Another pretty poor display by England but we're through to the quarters and did show that we can turn it on when needed.
& through to the final. Cannot afford to go behind against Spain who have been the best team in the tournament by a mile
Good effort Gareth. One tournament too far. Over to someone else now. I bought gallons of booze and champagne to celebrate and everyone just went to bed at 11!
Good effort? Please tell me you are joking. England have Bellingham - La Liga player of the year Foden - Premiership player of the year Kane - 40+ goals for Munich Rice - Most expensive British player Saka - 25 goal contributions in the prem Palmer - 33 goal contributions, and left on the bench Shaw - not played a game in 6 months and takes him Grealish - a real game changer, left at home. You have players like Gordon and Eze, who excite fans, and attack, but no, instead we'll tell Pickford to lump it forward every time - what a joke, and a delusional manager. With these players, they should be beating Spain who are an average team. Southgate is useless as a manger/coach/tactician, an in my opinion cost England the trophy. And to come out after the tournament ended and say there were players that were nursing injuries before the tournament started is a disgrace, and is a kick in the teeth to players that deserved their chance more, but no, we can't upset captain Kane (one word springs to mind, four letters beginning with c and ending in t.
Back to back EUROs finals - particularly given our poor history in the competition - is no failure. Southgate is clearly a good man-manager who the players respect. He has arguably the most consistent and strongest record as an England manager, bar Sir Alf. But the issues are there - tactically, he's too cautious and he's too slow to read a game and make in-game changes. I do feel it's time for a change and to bring a new voice in the dug-out. Widening the criticism to the players, I feel there are many out there that seem to wilt under pressure and fail to show initiative. A case in point is Foden. No doubt a talented player whose ability is maximised in the Manchester City set-up. But take him out of that and he's never really convinced me in an England shirt. Harry Kane is a bit of a flat track bully plundering goals against weaker opposition, which is fine as he's a consistent goalscorer, but his goalscoring record in semi-finals and finals isn't great (5 goals in 19 or something, if I remember rightly) and he looked notably short of fitness in this tournament. It might be a bit of an overreaction on my part, but I genuinely think he needs to retire from international football. To turn to the winners, I think branding this Spain side as 'average' is massively unfair. They won all seven games, mostly in a convincing fashion and against tough opposition. They're tactically aware and intelligent on the ball. I think their midfield five, particularly with Lamal and Williams on the flanks, is a really strong set of players - and this was without Gavi. They fully deserved their win last night. Spain's football dominance continues - I believe that's 27 finals won in a row (when a Spanish club or national side has made it that far), which is a crazy statistic. People know I'm more sympathetic to Southgate than most. That's largely because he took the job at our nadir (the defeat to Iceland) and has outperformed all his predecessors (bar Sir Alf) tournament-by-tournament with a group of players generally inferior to the 'Golden Generation' of the 2000s, the best England teams of 1990s, and the winning generation in the late 1960s/early 1970s. I agree the squad he had at this tournament has been Southgate's strongest on paper, filled with talent (albeit mostly younger lads). The issues for our national team remain though. We don't have any world-class central defenders. We have a real problem bringing through fit, capable left backs. We are light in central midfield. The question is who will succeed Southgate? The options don't look overly convincing. If we're staying English, we've only really got a choice between Eddie Howe and Graham Potter, both of them don't feel particularly inspiring. Some may make an argument that we take Lee Carsley (current England U21 manager) as the 'continuity candidate', but again, he doesn't really have a decent reputation or record in football. If we go for a foreign manager, who fits the profile? I'd love Jurgen Klopp, recently out of work and available, but you'd get numbskulls that'll be on his back straight away just because he's German (despite having lived in England for several years). Some will point to Guardiola, but will he fancy international management? You'd also think he'd want the Man City job for this season before leaving, so he's not readily available.
Some people are forgetting the abject failure to even qualify for tournaments. Under Southgate we’ve always qualified comfortably. Then they are forgetting just how few knock out games we’ve progressed through between 96 and 2018. They are forgetting that players like Beckham and Rooney lost their heads - and Bellingham looked the most likely - but we haven’t had a silly incident like that. Then they are forgetting the fun free flowing football we’ve played at times if not at this tournament. They are forgetting how very close we were three years ago. We were awful against Spain but that’s not because Southgate has instructed them to be defensive or sit back. We’ve seen our backs against the wall at times for Ipswich - an out and out attacking side - against Championship opposition, nowhere close to this level of opposition. What’s gone wrong in this one is all to do with mentality and nothing to do with personnel or tactics. Ultimately I think the curse of Harry Kane has a lot to do with it - especially as captain - it can’t be coincidence that he has never won a trophy from so many opportunities. He has certainly not led by his performances. He should have been rotated. Even at this tournament, which has had by far the worst performances of his four, he still got an awful lot more right than the pundits or anyone since Venables.
Tactically what did he get right? Playing the long ball to Kane on every goal kick? Starting an injured Kane in every game? Bringing shaw, who hadn't kicked a ball in 6 months? Starting an injured Trippier in every game bar the final? But its OK, Southgate is a nice guy and every player loves him.
The tournament was handed to him on a plate. Serbia, Denmark, Slovenia, Slovakia, Switzerland, a mediocre Netherlands and an average Spain. Abject manager, who should never manage a team above L1. McCarthy would've done a better job.
