A semi-final appearance (at least) at the World Cup or European Championships is the Football Association's stated ambition. It might not seem too demanding for a nation which has dominated this season's Champions League, but take a look at the figures.

The number of Englishmen playing top-flight football in their own country has never been lower.

To give you an idea how we compiled the numbers, we classified an 'English player' as anyone who is eligible to be picked by England.

So that means somebody like Manchester City's Kelvin Etuhu, who was born in Nigeria but says he wants to play for England, is classed as English.

However, his brother, Dickson Etuhu, at Sunderland is classed as Nigerian as he has represented his native country at international level.

It can get quite complicated and the Premier League points out that counting up the number of players is a "blunt and misleading" measure.

Its argument is that Capello needs a strong, elite group of players - and point to the fact that 10 English-qualified players appeared in the Champions League final.

It also sees youth development as the key to developing a successful England team, rather than artificially packing Premier League line-ups with sub-standard English players.

That, of course, is Sepp Blatter's solution - he continues to propose a "six plus five" quota system, where the number of foreign players would be limited to five per starting line-up.

We worked out how many of the Premier League starting line-ups last season would have met his proposal. The answer is only 18%.

However, it is interesting to note the disparity between clubs: Aston Villa met the proposed quota requirement in 36 out of their 38 matches, while seven clubs, including Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool, never achieved it.

The comparison with Scotland is also interesting. There has undeniably been a shift towards more homegrown players in the SPL in recent years, with Rangers one of the clubs leading the way.

They - along with five other SPL clubs - met the "six plus five" proposal in all of their matches. In fact, Aberdeen averaged 9.18 Scottish players in their starting line-ups last season.

And if the final weekend of the season is anything to go by, the English Premier League also continues to lag behind its main European rivals in terms of homegrown players performing at the top level.

Serie A in Italy averaged 7.3 Italians in their starting 11s on the final day and La Liga had an average of 6.9 Spanish players per team.

The Premier League, by comparison, averaged 3.9 English players in the last round of matches.

It is also worth noting that while the likes of Spain's Fernando Torres and Cesc Fabregas are plying their trade in the Premier League, England has only one high-profile footballer playing abroad, 33-year-old David Beckham in the MLS with LA Galaxy.

A leading human rights activist in China was formally arrested while his wife and two-month-old baby remain under house arrest.

Human rights issues are not new in China, but as the Olympics gets ever closer they will be brought into sharper focus.

The Beijing authorities are under scrutiny like never before - their reaction to that increased media attention could determine whether the decision to award them the Games is judged a success or a hopelessly misguided error.

They say they are constantly monitoring the situation and remain committed to protecting their 'Olympic values.'

Their calming words are unlikely, though, to satisfy those groups demanding a tougher response.

For us, as sports journalists, the Olympics are the pinnacle - an event which captures the drama of all sport like no other (only the football World Cup comes close).

As you would expect, BBC Sport will cover every aspect of the Games in Beijing , but that doesn't mean we can close our eyes to the very serious issues surrounding it - whether they are human rights, pollution or drugs in sport.

As the BBC is split into separate news and sport departments (like most media organisations), we sometimes get involved in strange arguments about whether something is a 'news' story or a 'sports' story. My own view is that it doesn't really matter how we characterise it - the most important thing is whether it's a good story and one which the BBC should be covering.

On Wednesday February 20th, the new series of Inside Sport returns with a special from Beijing - including Matthew Pinsent giving his take on the city and preparations for the Games.

The programme will, of course, focus on sport and some of the sportsmen and women aiming for gold in August, but it will also address the wider social and cultural aspects of holding an Olympic Games in China. Look out for more details on this website over the next week or so.

Also, on the dedicated Olympics section of this website, one of the BBC's news correspondents, Michael Bristow, is writing a regular 'Beijing Bulletin' - giving an insight into life in the Chinese capital.

Meanwhile Five Live Sport has been following the stories behind some of the athletes preparing to compete in August - the next 'Five Live Olympics - the road to Beijing' is on March 20th.

Ultimately, the aim must be to ensure that while we cover the sport in all its glory, we don't neglect the other fascinating, controversial and complex issues surrounding the 2008 Olympic Games.

The Daily Mirror led their front page with 'canoe-gate' for eight successive days last week and the week before, while I've given up counting how often the London Evening Standard and the Daily Express have led with the Maddie story.

But it's not just been the tabloids who can obsess about one story or another, the BBC and every media outlet have dedicated plenty of air time and column inches to both those stories.

Let's face it, they've captured the public imagination in a remarkable way.

It's the same in sport, of course. When both England and Scotland are looking for new football managers, their search is bound to dominate the news agenda.

In fact, only Jose Mourinho and his dalliance with the FA managed to knock 'canoe man' off the Sun's front page throughout most of last week.

And that's hardly surprising - for the media, the prospect of Mourinho becoming England manager was almost too irresistible to contemplate.

Somebody at Chelsea once described him as a "walking headline-making machine" (just notice how the number of
column inches devoted to Chelsea have plummeted since Avram Grant took over). Combine that with the most high profile job in English sport, and you are in sports editor's heaven.

However, when one story dominates the agenda, it can also pose important questions for every editor. Amid the feeding frenzy over whether Mourinho would or wouldn't say yes to the FA and the eventual pursuit of Fabio Capello, every other story can get swallowed up.

From the BBC's point of view, we need to cover every twist and turn in the England manager saga, but we also cannot neglect all the other sports stories around - and the bigger issues at stake.

Our report on the state of English football - and in particular the proposed National Football Centre - attempts to address some of those big issues.

Sir Trevor Brooking, the FA's head of football development, caused a stir in September when he told us the future success of the England team was under threat from the number of foreign players in the Premier League.

His comments now about producing the next generation of England footballers are equally forthright. He says England's footballing authorities have been "hugely negligent" about player development over recent years and that the decision over Burton is one of the most important in the Association's recent history.

The FA's chairman, Geoff Thompson, spoke about a 'root and branch' review of the game following Steve McClaren's sacking. However, on one issue, there seems to be a general consensus: English players just don't have the technique of their foreign counterparts.

Carlos Alberto, the captain of Brazil's World Cup winning side in 1970, knows a thing or two about the finer qualities of football. As far as he concerned, young English players have the wrong mentality - he says they don't "feel" the game.

It's a pretty damning indictment and sums up the size of the task facing Brooking, Capello et al.

For the BBC, while we'll continue to cover all the day-to-day news across all sport, we cannot lose sight of the bigger picture. With the FA due to publish its strategic review in March next year, the future direction of English football will remain one of the most important issues on our agenda.

Controversy is never far away from the Olympic Games - it's the nature of the beast - but Rogge seems to take it all in his stride.

With human rights groups calling for a boycott of Beijing, does he regret giving the Games to China? Not a bit of it.

So can we deduce that all is rosy in the IOC garden? Not quite. Rogge's messages in our interview might be subtle but they are there nonetheless.

He is positive about 2012, but the implication to Lord Coe and his team is clear enough - get building as soon as possible and get yourself an anchor tenant for the Olympic stadium.

To those who expect China to embrace liberal western democracy and all that goes with it by next summer, Rogge is equally clear - it just won't happen and you can't expect the IOC to work miracles.

And when you hear his impeccably diplomatic reply to the question of what should be done about Marion Jones' Olympic gold medal, you don't need to be a mind reader to work out what he really thinks.

The IOC is desperate to avoid the humiliation of handing over one of their prized assets to the disgraced Greek sprinter, Katerina Thanou, and you can bet they are exploring every legal option right now to escape their predicament.

For the BBC, the Olympics are hugely important. The director general, Mark Thompson, recently described London 2012 as "one of the biggest broadcasting events in the corporation's history."

Over the next nine months, we will be building up to Beijing and attempting to cover every angle - from following Britain's main medal hopes to increasing our coverage of all Olympic sports. Then, of course, from August 8th next year the Olympics will be front and centre across TV, 5 Live and this website.

But that does not mean we are just cheerleaders for the Games. It's important that we continue to put the right questions to Mr Rogge et al - and attempt to interpret their answers.

As the Games approach, the issues, controversy and debates will doubtless intensify - and so will the questions to the IOC.

Ok, it wasn't just me - Chelsea had invited sports editors from across the national media for an informal and off-the-record chat with their charismatic, and occasionally combustible, manager.

Mourinho held court for around two hours - he was captivating company...

But that was before Shevchenko, before Ballack and before anyone had even heard of Avram Grant.

The catastrophic collapse of Mourinho's relationship with Abramovich over the past 18 months has been one of the biggest sports stories around - and yet, not an easy one to cover.

I was at a wedding over the summer and one of the other guests started to have a go at me about the media's coverage of Chelsea.

To paraphrase him, he questioned why "you lot" are always going on about rows behind the scenes at Stamford Bridge but nobody is ever quoted and there are no hard facts. "How do we know it's true?" he challenged me.

As I blustered about our sources at Chelsea, I could see his expression looking distinctly unimpressed. By the end of our chat, I was reduced to telling him that the stories are true and he would just have to believe me. Not a particularly convincing argument.

But the truth is that journalists cannot just swallow the official, sanitised line - whether that's from football clubs, politicians or anywhere else. Our job is to report what's really going on and that does involve speaking off-the-record to people who don't want to be named or even quoted.

Even Chelsea have now admitted that the relationship between Mourinho and the club had "broken down" and that it has been a problem for "several months."

However, it's ironic that while Mourinho was texting his favoured players on Wednesday night to tell them he was leaving, at the same time the club were showcasing their new promotional DVD Blue Revolution in which chief executive Peter Kenyon was championing Mourinho as a true "winner."

Footballers and football officials are always telling us not to believe everything you read in the papers. I might add to that - don't believe everything you read on official websites and hear on promotional DVDs.

The other common complaint about our coverage of these types of stories is - "Why can't you just concentrate on what's happening on the pitch?"

But this story, as much as any other, has proved that matters off the pitch are inextricably linked to what happens on it.

Chelsea believe their performances were beginning to suffer because of the rows behind the scenes and you can bet the Stamford Bridge faithful will be seeing a lot more of Andriy Shevchenko now that Mourinho has gone.

The simple answer is that most people will probably point the finger at manager Steve McClaren. He will be the obvious - and perhaps easy - scapegoat for the side's failure.

But surely the truth is that England's problems go much deeper than one man.

Our report on the future of English football - as featured on Inside Sport - highlights the challenges facing McClaren and the FA as they look to build a national senior side which not only qualifies for major tournaments but occasionally wins them too.

Hang on a minute, I hear you say, isn't it Brooking's job to cultivate the next generation of England stars? Perhaps he's the man to blame if England don't qualify.

Well, no, not quite. Watching his interview, Sir Trevor seems almost powerless. He says he's virtually given up on the professional game (namely the youth academies at Premier League and Football League clubs) - and now just concentrates on grassroots football. It seems an odd state of affairs.

In his recent review into football's youth development system, Richard Lewis argued that the FA, Premier League and Football League need to come together and form a 'Youth Management Group' under an independent chairman. You can read the review here.

Whether that would solve the seemingly inevitable tension between the professional leagues and the FA, it's hard to say.

Clubs can justifiably argue that they invest millions in their academies and it's in their interests to produce exciting, young English talent. But are they really best placed to make the long-term, strategic decisions for the future of English football?

There seems to be a consensus that the Lewis review has got it just about right. It will be interesting to see whether football's powerbrokers back up his words with some action.

Take the middle of October for example: four crucial games in nine days, travelling across 20 time zones, more than 24 hours in the air and barely the chance to draw breath - let alone recover - in between.

Beckham is going to be doing more flying than Superman. And the fear for Steve McClaren and England is that American soccer’s newest super hero is heading for a fall.

Is it really tenable for a 32-year-old to play in Minnesota, then London, then Moscow and 33 hours later back in Los Angeles - all in the space of nine days (October 10th to 18th)?

The English Institute of Sport doesn't think so. It has told us that the chronic effects of jetlag are bound to affect his performance and increase the risk of injury. And if you think Beckham can coast through his club games, think again. LA Galaxy are facing their own qualification fight - to reach the end-of-season play-offs.

Their general manager, Alexi Lalas, was typically honest in his interview with us - for footballing and financial reasons, they need Becks to play in every game.

Those close to the former England captain argue that he is no different to the likes of Ronaldinho and Gilberto who manage to perform for both club and country across different continents. In fact, they say if England qualify for Euro 2008, he will be freshest man in McClaren’s squad - Galaxy's season ends in December and doesn't start again until April.

As for jetlag, a source close to Beckham politely pointed out to me that he won't be travelling at the back of a plane with kids behind him screaming in his ears.

It's a fair point - and nobody doubts his commitment to the cause or his unceasing ability to confound the critics. But if Beckham had known in January that an England recall beckoned, would he have signed up for the MLS? We'll never know but now he has to find some way of coping.

His new home is nicknamed “The City of Angels” - over the next few months, Beckham could do with a pair of wings.

When Jacques Rogge took on the IOC's top job some six years ago, he was well aware of the controversy surrounding that decision. But over the coming weeks and months, as Rogge's Beijing in-tray bulges, the spotlight on China's capital city will only intensify.

There continues to be concern about the drug-testing (or lack of it) for athletes in China - the head of the World Anti-Doping Agency, Dick Pound, will be back in the country next month to check on progress.

And now, the World Health Organisation have told us that even the health of spectators - not to mention athletes - could be at threat because of the levels of air pollution.

This is serious stuff for the IOC: imagine the PR disaster, not to mention the compensation claims, if fans start falling ill during the Olympics.

Nobody seems to doubt that the Chinese authorities will stage an impressive Games. Unlike many of their predecessors, they are determined the preparations won't be beset by last-minute building crises or wrangling over cash - some estimates put their budget at more than £20 billion.

But if the games are overshadowed by drug scandals, human rights protests or clouds of smog descending on the city, then all that money will count for nothing.

Rogge, however, remains optimistic. He claims the Games will be a “force for good” in China and that he “could not be happier” about the state of preparations.

Such public statements are typical of a man who has led the IOC with poise and admirable propriety. His sternest test, though, is yet to come.

If you haven't seen it, basically it's a list of offences ranging from theft to forgery - you can see the full criteria here.

As the League points out: “The rules go above and beyond any requirement by UK Company Law.”

Our special report on Thaksin Shinawatra this week has raised some important issues for the League, and for football fans in general.

A leading human rights group, Human Rights Watch (HRW), believes the “Fit and Proper Persons Test” doesn't go far enough. They argue that football's governing bodies should have consulted them before allowing Shinawatra to buy Manchester City. The Premier League didn't - and have no plans to - meet with them, despite a direct request from HRW.

The bottom line for the League seems to be that moral judgements are for the Government to make, and not football.

It's not a stance that everyone agrees with. Author and journalist Tom Bower wrote in The Observer this weekend that: “Football is not a utility or a bank, but part of the fabric of England, uniting so much of the nation.”

Adding: “No other country allows the crown jewels of their major sport to become the uncontrolled playthings of investors whose backgrounds remain untested.”

The Premier League would argue that's unfair, and point to their “Fit and Proper Persons Test” as an example of their higher corporate standards.

Ultimately, it will probably be an issue for supporters. If they become disillusioned with the ownership of British football, then they will vote with their feet.

Interestingly, season ticket sales at City have already topped the 25,000 mark and are well on the way to beating last year's total sale of 27,000.

Ok, that was a pretty poor attempt at irony.

Judging by your emails, some of you have been tearing your hair out about the media's blanket coverage of Becks and Posh arriving Stateside. In fact, “blanket” probably doesn't do it justice - king-sized duvet is maybe more accurate (and before you say it, I know the BBC has covered the story as extensively as everyone else).

Don't get me wrong, David Beckham joining LA Galaxy is a great story which has implications for English and worldwide football. It's also a story which we know interests a lot of our audience.

But there are many other serious and significant sports stories which the BBC should be leading the way on: corruption, drugs, foreign ownership in British football, the preparations for London 2012 - to name just a handful.

My new job here at BBC Sport is to co-ordinate our coverage of these sort of “big” stories across all our media outlets - TV, radio and this website.

I think most people would agree that Five Live, News 24 and the sport website provide pretty decent coverage of the day-to-day sports news, but do we produce enough original and distinctive journalism?

That's certainly our aim - to set the sports news agenda and focus on the important stories which matter most to you.

That doesn't mean we go all serious and highbrow - and frankly dull. Let's face it, the best stories are normally about personalities (as my first editor used to shout at me: "People are interested in people!").

And I know - just by looking at the page impressions on this website - that transfer stories and speculation float a lot of your boats.

Ultimately it is about finding the right balance in our journalism. Sport, after all, is meant to be fun and our coverage has to reflect that, while not forgetting there are some pretty serious issues at stake too.

Our reporter, Mark Clemmit, will be in the crowd at the Doncaster v Scunthorpe match to get a feel of the atmosphere.

We're also looking for listeners to phone in and record the noise from their supporters - you can get more details here.

If you listen to golf on the radio, one of the great things is that the commentator is slap bang in the middle of the crowd - and it sounds great.

So who has the loudest fans? What do you think? Just a guess, but I reckon it probably isn't a club in the Premiership.

And it's in the build up to football's transfer deadline that my cynicism levels reach their height.

While speaking to a director of communications at a Premiership football club this week, I inadvertently told him:
"The problem is that we don't believe a word you lot are saying at this time of year . . ."

He wasn't wildly impressed with my sweeping statement - until I quickly reassured him that he and his club were, of course, an honourable exception.

Our job is to try to steer a course through the games of brinkmanship, bluff and counter-bluff.

As well as the public statements from clubs, our football reporters at Five Live also speak to managers, press officers, agents and players off-the-record (in other words, not for direct reporting). The idea is to find out what's really going on.

I'm always conscious, though, that we're not being used to bump up interest in a player, inflate a transfer fee or help someone negotiate a better contract.

Ultimately, we're not a PR agency for the Premiership - and we need to scratch beneath the surface of the public pronouncements. So, when Arsene Wenger said two weeks ago that Jose Antonio Reyes would not be moving to Real Madrid - in his words the deal was "finished" - it's not always as cut and dried.

I don't want to sound too pious about this - it is only football and transfer news and gossip is voraciously devoured by most supporters.

The bottom line is we want to reflect the stories which interest our listeners, without getting stuck in endless speculation and mis-information.

At least you can't criticise Peter Kenyon for his assessment of the Ashley Cole transfer when we spoke to him at the Champions League Draw a week ago.

"It's going to go down to the wire," he told our reporter, Nigel Adderley. He wasn't wrong there.

It's my first blog entry so I thought I'd give you an idea of an average day for me, how decisions are made and how our reporters chase (and hopefully break) stories.

Basically, it's to make sure we're leading with the right story, not missing anything and to check if there are any problems.

I get into the office at 0800, endure some of Garry Richardson's best gags and read through all the newspapers to see if there's anything we need to follow up or check out.

A good recent example was when David Beckham was dropped from the England squad. The Sun broke the story in their first edition and it was up to our football correspondent, Jonathan Legard, to verify it.

And that brings me on to one of the main aspects of my job: directing and liaising with our reporters and correspondents (people like Mike Ingham, Cornelius Lysaght, Pat Murphy and Gordon Farquhar).

Their expertise and contacts are absolutely critical to our news organisation and staying on top of the news agenda.

A good illustration is Pat Murphy's coverage of the Aston Villa story over the past month or so. In my view, no other journalist has been better informed or better connected than Pat.

Apart from monitoring our sports bulletins, the other main aspect of my job is the inevitable round of meetings...

Actually I quite enjoy them: they're vital for sharing information and coming up with ideas. On some days, I'll have an 0845 meeting, one at 0930, another at 1030 and then the Five Live Sport meeting at midday.

We spend a lot of time talking about which stories we think will most interest our audience and how we can 'move the story on.'

Just a few examples - last week, we spoke live to the Chelsea chairman Bruce Buck about Ken Bates, Owen Hargreaves' agent on Manchester United and Darren Campbell on Dwain Chambers.

Today, the Oval cricket story is dominating our thoughts. It's clearly one which divides opinion among our listeners - some blame the umpire, Darrell Hair, others feel the Pakistan team are in the wrong.

Our priority is to ensure we hear from all the key people involved in the controversy - and keep on top of a story which is developing all the time.

For our cricket correspondent, Jonathan Agnew, it's a question of reporting events in a fair and balanced way while, at the same time, offering an expert analysis of the situation. It can be a difficult line to tread but, with a story like this, Jonathan's experience and expertise are invaluable to us.

Ultimately, the aim of our sports journalism is to be distinctive, challenging, authoritative and agenda-setting.

Well, basically, my job is to co-ordinate our sports journalism across television, radio and the website. The aim is to break stories, set the sports news agenda and interview the big names in sport.

I started my career as a news reporter at the Grimsby Evening Telegraph before moving to the Manchester Evening News where I was the Manchester City reporter. And yes, I am a City fan but I try not to let it depress me too much.