Does this sound familiar? how many times last season did we do that High up the pitch and the ball goes all the way back to the keeper Turning point: the England throw-in that encapsulated 58 years of hurt Jonathan Liew please log in to view this image Bukayo Saka turns towards the crowd and pumps his arms like an orchestra conductor, demands more noise, and the noise explodes like thunder, lifting the Olympiastadion off its stone foundations. Back in the England goal, Jordan Pickford is waving an imaginary lasso. There are 75 minutes on the clock in the Euro 2024final. Cole Palmer has just scored a spectacular equaliser to make it 1-1. England have an attacking throw-in deep in Spanish territory. How can this be the end? But it is the end and Gareth Southgate, even through his haze of distress and disappointment, the noises still ringing in his ears, the consequences and the contingencies, will identify this as the end. Can a throw-in change the course of nations? Can a throw-in decide a game? Can a throw-in encapsulate 58 years of English tournament dysfunction? Let’s find out. Here is what happens … England have won the ball back after the goal, working it forward through Jude Bellingham and then Saka. Palmer, adrenaline and endorphins still surging through him, tries to jig past Fabián Ruiz, who puts in a desperate tackle and bunts the ball out of play. As he regains his balance, Ruiz stumbles a little. He looks exhausted. His shirt is absolutely soaked in sweat. The roar of the England fans is primeval. The clock shows 74:49. Kyle Walker trots forward to take the throw and Palmer gives the ball up for him. Walker studies his options – the long throw into the mixer, the short one to Palmer or Saka, who are wheeling around in front of him like bobbins – and doesn’t like any of them. So he waits. Perhaps he even freezes momentarily. By the time Walker releases the ball it has spent 31 seconds – 3.4% of the remaining time available in the match – in his hands. The noise has died down a little. Walker, a powerful man, takes a run-up. Winds up those fearsome, Carrington-carved core muscles. Hurls the ball with all his might. It skims through the Berlin night, skips across the turf and finds its way to … John Stones in defence, 40 yards behind him. But Stones is under pressure and returns it to Pickford. Pickford is also under pressure and boots the ball straight out of play for a Spain goal-kick. Ollie Watkins scowls at him. Pickford shrugs and grimaces at once, like a man who has stolen a hedgehog, stuffed it down his trousers and is now trying to play it cool in front of the parish elders. The clock shows 75:29. England’s little frisson of post-goal momentum has simply evaporated, gone, stolen off into the night. Spain get the ball back. England’s midfield are pressing Spain’s midfield, five on five. Watkins is therefore left to close down the two centre-halves and the goalkeeper, Unai Simón, all by himself. Palmer comes up, Saka comes up after him, but that leaves Marc Cucurella free on the left and, after Simon plays off him, Spain are away: camped in the England half, working it from left to right, right to centre, centre to left. Eventually, a cross comes in and Stones heads it out for a corner. The clock shows 77:40. The corner is cleared by Bellingham and then Palmer. Spain get the ball back. England have collapsed into a basic 4-4-2 defensive shape and Spain can simply walk it through them. Marc Guéhi shepherds the ball out for a goal-kick. Pickford boots it straight back to Spain. Ruiz advances, Phil Foden tackles, the ball hits Declan Rice and finally – more than six minutes after the throw-in – England have possession again. The clock shows 80:57. The moment it died… After our 73rd min equaliser, we had started to play it around for a period of sustained possession. Then for some reason, Walker throws the ball way back to Stones, who passes it back to Pickford, who long balls it out for a goal kick to Spain.Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. “We had a throw-in in their third of the pitch,” said Southgate when asked why England were unable to capitalise on their equalising goal. “We had an opportunity to keep the ball there, but we played backwards, out of the pressure, and we didn’t get the ball again. So there was a turning point, if you like.” “Southgate’s England in microcosm: torn between optimism and caution,” I wrote after the 1-0 win against Serbia, another game when England’s head of steam curiously and suddenly dissipated. There, Serbia broke through the press and a spooked England retreated 10 yards down the pitch. In Berlin, Walker had options that would keep up the attacking pressure on Spain, but would also put the ball at greater risk. Walker chose to keep the ball, but in so doing he gave up control. There are probably four separate but interlinking forces at work here: one physical, one tactical, one mental, one cultural. England, by this stage of the game, are exhausted, having twice been taken to extra time and with one day fewer than Spain to recover. Attacking football requires physical bravery, the ability to seek out and win duels, to make sharp sacrificial sprints, to hold off burly defenders and ride challenges. Sterile possession football, tapping it back to Stones and back to Guéhi and back to Pickford, requires none of this. It’s easy work. This bit is very much not on Southgate. But this is an attacking set piece, a chance to work the ball into a dangerous area, the sort of situation Southgate and his coaches must have plotted out in advance. Why is there no playbook, no set of choreographed routines or movements? Why is flinging the ball 40 yards backwards (and still into trouble) even an option? This bit is on Southgate. please log in to view this image Mikel Oyarzabal put Spain ahead late on after England had no touches in the opposition half in the previous 10 minutes. Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian Walker does not make these judgments in a vacuum. For virtually the whole of the past eight years with Manchester City and England, Walker will hardly have faced an opposing team that has technical superiority over his own. What he knows is possession, space, time. How often in the past decade has he been in a situation where he can give the ball away and his team will not see it again for 10 minutes? Throw in the stakes, the magnitude of the occasion, the state of the match, and this is essentially a moment of intense and unfamiliar stress, even for a player as experienced as Walker. Perhaps it is no surprise that in this moment of boss-level challenge, he opts to retreat into the comforting embrace of his City teammate Stones, the ley line of an old folk memory going all the way back to Russia in 2018. This bit is slightly on Southgate. His side should be sufficiently tournament‑hardened to be able to know when pressure needs to be put back on the opposition. If they don’t, the gameplan should change accordingly. England tried to be more enterprising at this tournament, to throw more attackers on to the pitch, and have paradoxically found themselves more inert and disjointed than ever. Brilliant footballers have bailed them out at vital times and this, too, does not happen in a vacuum. The irony here is that Southgate has leaned too heavily into the court of public opinion, tried to fit in too many of the A-listers, tried to win an international tournament in an authentically English way, ignoring that the authentically English way is not to win at all. The immaculate super-structure that saw them through 2018-2022 has broken down. In trying to wring every drop out of the individual talent at his disposal, Southgate has largely abandoned the principle of collective responsibility, allowing players such as Bellingham and Harry Kane and Foden to choose their own adventure on the pitch, to feel their way through the game, to trust in their own decision-making skills. This has generated some of the most unforgettable individual moments in England football, but it also does occasionally mean Kyle Walker will take it upon himself to throw the ball 40 yards backwards. And no, by the way, one throw-in cannot sum up 58 years of hurt. This is a simple game wrapped up in layers of complexity, the “what” subsumed in the “why”. England were beaten by a better team. But why are England so rarely the better team in games like these? You lose on penalties, so you fix the penalties. You lose at set pieces, so you fix the set pieces. You lose because you can’t pass the ball, so you try to pass the ball. You lose because of the unbearable scrutiny and pressure of the environment, the club cliques, the joyless camps, and so you organise a padel league and put some inflatable unicorns in the pool. And now what? You lose because your star striker balloons a penalty. You lose because your right-back throws the ball in the wrong direction. It will be of no comfort whatsoever to Southgate or his players. But their excuses are at least becoming less and less plausible.
Yea Spain were absolutely rattled at that moment And england allowed them a chance to get a hold back into the game
And all along we thought Rosenior was trying to emulate Pep, when all the time he was using the Southgate playbook...
The English players apart from two or three do not have the technical ability and easy athleticism of the Spanish - they move and turn and control a ball instantly - they look about 1/2 stone lighter - Mainoo looks heavy , like Shaw Foden has no speed , Saka can dribble with one foot but can’t pass with the other and is not quick enough to be a conventional wi get Stones , Palmer Jude have the mobility to compete . It’s part tactics. But mainly an inability to keep a ball when squeezed - City became very good at it last year .
Southgate is awful, I’ve never liked him. He has zero balls when it comes to making the big decisions and his style of football for the players England have is outrageous. How England could have done with Rashford and Henderson, we needed that experience against Spain.
Awful? That's a bit extreme. Henderson? He got a lot of flak for picking him 2 years ago... If he'd have picked him now and England went out in the quarters, this would be used against him. He chose his method to get England not to lose as often as possible and got further than any other manager in 58 years. Until England win something, every manager will get criticised.
The Gibraltar FA to make official complaint to UEFA following Spanish Men’s National Team Euro 2024 celebrations. The Gibraltar FA has noted the extremely provocative and insulting nature of the celebrations around the Spanish Men's national team winning Euro 2024. The Association is this morning taking advice on the filing of a complaint to European Football's governing body, UEFA, in relation to the unacceptable chanting and songs, relating to Gibraltar, sung by Spain's Men's National Team players after winning Euro 2024. Football has no place for behaviour of this nature.
Got a lot of time for this bloke, good manager already, but far too early for him to step back from club management to go into national ... let him mature a bit, learn from mistakes, then if he stands up to scrutiny let him loose.
