Apart from his experiment of trying to play Palmer, Foden and Bellingham in the same team which tbf lots of people wanted him to try, Lee Carsley has done really well and we've played better football than in the Southgate era. And he's introduced some really good new talent. Hope we've appointed the right man!
Good to see players Carsley brought through and had success with for England U21s stepping up on to a bigger stage and doing well.
Well it's a tactical tradeoff isn't it. We could go back to sticking a big unit like Andy Carroll in there and slinging balls in, but the thinking is that we can be better than that now, that we can compete technically with the best and create chances through more deliberate and considered play, like all the top teams do. The Euros showed we still have a long way to go on that front compared to sides like Spain, but that's the idea. Essentially, Greece would be much happier defending crosses than being pulled around the pitch all game and dealing with technical, nippy players running in behind them. It paid off in the end I thought.
On the whole, a pretty good performance considering the amount of changes and a great result. Jones and Bellingham had good games, as did Pickford, and I thought Gallagher had a good game also.
How did we lose to that lot the first time around????? Pelkas came on and looked to be there best player. Jones was superb as was the kid on the wing from Chelsea.. Geez, we've got some talented individuals. If Tuchel can mould them into a unit we should have a good go at the WC in the next few years.
They where a lot more dangerous in the first game and we ended up with 2 at the back half the time . They could and should have had 5 goals at Wembley . They probably thought it would be easier at their place but came unstuck .
Carsley completely screwed up the team selection for the home game and didn't bother trying to remedy that error at half time, we were terrible.
They were rightfully disallowed weren't they? So, I would say could rather than should. I think it was a one in a generation game for Greece that night - they tend to do poorly against the elite nations - but that night everything clicked, not to mention playing a misshapen England. Also, one of the ways Wembley can work against us: playing there can inspire the opposition. Last night, Greece were schooled by a very young England team and some perspective was restored. I would have thought Greece will be one to avoid from pot 3 for the quals though - overall they look a good tenacious side.
Demand to watch this game was so high that it broke the transmission capacity of every credible broadcaster worldwide. It is available to watch on YouTube however. But you'll have to watch several crazy cat videos and a couple of frothing right wing gammon diatribes first.
