(Agencies)
Updated: 2007-12-19 09:34

LONDON - Fabio Capello's unveiling as England soccer coach was welcomed by some, while others bemoaned the fact that the job had gone to a foreigner.

The highly respected Italian coach - who won club titles with AC Milan, AS Roma, Juventus and Real Madrid - has to transform a national side which failed to qualify for the 2008 European Championship into a contender for the 2010 World Cup.

Fabio Capello, the new England national soccer team coach, walks into the room to be introduced at a press conference, in London. Monday, Dec 17, 2007. At left is Brian Barwick chief executive of the English Football Association. [Agencies]

"Renaissance Man" was the headline in the Daily Telegraph on Tuesday, while the tabloid Daily Mirror ran a photo of Capello holding up an England shirt saying "I will make you do proud of this."

Both the Daily Mail and Daily Express used the term "iron fist" to underline Capello's reputation as a disciplinarian and the likelihood that he will take a hard line on the team's highly paid stars. He replaces Steve McClaren, who was fired last month.

Several papers quoted Dutch striker Ruud van Nistelrooy, who had a successful spell in England for Manchester United and then helped Capello win the Spanish title with Real Madrid.

"He is definitely the right manager for England. He fits the English game," Van Nistelrooy said. "He always talked about England. It was his wish to be England manager one day. He likes the way the English players are, the way they play with their hearts, the way they give everything."

With Capello signing a 4½-year contract worth a reported $12 million a year and bringing in four Italian assistants, some columnists were angry that the Football Association had not chosen an English coach.

Under the headline "we're outsiders in our country," the Mail's Des Kelly said that Monday's introduction of Capello at a London news conference was "a hideous embarrassment, a farce that demonstrated how pathetic England and its Football Association have become."

The FA has gone for its second foreign coach in three appointments -- McClaren replaced a Swede, Sven-Goran Eriksson. English managers such as Newcastle's Sam Allardyce, West Ham's Alan Curbishley, Reading's Steve Coppell and Portsmouth's Harry Redknapp were overlooked.

The problem with English soccer is that the top clubs are run by non-English coaches. Arsenal's Arsene Wenger is French, Manchester United's Alex Ferguson is a Scot, Chelsea has an Israeli in Avram Grant, Liverpool's Rafa Benitez is Spanish, Manchester City has Eriksson and Everton's David Moyes is Scottish.

Kelly said it appeared pointless for young English coaches to get FA qualifications if they stand little chance of becoming the national team coach.

"Ask yourself what an FA coach is really worth now," he wrote. "What is the point of going through all the exams and training to collect an accolade from this football association when it is clear they hold their own coaches and their own qualifications in such utter contempt?"

Capello spoke only a few words of English, doing his news conference almost entirely in Italian. His comments were translated in uneven fashion by an Italian who works with Queens Park Rangers manager Luigi de Canio.

"It was the first question in Italian that did it," Times columnist Martin Samuel wrote. "Fabio Capello gave his answer, also in his native tongue, and the nation waited for (the translator) to relay the thoughts of the new England manager. At that point it felt as if the roof had fallen in.

"The nature of the surrender was unequivocal. The appointment made by Brian Barwick, the FA chief executive, was not a victory after all, not the triumph it had been painted, but a terrible, hollow defeat. England lost, Italy won -- again. Lost the way, lost the plot, lost all knowledge of what had been invented within these shores, with no clue how to get it back."