Sadly, Kane has played his entire club career for a mentally weak club that has limited focus on winning the biggest prizes, he has never quite had a team around him capable of jumping the final hurdle, hence he has never learned how to win (yet). ENIC don`t have a winning mentality and it filters down to the players, especially the likes of Kane who doesn`t know any different. It was an awful penalty, why go high and risk what happened, he should have been going low into a corner or down the middle making sure he hit the target, we can only assume the pressure got to him and clouded his judgment. Kane will get all the stick, but Safegate`s management (no subs until France scored) and poor defending (failing to defend the header from which Rylan scored) were the reasons we lost.
This weak Spurs side you talk of, Harry Kane is a huge part of that. How is it Southgate’s fault that Giroud scored a header?
The difference in the end was the crossing into the box. They found Giroud when it needed to, not one of ours (excluding set pieces ) found an England head. Most went too far or directly into Lloris's hands.
Fs you have kane going one way then you another lol. Granted some of the previous teams have been crappy or us england fans like to overrate our team but this england side and even previous England sides have always been on par if not better than the argies and portuguese. Even at its peak, the argentine sides have always had a sprinkling of world class players, some solid players and some absolute dross. Portugal even worse in terms of number of world class and more dross whereas england you could argue had less world class but definitely no dross (unless the managers picksd it). I look at that argie team and short of messi, Romero and alvarez the rest are no names, average or unknown. Even then messi isnt the player he was and cant run.
Take Messi away and Argentina would be home long ago. He’s been player of the tournament by some distance imo.
Argies were favourites for the World Cup before a ball was kicked weren’t they? Won the Copa America the other year plus beat Italy in the Finalissima too. Their attacking options are probably better than ours and I think we had real quality. Messi, Martinez, Alvarez, Di Maria, Correa and Dybala who I don’t even think has got off the bench, crazy selection. De Paul is very decent in midfield, on a par with any of our CMs, Fernandez gonna be at an elite club soon I reckon too. Mac Allister been doing well for Brighton as well, chances are a top six or equivalent abroad will look at him soon. Romero and Martinez two good upcoming CBs and Otamendi’s seen it all. They’ve got a serious team, mate. Portugal this year aren’t better than us but previous years it’s either been equal or edged in their favour due to Ronaldo I’d say. Pre tournament I’d have had England just under the Argies and possibly Brazil as favourites but over France, Spain, Germany, Portugal etc.
All i know is, going by big game bottling the little guy hasnt done much in half the world cups hes been at, bottled some decent chances in the few finals hes been in and hasnt set the world alight in terms of goals or assists (apart from the pens hes been scoring this world cup) Pretty much like kane really. Fyi i think he's been the best player ever but if we are running the stepping up in major games moniker at him internationally
Di maria is about a million years old (used to be quality), messi is still quality as a playermaker but cant run, just man mark him and argentina cant do anything (once Holland did this). Again, alvarez martinez, dybala you cant play them all (imbalanced) and also with messi but are any of them world class? None of them 3 are better than kane, probably on par with foden. Never heard of de paul but looks tidy. Fernandes looks good, MacAlister no chance. Hes at brighton for a reason. He wouldn't even make it ahead of winksiesta (okay i joke but hes not even as good as hojgbjerg). Romeros great, martinez is 4ft2. Otamendi i think is good but inconsistent but no one rates him. Which leaves their full backs and keeper than no one has head of, thats before we start looking at the depth of their squad. You seriously think this argentina side on paper are better than englands? You must be on crack Just had a look at the pre tourney odds, apparantly england ranked same as argentina lol. Think brazil were faves. Guess their must have been a load of hardcore argie fans betting on them Copa america is a serious for south americans but its hardly the euros As for finalissimo, thats like arsenal winning the emirates cup....
There probably hasn’t been a single elite player that’s turned up in every game so far, even Mbappe was pretty anonymous tonight. But in some ways it’s a good thing as it’s allowed “smaller” players to take the limelight. Some of the players of the tournament so far are the likes of Amrabat, Bono, Livakovic, Kudos looked really good for Ghana and there’s others I’ll have missed/ forgotten. Been a great World Cup, just gutted it’s over for us now.
Oh i was meaning messi at world cups in general because kane never turns up to big games. Yeah, really enjoying this world cup, some great knockout games that have been tight but attacking and fast paced
Million years old or not he’s still a baller. Dybala ironically would probably start for England as he could slot in superbly behind Kane. Mac Allister’s only 23 you know? He’ll almost certainly go to a top side soon. Brighton’s been a hot bed for ballers, both you and us shopped there in the summer and we won’t be the last. Martinez is a hobbit and lob the ball anything over 5ft and you’ll beat him to a header but he looks a good tackler, very aggressive. Not sure about no one rating Otamendi. We’d have definitely given Argentina a game but before the tournament I’d have probably said they’re slightly better. Make no mistake though, England were good enough to win this World Cup. We were definitely one of the top teams. South Americans probably say the same about the euros, lol.
Di maria is a baller but people say he failed in the prem (i didn't think so) but hes not really done much this world cup and hes old and slower now, someone for a cameo. Then again you love perisic so he would be right up your street. Dunno about dybala, was class a few years ago but hes not getting a look in and seems to have dropped off. Didnt realise maccalister was that young. Hes looked good for argies looked alright for brighton but nothing special. Cm might be right for him as he started as a forward. As for shopping at brighton, wish we didnt, the left back we brought is ****e.
I always put respect on the old heads of the game, lol. Perisic still class too, been one of Croatia’s top performers at the World Cup and Spurs’ current assist king and he’s like 48. Dybala never been as good as hyped but still a very good player nonetheless. Him behind England’s front three would be juicy. Nothing special is a bit harsh, I think Mac’s got a bit about him and will likely get better, especially around better players. Would say I’d take him at Spurs but not sure where he’d fit in our system. Haha Cucurella’s a weird one, looked good for Brighton and some on here wanted him at Spurs but I was adamant Reguilon was as good (if not better) but for some reason Conte felt Sessegnon was better than Reguilon, let him go to Atleti on loan and now we’ve been left with one of the worst LBs/LWBs I’ve seen at the club in about 15-20 years, which is actually a shame as I like Sess as a bloke. So basically I kinda wish we did sign Cucurella if I knew we’d be in this situation with Sess, lol.
2 penalties possibly 3 is a clue to the way France stopped England. Football can be a bastard when it comes to fairness and justice it really does reflect the real world in that way. The cynicism of France was rewarded with a victory. Well done to England anyway they have nothing to apologise for. Kane has scored so many goals and penalties in his career it looks a little silly to accuse him of bottling it. Everyone misses penalties including Messi in this tournament, that's why they don't just award a penalty goal without a shot being fired. Incidentally Saka was man of the match IMO why was he substituted, unless he was injured, that was a crazy descision.
Fine margins at this level are the killer. Kane strikes the ball a little differently than intended, Giroud gets a deflection on his header, a couple of arguably marginal refereeing decisions go against you…it all adds up. France shaded a close encounter and I think a 1-goal victory was as much as either team deserved because it was a close match and neither side stood out from the other in terms of quality. I’m absolutely gutted for Kane, who had the chance to go some way towards putting to bed the (often ridiculously overstated) narrative that he never turns up, and fluffed his lines in a massively high pressure situation. I hope the images of him after the miss and at the end of the game don’t go on to define his career, which would be so disappointing for a player who is likely to head off into the distance with England’s goal scoring record and is in a good shot for the PL record. Even more so than just being an England and Spurs fan I hope he has a shot at redemption and that this doesn’t break him. He has at least another WC cycle left at the top you’d think, and after that it depends on the other players out there. As for the whole tournament, I think England about made par. They’re probably amongst the top 5-ish teams out there and therefore making the QFs and suffering a narrow defeat to the defending champions is about right. The margins at that level are so fine that anyone can beat anyone and the games at the elite international level are more about moments than systems usually, more so than at elite club level. It’s a gutting defeat though because France were there for the taking and we didn’t manage to do it. At least I can enjoy the rest of the tournament now safe in the knowledge that any of the 4 teams left I would be delighted for them to win it.
I see Spurs fans backing up Saka when all manner of racist abuse last summer doesn't stop Runners using their one joke en masses...
