing anything of note in an England shirt.

At times he has shown he can be a competent Premiership performer but he's a long way off the standards required to compete at the very highest level.

That brings me nicely onto Sinclair, who is arguably the worst of the three.

The only England shirt he's been fit to wear over the last 12 months is a replica one for he's one of the most overrated players I know.

If England are to move forward then Eriksson must start looking to the future now and that means consigning some dead wood to the past.

It's time for people like Seaman, Sheringham and Keown to move over and make way for the new generation.

By that I mean Dunn, Alan Smith, Paul Robinson and, dare I say it, John Terry.