im usually one of the first to Berate England , but i think the amount of negativity is way over the top. how ofen do we get 7 points? 3 clean sheets, sailed through with no drama. Portugal scraped through and ended up winning the thing, need to find some balance between, its coming home and we are ****ing ****e would be nice to keep up the intensity of first half , but we did what needed to be done.
i agree its maybe not needed against lesser nations , but by all accounts Modric ran the sweaties ragged in midfield last night, and dictated the game from start to finish. what did he do against us? when we come up against the bigger boys it could be needed, our complaint for years was playing 4-4-2 and never winning the midfield battle against beter teams.
I agree. Yes its not been scintillating but I think we need to remember we haven't won anything (except Le Tournoi) since 1966. I'd take a tournament win over playing good football, and despite what most people think, playing attacking football won't necessarily beat France, Germany, Italy etc. I think Rice will come into his own against more attacking sides, which will help our forwards attack more. We need to remember that we're playing defensive teams at the moment, who are desperate to stop Kane and Sterling getting a footing in the game. The knockouts will be different.
people also think back to Italia 90 and Euro 96 with rose tinted spectacles like we ripped both tournamants up. in italia 90 , we drew with Ireland, scraped past Egypt 1-0 , an needed 2 penalties to beat Cameroon. in Euro 96, drew with Switzerland Scotland missed a penalty , then Spain had a very dubious goal disallowed for offiside.. but we didnt complain as we where getting through, for some reason we are now expected to smash our way through 3-0 every game
I'm not a Rice fan, I know the West Ham fans love him, but I don't watch West Ham and having just seen his England performances, I find it hard to see what the fuss is about (Phillips was at least impressive in the Croatia game). Though you can't argue with the results, the performances are less than inspiring, hence the element of negativity (all of which will go out the window if we get through the next couple of games). I think the issue is compounded by the first fifteen minutes against Croatia and the first half last night, which showed the exciting football we are obviously capable of. Still, we won the group without conceding and that's a great platform to progress from.
I get wound up at the sideways and backwards play that's always been there in England games, when you know for their club they'd be working it forward. Maguire was one of few who seemed to want to get into the Czech half, and I'm so glad he played last night. On another day we could easily invite the opposition to score with a wayward backpass or short sideways pass, and against better teams we wouldn't come back from it. Saka and Grealish were excellent and Sterling made the most of the service he got, but after scoring in the first half he got bogged down more as the game went on. Kane looked a shadow of the player who stuffed us at the KCOM as we left the prem, and the link up play wasn't there. And bringing Sancho on for 7 minutes was just to give the fans something to cheer. Southgate knew it was dire and needed something, and all he had was Sancho. Too little too late.
The knockouts have to be different! It's no longer about securing a position in a mini league,it's win or your out,it's outscoring your opponent,it's Football. Why should we be content with players passing back to the keeper when the options are far more attractive going forward? We've got some of the best talent on show in the tournament,why not unshackle it and show the rest of Europe we're afraid of nothing? I firmly believe if we play creative football for the rest of this tournament we've got no-one to fear...
a lot easier to outscore your opponent when you dont concede goals too , i took some real positvies out of last night and im usually a right miserable bastard. minutes under the belt for Maguire,Kane looked marginally sharper , Saka showed an option not namy had thought of. going back to the 2 tournamants i mentioned above, in each tournamant one of our best performances in each was against Germany in the semis, we ended up losing both. id take scrappy 1-0 all the way
Well, I know it wasn't the best game, but played 3, won 2 and drawn 1, with no goal conceded can't be a bad platform to kick on. I think we need to judge Southgate when the tournament is finished, so far he has been pragmatic but has got the results needed. The night was further enhanced by Scotland getting beat, nice to see them going back with their tails between their legs. P.S. Best comment on twitter I've seen. CONGRATULATIONS TO BILLY GILMOUR FOR ACHIEVING SCOTLANDS ONLY POSITIVE RESULT.
If that 'good thing' is scoring the winning goal, I'll settle for that right through the tournament!!
If England happen to win this tournament playing throughout like they have so far it'll be a very bittersweet experience for me.
each to their own but i find that hard to grasp when we havent won anything for over 50 years, i personally would take winning it by default if everybody else had to pull out with Covid.
Really? It'd be totally sweet for me after the 3000 years of hurt. We're not good enough to win it any other way, YET.
Harry is brilliant at pointing. Something he must have learned at Lester. I can't recall him doing it for us. I'm sure he does it to confuse the opposition.
Looks like Germany in the last 16…. Not a hope in hell of beating them… A penalty shoot out would be a bonus