Can Club Form have a bearing on Major International Tournaments ?

Well i dint watch the match between Italy and Serbia but i heard Cassano was quite un-impressive along with Montolivo.

I am not relating these perfomances to the question i have posed above but Hypothetically speaking ,if Cassano manages to have a bad season with Milan would it possibly effect his perfomance in a two-week tournament such as the Euros considering up until now he has been quite impressive for Italy and is pretty much the focal point of Prandelli's team ?.

Well i know this is a presumptous comment to make and there is still a long way to go in the season but any instances you can think of where a certain player has had an unspectacular club season but revelled playing in an international tournament and also vice-versa.

At present only person i can think of is Miroslav Klose who had a unspectacular club season in 2009-10 but sprung to life in the World Cup.Well you can also consider that he hardly ever dissapoints for Germany but that is a seperate discussion.

Also Note that i am not talking about the Qualifiers here but tournaments like Euro and WC which is almost like a season-ending tournament.

Probably sides like Spain and Germany could get away with it as they have an incredible amount of talent but some sides do depend on their major players to deliver.

So the genuine question is could Club Form of a certain player of that particular season have a bearing on his Perfomance in an international tournament ?

And any more cases to say that it is not the case ?

Klose wasn't in bad form, he was simply benched because van Gaal favored Olic and was grooming Mueller. He's still kicking ass at Nazio

Club form will most definitely influence most international form, although some players get a huge confidence boost and perform very well in a tournament, only to go back to their usual slump form.

Schweinsteiger has always been awesome with the German NT, yet was average to good with Bayern until he was moved to a central role.

Messi

Well, IMO there are more players who are great in their clubs but not so in their NTs than the other way round, so there you could say their club form is not really relevant.

hit or miss for me. higuains good form carried over for argentina. but again this is not always the case

Forlan always performs for Uruguay......no matter how bad his club from is to be honest. He was AMAZING at the WC, then had one of the shittiest years, and again played great at Copa America

Very good question, I think it does for most players but for some they can only play good either at club only or NT.

The question was "can" it have a bearing - the answer is yes.

If the question was whether it actually does, we would have need to discuss.

I would like to hear your thoughts either way.

Yes it does usually, in the way that it affects confidence.

If a player is more confident, he always plays better. Club form only doesn't have any bearing on internationals, if the players have a good relationship with their NT coach and not with their club coach, or rather:

I think it's less about directly transferring confidence, though that does happen as well, but more about whether the chemistry between player and coach in Club and Country.

Look, we all think about Podolski and Klose when we hear shit club player, great NT player.

But they actually both never were truly shit for their clubs. Klose just didn't click with van Gaal and Podolski got screwed by Klinsmann at Bayern (was great under Heynckes' brief spell there) and then just got zero service at Cologne, even when he did actually play quite good for most of the past seasons.


Yet they both got a huge boost in confidence at the NT, first with Klinsmann who trusted Klose and wanted more youth, so he pushed Podolski and Klose. Then Löw who has noticed that Podolski always shows up in tournaments. And the German system suits them, it's built around them, in a way. Not directly, but it really favors them, that's why Gomez hasn't looked as sharp as Klose for the most part. Klose suits our system better, and that's why strikers like Müller or Podolski look better than actual wingers when playing as wingers.

So I think club form has a bearing, but it's overrated. Team chemistry and chemistry with the manager/coach is the kicker.

I would say so, for example Higuain is the type of player that tries to force things when isn't scoring regularly. Trying to kick a hole through the keeper's chest is something he does when he isn't focused and calm.

Pipa would not have scored a hat trick with Argentina if he didn't score against Espanyol a week before.

On the flip side you have guys like Forlan who play well with their NT regardless of club form, perhaps due to the fact he feels he doesn't have to prove anything with his NT and can just focus on playing.