Gary Lineker thinks it would be a disgrace if Kane, Barkley and Sterling don't go to the U-21 Euro cup. I agree about Kane and Barkley, but I think it would be very disruptive if Sterling goes. Here is a young man who appears to have an ego almost as big as Ronaldo but with only 10% of the talent and seems to think that an offer of allegedly £180,000 per week it's not sufficient for him. It would also not be fair to those players who have played so well to get to the finals to miss out to a player who might be too tired to play two consecutive games in under a week.
I agree with Lineker about the potential of the current side that Southgate's put together, but I can also see your point about bringing in new names. How much should sentiment stand in the way of building towards a strong senior side for the future? Interesting question. Highlights of the U21 team's 3-2 victory over a strong German side: Very good win, especially considering the players missing. Nice dummy and an assist from Pritchard, from the bench. No idea how Ings missed that rebound from his shot, either.
Hart, Clyne, Gibbs, Henderson, Smalling, Jagielka, Walcott, Jones, Kane, Rooney, Delph. I assume that's Jones in the midfield, for some unknown reason.
That’s a funky lineup. I’ve often thought national managers do too much experimenting and too little fine tuning, given the limited time they have with the squads. Though i guess the options are pretty limited with so many players suffering from the international flu.
Hart; Clyne, Jagielka, Smalling, Gibbs; Walcott, Henderson, Jones, Delph; Rooney, Kane? Looks wonky as hell. Maybe it's a 4-3-3? Rooney and Walcott either side of Kane?
Jones as holding midfielder at the base of a diamond, Rooney as an attacking midfielder at the tip. I suppose the width will come from the full backs so Jones may play a lot as an auxillary defender.
I'd imagine that is it PNP, with the front 3 having a reasonable amount of freedom in their movement.
Nice to see Chiellini managing to foul Kane in the first 30 seconds. Get him used to playing against dirty ****s.
Don't like the look of the England midfield so far. Delph is a decent athlete but sometimes seems a little limited in possession, Henderson is competent but doesn't have the consistent quality on the ball of Carrick and Jones is solely there to break up play. Could see this being a frustrating night for our 3 forwards unless they drop off plenty to get hold of the ball.
Having Jones there is all well and good when you're dealing with ariel balls, its great to have an extra man to help the CBs compete in the air and clean up the loose balls after. When the ball is on the ground and when England have possession though, he is all at sea. He pushes too far forward and offers next to nothing, and the other two won't cover him adequately. We're up against it now.
It's just awful, awful, awful selections and tactics from Hodgson and embarrassing that's he's being offered a new contract. For what exactly? Why do we always end with dinosaurs as our national manager? Jones as a midfielder? Walcott picked who's played about 5 minutes of football this year? It's just utter cack. Hodgson is the master of making a meal out of beating the worst teams in the world, losing to anyone remotely good and banging on about what we 'learn' after every match when it's patently obvious he learns nothing and is just a useless manager.
It's like watching walker at right back! This was my worry before the match that as soon as we come up against a decent team we will be showed up for what we are. We are not a bad team by any means but it's just such uninspiring football. We are so pragmatic, there is no spark or guile and you feel sorry for Walcott and Kane as they are just feeding off scraps right now.
To be fair its a friendly, its supposed to be about experimentation to an extent and the nature of experimentation is that it doesn't always work. We may well see a very different selection and setup after the break. This has not been a good 45 though so far.
I like to see managers experimenting in friendlies, as that's essentially what they're for, but I couldn't make much sense of that side before the game. It makes even less sense now I've seen it in action. The defence is fine and Rooney and Kane as a pairing would be decent, but the midfield's a ****ing mess.
