HAHAHAHAHA!! "well we want to win football matches" F**k off Southgate! Why have you started lying to the fans the past week. I liked him for his honesty. He's just talking sh*t now. Colombia won't be scared of us now. They will be happy to just play their way.
Abysmal tonight - there was NO need for so many changes. I said before kick off that I'd a problem with Cahill. #toldyouso
I don't think there will be an easy game in the last 16, so doesn't matter who we got. I would rather try to win this game and go into the next one on a high. Saying that I can also see why you would rest players and give others who haven't played some game time, I don't think either teams were taking this game serious.
Would have been more confident with a settled side who carried on playing as they were. No idea now. Wouldn’t be surprised if Southgate has engendered a collapse. Hope not, but was so happy with watching England before, to watching the same old sh*t we have watched for years. And there was no need.
Tend to agree with this. Not sure about engendering a collapse, but the feel-good factor certainly disappeared quickly. I kind of get the logic of resting players, but 8? I for one was certainly reminded of England of old, and that wasn't nice. I really feel for the fans who paid good money to fly across Russia to witness that. Hope they'll be rewarded when the first eleven are re-instated. (..and Jones.And.Cahill.Just.No!)
Southgate rested key 1st team players for a dead-rubber game that has no impact on the rest of the tournament. I don't know where FML gets the info that Kane is now "pissed off" and we're about to see an "engendered collapse". Can you imagine the headlines if Kane had started and pulled up with hamstring injury etc? I'm happy to see Southgate rotate the players for this game. Afterall it's the point of having a squad. We lost narrowly to another fancied team. Colombia have learnt nothing about England from that and will face a very different team next week.
It was a fancied team who played none of their stars. I hope Kane isn’t really annoyed, but you would be, wouldn’t you. He would have fancied himself against a poor second 11. Don’t know what to expect against Colombia now, but at least we made it out of the group this year and had 2 enjoyable wins.
The positives: "England, however, will gain advantages from finishing second in Group G. Southgate's side will avoid a potential meeting with Brazil in the last eight. This has to be regarded as a plus. They will get an extra day to prepare because, if they had won the group, they would have gone to Rostov to face Japan on Monday. England's travelling will also be easier and they will undoubtedly benefit from a better climate in Moscow, where it is expected to be around the low 20s. Southgate and his backroom team will have noted reports from the furnace of Rostov, where temperatures have gone into the 40s. Moscow will be much more to England's liking. This was a surreal occasion with two shadow squads. England and Southgate will discover on Tuesday whether their clearly conscious decision not to go all out for victory will be the right one."
An EXCELLENT post FML and I can see the logic in finishing 2nd in this group, only conceding 3 goals in the process - 1 a soft penalty, 1 when the defence got sloppy and an unstoppable. I can see your p155ed off with last night's team selection/display, but you're now looking forward to the knock--ut stages!!!
I'm not sure which one you class as unstoppable? Last nights goal was very sloppy, Rose didn't even try to show him the line, you could have driven a bus through the gap he left inside for their guy to step in and score. The question is, did he want to afford him that opportunity? And did the Belgian mean to score? If you look at the Belgain team selection, early bookings and how they also looked within themselves, maybe he just cocked up an effort at row Z! Bah!
I'm not sure we can ever know if it was fully right or wrong. If we lose in the final against Brazil, it will look a good decision, if we lose to Columbia, arguably we were going no where anyway. Maybe we squeek past Japan, but if we can't beat Columbia then no chance against Brazil. Gareth can't come out and say it, but losing looks the only sensible option against Belguim, especially considering the Rostov heat. Bah!
I wasn’t p*ssed off with it. I was disappointed after all the talk Southgate gave it. It’s the first time he’s said one thing and done the opposite. Just a bit of a shame. But, as we all know. We are in the kindest part of the draw. Fingers crossed Southgate gets back on track with a fast and exciting attacking win against Colombia.
One for my old uni friends works for a company that runs the overlay analysis software for TV football coverage. Apparently all the shock and disappointment from the pundits is entirely fake. In the hotel bars he says everyone is pretty happy, and thinks Southgate made the right choice. They are just playing the part of suggesting it wasn't an engineered result. The bookies are right that this has greatly boosted England's chances of getting to the semis. Positives We have a fully fit squad for the knockouts now. Kane will not be livid as he now gets the chance to score against lesser rated competition/ and captain a team further into the world cup. Due to wholesale changes no momentum lost for well rested 1st team. General public stop overhyping England because we beat Panama and Tunisia. (Eli rankings 47 and 61) Better weather conditions for next game. We now won't face a team above us in Elo rankings till semis. Gives us games to gel and improve before sterner tests. The players did a reasonable job of looking like they were trying to play against Belgium, so no international condemnation for being unsporting (although I've never seen players so happy to miss shots on goal) We are 9th on Elo rankings. 5 teams on the other side are above us. Only 2 on our side now, one of which we would meet in the semis. Two games where we exceed our ranking is easier than 3.
That is a very good point, maybe he will be looking at it like that. But, we have to beat a very tricky Colombia side, otherwise he won’t get the chance to score against those easier teams.
Yup Colombia are better than Japan on paper. They've been a mixed bag this tournament, and we should beat them if we are going to get anywhere in the knockout stages. If we lose to them then we didnt stand a chance of doing anything later. It's a good test to see if we can make the step up. I'd take Columbia Sweden/Switzerland/Spain as a good gradient of challenge
