From the index to his captain having sex: the stumble and fall of Fabio Capello

It is almost two years to the day since the now ex-England boss Fabio Capello's decline began with the ill-fated 'Capello index'. This was a weird notion where points would be awarded for the overall performance of each player, then even more bizarrely making that information public.

It is as if ever since that day things just seemed to have gone from bad to worse for the former Real Madrid boss.

He was a hugely successful manager with a CV as glowing as you could possibly want, titles in Spain and Italy, not to mention a Champions League winner. He had spells with something not too dissimilar to a who's who of European football (Roma, AC Milan, Juventus and Madrid).

For the first two years it looked like the English Football Association had finally found their man. A proven winner who was continuing that rich vein of form for his new employers.

England qualified for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa with consummate ease and Don Fabio could do no wrong. Then came the index and it all began to unravel just prior to FIFA's showpiece event.

Bad preparation

After the index, there was the decision to play England at altitude in their friendlies prior to the last World Cup, as well as base them at a training camp in Rustenburg 1500 metres above sea level in South Africa and not giving the players sufficient rest from the rigours of a Premier League season.

Graeme Souness was highly critical of such preparation. He told  The Sun: "Your body is demanding oxygen.

Your brain is telling your kidneys 'I need more EPO' which is a growth hormone which helps you produce more red blood cells, which enables you to push more oxygen through your body.

"So, for three or four weeks that's happening, so you're going down and down and down. After that, you start to recover."

The players looked laboured throughout the debacle in South Africa and Capello has to take some repsonsibility for that.

The wrong squad in South Africa

There was immense surprise and disappointment at the decision to omit Theo Walcott from his squad for the 2010 World Cup. Then news filtered through that he wanted to take Owen Hargreaves who had not started a game for nearly two years. Sir Alex Ferguson ridiculed the idea of taking his non-playing crippled midfieler. Capello eventually plumped for Gareth Barry, who also looked well short of fitness having not played for the last two months of the season.

The wrong goalkeeper

Then we had the lamentable situation regarding the number one jersey in South Africa. It was clear to all and sundry that the most talented goalkeeper in the squad was Joe Hart. Capello claimed he lacked experience, but it was the manager's fault for that lack of game time for not picking him prior to the tournament, particularly in the friendly against Ghana three months before the World Cup began.

The wrong formation

We had one decent striker going into that World Cup - Wayne Rooney (albeit his performances never lived up to expectations). The best thing to have done would be to have played Rooney up front with Steven Gerrard in support. From Gary Lineker to Michael Owen, it was clear to all the experts the way to go but our £6 million a year head coach could not spot it.

Capello claimed that English players only new how to play 4-4-2. The 65 year-old clearly hadn't watched much football in recent years as he would have seen English clubs dominate the Champions League with just one up top in something that could be described as anything but 4-4-2. Furthermore, Rooney had performed remarkable feats as the lone frontman, and Gerrard had had a similarly successful season playing as an attacking midfielder (behind Torres).

Captain not so fantastic

What I just do not get with this whole John Terry business is it was Capello who was angry with JT after his now infamous press conference in South Africa, undermining the Italian with his comments about standing up to the coaching staff.

It was also Capello who stripped Terry of the captaincy for a far less serious issue (sleeping with the ex-girlfriend of a former team-mate) than we are currently dealing with.

Then we see the Italian gifting him back the armband soon after the World Cup, and now apparently resigning as he did not want to see the Chelsea centre-half lose the captaincy once more.

Just to add to the confusion, Capello has always stated his amusement at the English fascination with the whole importance of who the captain is.

Finally on this whole JT story: why on earth has the trial been postponed until July anyway? Ron Gourlay, Chelsea's chief executive, informed the judge it would be impossible for all the necessary witnesses to appear in court due to work commitments. First of all that's rubbish. And even if it were true, completely irrelevant. You cannot skip a court appearance due to such frivolous reasons.

Anyway, I digress, Fabio's reputation, at least in England, is in tatters and the guy who accused him of 'killing' Gerrard a couple of years ago for playing the Liverpool man out of position has a stock that could not be any higher. Maybe Paul Gascoigne calling him 'Sir' Harry earlier this evening on Sky Sports was not so ill-placed afterall.

Mind games

To understand why England have improved so much during Fabio Capello's first year in charge we need to look deeper than the introduction of Theo Walcott onto the international stage or the re-invention of Emile Heskey as a fulcrum for Wayne Rooney to play off. It was all in the mind.

And the single most significant moment during Capello's reign so far came after the 1-0 defeat to France back in the spring. "I told the players I was very happy", the Italian mused. "I think the players were surprised as most were disappointed with the result but I told them that we played well for 30 minutes. If we can play well for 30 minutes against a good team like France in Paris then we can play well for the whole game I reminded them.

He continued: "We had taken a big step forward from the Switzerland game which also pleased me. Before that game (against Switzerland) we had trained very well but then when we played at Wembley in front of 90,000 fans we played badly. It was then that I realised the problem was a mental one and not a physical one.

Hearing Capello elaborate this week on the reasons why England proudly sit top of their World Cup qualifying group with a 100 per cent record was reminiscent of hearing a young Nick Faldo. When Faldo won his first senior title he realised he could win one title every year. Upon this realisation he thought: 'If I can win one title per year, then why can't I win five?' His improvement was dramatic and his mental fortitude will always go down as one of his biggest strengths.

If England are to realise their dreams at the World Cup in South Africa in 2010 then they will surely have to adopt an ability to cope with the pressure similar to that of Germany. The Germans have not missed a penalty in a competitive match since 1976. That includes shoot-outs and penalties in open play. England, meanwhile, have exited five major tournaments after their failure from 12 yards. It is likely that success in a penalty shoot-out will be necessary if England are to be successful in South Africa. Four out of the last five winners of the World Cup have had to successfully negotiate a penalty shoot-out en route.

Capello has a squad at his disposal capable of going far in South Africa but then so do seven or eight other nations. The difference between the winners and the also-rans is usually small. It is usually a mental one.