Hodgson has had his day. He is a boring, Owl-lookalike, 1970s throwback, Cautious Colin, FA Blazered Yes Man. As Henry Winter among others has said, the bloke has got a bloody cheek to assume he will be going on to 2018. He looks like a geriatric in a tracksuit.
Wales beat Russia easily - swept them aside with no problems. England had a decent 45 mins - though needing a set piece to break the deadlock. Wales beat Slovakia. Northern Ireland held them to a 0-0 draw. England manage the same as a side who's squad is filled with players from League 1/2 and the Irish league - let that sink in. Wales - strangely enough, was England's worst 45, but a bit of a panic saw the squeeze a result. 19 players used tell you Roy hasn't got a clue what he's doing. He stumbled across something against Wales and instead of building on it, has drawn more questions. Dinosaur.
Following you lads in the euro's, hoping you win through the next matchup. Lame offseason so far, how do we stay positive ?
Portugal are a very decent side on paper. If we do now have to play them, easy to see Ronaldo ripping Smalling and Cahill a new arsehole. The bottom line is that Woy doesn't know what his best side is, and is unable to explain the Wilshere/Henderson decisions. All this "we are going to score a load sooner or later" is wubbish.
I thought it was going OK until last night. A win last night, England top of the group, who would be complaining? But dropping Rooney and Walker, England's 2 best players was an unnecessary gamble which didn't pay off, and ITV's panel were very lenient on Hodgson. With a week until England's next game the idea that they had to be rested doesn't hold water. Walker has loads of energy and Rooney is playing within himself very effectively. It's not a disaster though, England could still do well if Hodgson gets it right.
I just don't get why we had Wiltshire and Henderson, when we've had better midfielders that have played full season in the Premier League. I distinctly heard Glen Hoddle saying "Wiltshire had only played 2 hours of competitive football this season." Why the f*** is he in the England squad then? Would have rather taken Drinkwater, who's had a blinding season. I get fed up watching England to be honest. The FA meddle too much as they want to have faces for Sponsorship, rather than players who want to play.
He didn't cover himself in glory with Valencia. My choice would be Eddie Howe. By far the most impressive current English manager, IMO.
Russell Slade?. Scotland have suffered for years from the best managers not wanting the job, and we have to make do with whoever we can get. England might find things have changed from when all the top managers wanted the job. Cloughie said he'd crawl on hands and knees to get the job.
Moyes would do well to take the Scotland job. There are decent youngsters coming through, with the old heads nearing their end its a no risk position.
Okay, there are a couple of things for Roy. First of all, all three games were played against teams who were okay getting a point against England, and were all content to soak up pressure and sit back and wait for an opening. Wales played teams who expected to beat them, and played a more open game, allowing the Welsh to have more space, which they took deserved advantage of. Errr that's it. The negative side is that he chose to take players who missed large chunks of last season through injury, (Wilshire) and threw them on last night only to find they weren't exactly fine-tuned - and he left Townsend at home for that. Just like the first half against Wales, the wide players didn't try to stretch the Slovak defence wide to create some space, but hung about in 'easy to find' positions while doing nothing. Despite that, (or maybe because especially on the left there were almost never options to attack) we continued to plough into the centre of the Slovak defence, despite the fact most of Slovakia was waiting there. Some of our players frustratingly cannot control the ball properly at the first attempt. The Spanish can play tiki taka because their control is already learnt and the ball to feet stays at feet - ours needed too long to control the ball, by which time the defenders knew what was coming. Some of the passing was very poor for the supposed Premiership level- hitting the ball behind an onrushing attacker forcing him to backtrack and recover is page 1 of the Morgan Fox book of football. As against Wales, we were slow and predictable for long periods, even when we were bringing the ball out of defence with the Slovaks all running for cover. We may get a more open game against Germany or France, but we will be up against better players - is our on the ball abilities going to improve. In the end, we got out of the group, so no need to be suicidal, but neither can I see much need for euphoria. Last night was painfull and frustrating.
In Aaron Ramsay Wales have one of the best players in the tournament so far, far outshining Gareth Bale in his contribution over 90 minutes.
