Was a very emotionally charged evening, the mood was certainly different to other England matches I've been to. As OLM said, the atmosphere during the game was a bit weird, but it doesn't take much to guess why. England played well, it's hard to say whether France's hearts were truly in it (understandable if not), but even so they played some nice stuff at times, Pogba massively improved them in the second half. Needs a ****ing haircut though. That Coman looked a real handful anarl, made Gibbs look a bit ****. Of course, we didn't play our supposedly full strength side either, but they played much better than I think most expected. It is nice to see some improvement, even if it is at a snails pace. There are plenty of positives for Woy to take away. The pre-match stuff was very eerie, but very respectful and emotional, particularly the minutes silence, I was surprised that it was total silence, I expected some nonces to perk up at some point. The fans singing La Marseillaise was obviously a nice touch, many did sing, though I and a few others (including a lot of the French team it seems, Pete) stood silent. I stayed the full 90 too, was surprised to see about 70% of the stadium had buggered off though. Ps. He might've got the assist for Rooney's goal, but I still think Sterling is ****.
france are/were not a top team, they are/were mediocre. i gleaned this information from another thread.
From L'Equipe today: "There's not a people on earth who sing better than the British on painful nights. They have sense of homage and solemnity."
As other have said hard to say how much the French were up for it, but I was pleasantly surprised how well England played. Though as Quill said, even though Sterling made Rooney goal, he did nothing else of note all evening. Ali looks good as did Stone, both have great balance in their movement, and look very good prospects.
Ex-Tiger Clayton Donaldson got his first start for Jamaica last night and scored the winner against Haiti.
Germany & Spain aren't the teams they used to be? Spain beat us at a canter in Alicante last Friday. That match must be a wake up call to Roy that he can't piss about with the formation & players, and the ones he's going to take must play in the Spring Internationals against the Dutch & Germany. Dunno where you're getting this idea the Germans have suddenly become bad. I reckon they could turn it on if they wanted to. Performances in qualifying means bugger all in tournaments, especially so if you're playing dross like San Marino. England need a lot of tweaking if we're to be serious contenders at this Euros or the next world cup. Think achieving quarter finals is all we can hope for in reality. Depending on who we get drawn against.
This is the original MySpace profile picture for Dele Alli by the way, or DJ Dele Alli as I believe he preferred to be called at the time...
Tuther thread is closed but this is what happened in the minutes silence at the Turkey Greece game. http://www.cbsnews.com/news/turkish-soccer-fans-chant-allahu-akbar-paris-attacks-remembrance/
this is complicated, but i'm learning. this is what i've learnt so far, from several sources: 1. if england win, the other team was either mediocre or not really trying. 2. if good teams lose during qualifying, they weren't really trying. 3. if england lose after qualifying, they're rubbish. 4. some teams can go up a gear when necessary but not england. 5. england had 17 first choice players out injured for the game against france but fielded their best 11 against spain four days earlier and were rubbish. keep it coming, i'll understand it all soon.
