If anyone is looking for a laugh go take a look at the euro 2020 or World Cup threads. It's funny how many were defending Garethball.
You'd have to say that by dropping deeper and having to go looking for the ball to create attack...Harry Kane is essentially playing himself out of automatic selection,that's an appalling indictment on his so called teammates. He's still capable of getting us goals,he can still lead by example,especially if he plays alongside (for example) Phil Foden, doing the spadework.Kane hasn't become a bad player overnight,neither has Phil Foden. Sadly we're beginning to turn on players who are essentially playing out of position. This is down to Southgate and Southgate alone,he's utterly clueless!!
Two City flags. About the most interesting thing about tonight’s game. please log in to view this image
I think there's another one under the Coventry flag? If you zoom in it's draped upright partly showing and looks like it says ULL C? Anyway,they're all due an apology for travelling over expecting to see their team playing the opposition off the pitch..Respect to them all!!
Unless Southgate changes his attitude, the one he’s had since the beginning of his tenure, we’ll whimper out of the tournament. Just like every other bastard under him. Gallagher and Rice in the middle is turgid, it’s pedestrian and has zero creativity. I’d rather see Wharton start in the next game rather than Rice but there’s **** all chance of that happening. It sums up Southgate when Denmark were playing one up front yet we still had a back four and two deep sitting central midfielders. No wonder we can’t dominate the midfield with that **** show of a formation.
I have absolutely no idea what to make of that game. It was really really really poor - no question about it. But I can't see why? We switched the entire forward line - and got worse. Eze was really poor and after bright starts - Watkins and Bowen faded too. I actually thought Saka and Foden were doing OK (certainly better). There's a lot not adding up about this tournament. For a while, Southgate has been loyal (maybe overly loyal at times?) but now it feels as though he's taken a few risks with his squad - but on the pitch it doesn't look risky at all. My suspicion is that the lack of progression up the pitch lies with who takes the role next to Rice. Its clearly not working with Trent - but at the same time there's no other obvious option. Mainoo isn't a typical DM and Wharton is very inexperienced at any sort of top level. Gallagher doesn't seem creative enough and I'm loathed to put Bellingham in the 8 position because his performance against Serbia was our best attacking show at the tournament so far. Maybe we needed to stay loyal for one more tournament to someone who has played there before? Would Henderson, Phillips or Dier have (in an absurd way), been a better answer? If that's the question - we really do have problems.
Agree but it goes further than that. A back four against a lone forward. Stones should be pushing into midfield like he does for Citeh. Full backs should be bombing forward and or 'inverting' into midfield. We have 2 of the quickest players in the tournament in defence so can afford to push much higher up. It was absolute typical ****e from Southgate. FWIW I don't see it as comparable to Rosieball.
Southgate did say in his interview that AA in midfield was an experiment as there wasn’t a natural replacement for Phillips. If that’s the case the he clearly would have left it the same in style. One tournament too many for GS I’m afraid.
Bellingham was disappointing today so not sure that logic stacks up. Bellingham would probably have run the Sebia game as a no 8 anyway, in fact he dropped deeper a lot of the time anyway. Also we may then have seen the real Foden
Its possible. I've always felt that getting Bellingham as high up the pitch as possible is of benefit as he's so important to our attacking play. In terms of Foden - whilst he's clearly a very gifted player - he's not done it enough for me at all in an England shirt. He's had 30 odd games and how many has he really grabbed hold of? Moving Bellingham back would be more an attempt to try and get the midfield working higher up the pitch, rather than letting Foden find his form for me.
I think you really see it on the pitch though. If you think of the last two tournaments - Rice and Bellingham have really benefitted from having Phillips and Henderson destroying the other teams attacking play. Trent is not the same player - but I'm really not sure who that is. Maybe it is Wharton, but I haven't seen him enough.
Marc Guehi had a slack handful of caps before this tournament and was thrown in after Harry got crocked. He’s been our best defender by a country mile so far. By that rationale why not play Wharton ? Why take him if you don’t trust he can do a job when certain players are performing badly? He very rarely gives the ball away and moves the ball forward quickly. No way will Rice be dropped but if we must play 2 CDM’s he really couldn’t do any worse than AA or Gallagher.
Look on the bright side, we have Tim Walter (hoping he delivers)... some poor bastards are going to get Southgate as their next manager...
