Yeah that’s what I’m saying. People reminisce about Lampard/Gerrard/Ferdinand etc as being best in the world, but they weren’t. It was prime time of Sky hyping up the PL with Richard Keys and Andy Gray, in between eiffel towering the interns, calling everyone in the league the best in the world. No English team made the CL final between 1998-2004, the height of this supposed “golden generation”. I’m not saying the players were bad or weren’t arguably world class, but if they were up there so were other players from other nations at that time which was never mentioned by the English media
I think the Sven era had a better first XI (up until this tournament at least) but miles behind jn terms of squad depth. Defence was miles better, CM is debatable and forwards probably worse. Suppose it depends on on what tournament as well. I'd swap in the 2004 versions of Rooney and Owen for Kane and Watkins/Toney.
Right. Italy are crap now. The Dutch have been average for a long while. Croatia have outperformed the Netherlands over the last ten years. So does that make them a big nation?
Ferdinand absolutely was one of the best CB's in the world. Could argue Terry too though I wouldn't personally.
Dunno I was a teenager so can't say I spent much time reading the papers. For sure there were loads of great CBs at the time though.
Cannavaro and Nesta were both late 20s in 2002, or 31 and 29 in 2004 if you’d rather that tournament. They were just the first that sprung to mind, I’m sure there’s others if I actually sit and think about it Anyway none of that is relevant now, England to go 1 down in the first half against Switzerland after being under the cosh all game. They grab one from a scrappy deflection about 75 mins and score an injury time winner from a set piece after Switzerland hit the woodwork 3 times Decent bet builder that
Yeah I don't know why you think I'm calling Southgate a good manager. I agree he's crap. But he was okay in previous tournaments. I just think the facts get twisted by people desperate to blame everything on him.
I don’t think he was even okay in previous tournaments. We should have pissed on (a beginning to be crap) Italy in the last final - they were awful, but as always he decided to sit on a lead. We should have beaten Croatia in the World Cup too (in answer to previous question they’re in the B-level countries for me, alongside Belgium and now possibly the Swiss and Austria). What he’s been good for was the initial squad build. Excellent for it. But he has never, ever been tactically smart, and is the worst in-game manager I have ever witnessed. I can’t think of any PL club that would sensibly take him as their manager, which says everything.
Calling Italy crap is a good example of what I'm saying. They were widely considered to be the best team in the tournament. I've no issue with anyone's opinions on Southgate by the way. Doesn’t bother me at all. Can't wait for him to be gone.
Portugal Vs Slovenia will be interesting. We did not trouble them at all so it will be a good barometer of how badly we actually played.
So France have scored 3 goals this tournament - 1 pen and 2 own goals. 1 less than England. It's fair to say England are not alone in being underwhelming.
It isn’t all about goals. France absolutely battered Belgium there. They were intense around the box. Belgium were occasionally good on the counter but I would be far happier with a performance like that than the ones we have seen from England.
I disagree with you on 2018. I think people seriously forget just how low expectations were before that tournament and seem to conflate the quality of the current squad with his entire tenure. The WC 2018 squad was bang average in comparison to now. Players like Dier, Rose, Lingard, Delph etc - think how far those players would be away from the squad now let alone the team. As for the Euros then I think you're doing Italy a bit of a disservice there. They were something ridiculous like 18 months unbeaten heading into tournament and had their Indian Summer with Bonucci and Chiellini. Gareth did bottle it in the final but I think everyone did tbh, neither coaching staff, players, nor fans dealt with the realisation at half time that we were 45 minutes to KO. His biggest error at that tournament was ****ing the penalty selection up imo and have no idea what he was thinking. Ultimately though as much as we don't like the negative style it undoubtedly worked that summer. We were unbeaten, conceded only twice and we're only behind ten minutes in the entire tournament. I don't disagree with you a lot on Gareth, as you'll know even when I was big backer of his I've never been blind to his tactical shortcomings but the skills he brought was what was needed at the time (which you allude to). I do think not even done okay is extremely harsh though. We had just came off our two worst tournaments for a generation as well as probably our worst loss since USA in 1950 when he took over and you're essentially saying he needed to make back to back finals and win one of them just to make par?
I think Southgate’s earned the right to ignore the armchair pundits tbf. As long as we’re still in the tournament, he has every right to tell his critics to stfu (he won’t, he’s too polite). Especially managerial failures like Lampard and Neville ffs.
Of Sven's three tournaments, I would definitely say that the 2004 squad was the best. But there were problems with all three squads - things never aligned in an ideal way, in terms of an ideal "Sven era XI": 2002 - Gerrard and Neville were missing with injury (and Beckham only just made it); Seaman was 38; it was too early for Rooney, Terry and Lampard; Ashley Cole was still very raw (had only just completed his first full season as Arsenal's first choice LB). 2004 - Ferdinand was suspended due to his drugs ban; a lack of decent goalkeeper options meant that we turned to James, who for most of his career hadn't even been good enough to make the squad on a regular basis 2006 - Scholes had retired; Owen and Campbell's best years were behind them, largely due to injuries As you say, squad depth was an issue. The likes of Vassell, Heskey, Sinclair and Mills were not bad players, but clearly they were a million miles away from being top class. The striker options available in the 90s were incredible, but during Sven's era, there really wasn't much beyond Owen and a very young Rooney.
Yeah agreed on the strikers part and it's why I particularly picked out the '04 versions of Owen and Rooney. That's also the tournament we had the best chance of winning under Sven imo and similar to this one where there was no outstanding team but we had a great one on paper. I forgot Scholes retired from international football so early tbh. Our most underrated and underused midfielder was Carrick imo although that was later Sven.
