View Single Post
Old 21st April 2008, 08:11   #18 (permalink)
Tribec
Reserve Team Player
 
Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: Out and Proud of it.... I'm a Red and I'm from Salford.
Posts: 2,062
Bruce was a similar type of player to Vidic in the present, and Kevin Moran before him, would put his head, body, legs into situations he shouldn't and win the ball, and possibly end up hurt.

Pallister on the other hand was a cultured defender, a more elegant version of Paul McGrath, though I'm not sure he was better than the Black Pearl. Pallister is easily comparable to Rio today.

It is one of the glaring omissions from English football history that Bruce didn't get at least one cap. However, looking back at the time we (England) were fortunate to have a quite a crop of centre halves. If we look at the 1990 World Cup, England took Butcher and Walker as the number one partnership and at the time they were clearly the best we had. Adams, Pallister and Mark Wright were around the fringes of the team at the time which made it hard for Bruce to get into the squad. Once Butcher quit after 90, the four already mentioned had the position tied up. Walker's last game was 93 for England, however by that point, Keown had come into the squad, and not long afterwards Campbell, Southgate and then Ferdinand. At some point, with Injuries Bruce should have had a call up, but he was just unfortunate that he was playing when the depth in terms of centre halves was quite deep.
Tribec is offline   Reply With Quote