It is not a golden age for Italian football.

Their clubs are struggling in Europe and their players and managers are struggling over here.

Fabio Capello finds it hard to stick to a captain, Roberto Mancini and Carlo Ancelotti meet knowing the consequences of failure to finish in the top four, and Mario Balotelli seems to get booked or sent off every time he plays.

The England captaincy has been a real thorn in the side for Capello.

His first choice, John Terry, was sacked for moral reasons. He has been unlucky to see his second and third choices, Rio Ferdinand and Steve Gerrard, miss games through injury and now he may be ready to overlook his fourth choice, Frank Lampard, to bring back Terry as the team's leader.

Personally, I think allowing Terry to lead the team out in Cardiff against Wales on Saturday opens up a real can of worms for Capello - and I'm not sure it's necessary or the best thing for England.

It was Capello's decision to relieve the Chelsea player of the captaincy in the first place.

It had nothing to do with football reasons because John is a first-class player and captain for Chelsea.

But Capello clearly felt Terry's reputation or behaviour did not make him an appropriate captain for England, so he took his decision.

As England manager, he had every right to do that. But where the confusion lies is he has now overturned that decision.

It raises a lot of questions. If John was an unsuitable captain a year ago, what has changed now?

And you have to ask what Lampard has done wrong to lose the armband. He did the job well in Denmark in England's last game when Rio and Steven were injured, so why the switch? As far as I knew, Rio was the captain, Steven stood in for him, and if they were both unavailable, Frank. The system worked, until now.

Some will say it doesn't matter, that when you cross the white line you need 11 leaders.

True, but being a captain is more than just going to the centre circle to toss a coin and choose ends.

You are the public face of the England team to the media, sponsors and the fans.

Sometimes, you are the players' representative in front of the manager. The players need to have the right to ask things as a group, whether it be about training or whatever.

The manager doesn't have to do whatever they say, but at least the players have a forum to air their views and often that is through the captain.

Fabio might have felt Terry wasn't the right person to do that, so why is he now?

We shouldn't forget that in Italy, the majority of Serie A managers are Italian.

They have a particular way of doing things, a style of play, a mentality of their own.

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