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foxes_rule1978

I’m disappointed

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How to beat England. Taken from the football for dummies manual given to every foreign player.

 1. Sit back but stay in the game for the first half whilst the English wear themselves out.

 2. Start playing your own game after the break and watch the English manager panic whilst his players wilt.

 

 Still, at least Southgate started a new football manager fashion. 

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2 hours ago, DJ Barry Hammond said:

 

One of the most annoying aspects of last night was that the need for a change of shape was obvious - and Southgate essentially admitted that in one of his answers to reporters questions afterwards. 

 

We know only too well how difficult it is to switch a formation when you feel it is working for you... but a braver substitution  and we may have got over the line.

 

It had to be Loftus-Cheek for Sterling (who has flattered to deceive too much - does some great work, but always ****s it up ?).

 

Croatia had found us out, identified our flanks as the weak spot where time on the ball was all day and overloads plentiful. 

 

Yet we effectively did nothing - and the further annoyance, for the goals, defensively we were caught not attacking the ball twice. 

 

Walker... go head it, avert the danger.

 

Stones... go head it, avert the danger.

 

You want to win big prizes... take the criticism, learn from it, come back stronger.

This was the problem throughout the whole tournament.  We never really looked like scoring from open play, we just didn't create any chances.  The squad was picked to play a certain way and any subs were pretty much like for like.  The lack of a plan B cost us big time. I said before the tournament that a couple of players like Marc Albrighton and Andy Carroll would mean defenders would have something different to worry about if we needed a goal with 15 minutes left. But last night, in injury time in extra time in a WC semi final, we were still passing it sideways!  The statistic that came up on the screen 5 minutes from the end told us everything we needed to know. Shots on goal Croatia 7, England 1.

 

I have been won over by Southgate. I love how he has brought the team together and hand on heart, I have enjoyed watching these players play with pride and put 100% into the games, which is something I hadn't seen with an England team for a long long time. 

 

I'm sure Southgate will land a big 4 year contract now and that is fine with me, providing tactically he can learn from his mistakes.

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18 minutes ago, yorkie1999 said:

How to beat England. Taken from the football for dummies manual given to every foreign player.

 1. Sit back but stay in the game for the first half whilst the English wear themselves out.

 2. Start playing your own game after the break and watch the English manager panic whilst his players wilt.

 

 Still, at least Southgate started a new football manager fashion. 

But if we had taken our chances in the first half we'd be through, so those tactics would've failed.

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12 minutes ago, nnfox said:

This was the problem throughout the whole tournament.  We never really looked like scoring from open play, we just didn't create any chances.  The squad was picked to play a certain way and any subs were pretty much like for like.  The lack of a plan B cost us big time. I said before the tournament that a couple of players like Marc Albrighton and Andy Carroll would mean defenders would have something different to worry about if we needed a goal with 15 minutes left. But last night, in injury time in extra time in a WC semi final, we were still passing it sideways!  The statistic that came up on the screen 5 minutes from the end told us everything we needed to know. Shots on goal Croatia 7, England 1.

 

I have been won over by Southgate. I love how he has brought the team together and hand on heart, I have enjoyed watching these players play with pride and put 100% into the games, which is something I hadn't seen with an England team for a long long time. 

 

I'm sure Southgate will land a big 4 year contract now and that is fine with me, providing tactically he can learn from his mistakes.

Just watched the highlights again. We did well yesterday. Apart from our glaring defensive errors, Croatia did not create any really clear cut chances.  We created a few and from open play we got in there a few times, just not clinical enough

 

They rattled us with street savvy play and the ref's decisions imo, biased view of course, really went their way, which helped frustrate us

 

Experience won the day in the end. Its a shame we switched off once or twice, but the performance was generally good and we were the more creative side. Got bullied off ultimately though

Edited by AlloverthefloorYesNdidi
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1 hour ago, Gerbold said:

I didn't see any "crumbling" going on. Following the anti-Spurs caucus on here, are you - rather than thinking for yourself? Sometimes, and given the paucity of England's strength-in-depth, a chance has to be taken that a player might come good. Alli was a presence but sadly not at the level I would have hoped. Dier, Rose, Alli, Kane and Trippier represent the largest sub-group from a top-level club in this squad - that camaraderie is useful in these pressured situations. Rose may have been a better choice to start given that aspect.

Kane 'conspiring' to miss an open goal - what a bizarre choice of a word - was he conspiring with the 'keeper perhaps lol. An open goal is usually taken to mean just that -  no one between the striker and the net! He looked exhausted - and, as others have stated, should have been subbed early.

They didn't 'blow' anything - they, as you rightly point out, lost to a better team - whose key members are used to playing at the highest technical level of European football.

If this crew manage to remain a coherent group then they'll do better next time - but only if whichever manager is there manages to create an England ethos between now and 2022.

What is needed is two midfielders - playing at the level of Kante and Eriksen.

Excellent - id thought you’d ride in on your super inflated ego. Glad you didn’t disappoint. 

 

Is English your first language?  I ask because the term I used is simple enough to understand, without the need for obfuscation or manipulation. 

 

However I find I can agree about the midfield. We need at least a decent creator in there, possibly an enforcer. Perhaps Dier will grow in to that role in time, though I have my doubts. 

 

We did have chances to put the game to bed. Hence we did blow it. Again though, we lost to the better team. The two are not mutually exclusive. 

 

 

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I'm still so disappointed we blew this amazing chance of watching England in World Cup Final.

However; from watching the first game with my arms folded anticipating the shame I'm now back in love with England.

All singing the anthem every game, no tantrums no celebrities or scandal, just kids trying to perform and working their guts out in an England shirt.

It's been an exciting, great World cup watching our own Leicester boys and our travelling few fans have made me proud with their singing and behaviour.

Such a strange feeling; low and proud. But I'm Leicester and the highs always outweigh the many lows.

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3 hours ago, Webbo said:

But if we had taken our chances in the first half we'd be through, so those tactics would've failed.

But we didn’t and we looked jaded in the second half, and they didn’t, bearing in mind they had just had 2 extra time games and still ran rings round us. 

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29 minutes ago, yorkie1999 said:

But we didn’t and we looked jaded in the second half, and they didn’t, bearing in mind they had just had 2 extra time games and still ran rings round us. 

A few pundits have been talking about this today.

 

The general consensus was that our players didn't pace themselves and started off too quickly which meant they ran out of gas towards the end. The older, wiser heads of Croatia conserved their energy and used it at critical times later in the game.

 

Again, our youthful exuberance maybe cost us where more experienced players would manage their energy levels more smarter. Another factor in us having the youngest and most inexperienced squad at the competition I suppose.

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7 hours ago, Koke said:

A few points the morning after.

 

1. I know Young have done admirably but Danny Rose is a far superior player and a natural left sided player at that. I understand he was injured but once he got fit I'd start starting him. This isn't hindsight but I said before the Croatia game I'd start Rose. 

 

2. Kane has done brilliantly.  He had to sacrifice his usual game. And you have to remember Spurs midfield and creativity is vastly superior to England. If we had a proper #10 or an Eriksen type player Kane would flourish even more. My respect for Harry Kane as a footballer and captain has gone up a lot.

 

3. John Stones is just a sensational footballer. He was a laughing stock few years ago but he now looks like a mature world class CB. People say Kane is our only world class player but I would add John Stones into that bracket now as well. His composure and intelligence is fantastic.

 

4. Southgate got critics but remember what he did. He realised our defence needed strengthening and our weak midfield a needed beefing up so 352 was the correct way to go about it. His only problem for me is not using subs til 70 or 80 mins. 

 

5. Maguire and Tripper stock have risen enormously. I was previously agnostic about Tripper but he is a class player.

 

6. And lastly, yes it is a success. Going from group stage exist in 2014 to semi final in 2018 is success. You say the opponents were weak but Croatia played Denmark and Russia so does that diminish their success? 

Its not a like for like comparison though.

 

Croatia is a much smaller country so there would not be as much expectation in them to go this far in a tournament. They are smaller than Denmark and have a fraction of Russia's population.  I wouldn't have been surprised if they went out before the last 16 which was the case in their last 3 world Cups. An early Croatian exit is not going to make the headlines like Spain, Germany, Italy etc simply because of the resources available to them. 

 

In Englands case like the latter 3 there is a bit more expected due to numbers. Its damning for England that this was their first semi final in 2 decades. Of all the major nations they have underachieved a lot. Especially when you consider the big 4 leagues (La Liga, Bundesliga, Serie A) with Ligue 1 just outside it. The Premiership is the other but the National team hasn't been at the races for a while. All the other 3 + France have won a major since 2000.

 

It was a success for England compared to 4 very mediocre at best and horrendous at worst campaigns.  I watched my first full England game of the WC last night and I have to say outside the first 20 minutes I was very underwhelmed. There looked to be plenty of honest graft and decent defending up to the 65th minute but not much nous. I suspected that the draw ye had helped enormously. Croatia have been battle hardened and that helped them. They were terrible in the first 30 with passes mis hit and that but started to get going at the half hour mark.Ye got to this stage without any serious test. (Columbia are ok but they are flaky when the chips are down). When they scored ye didn't know what to do. Their passing and movement they did left ye chasing shadows a lot of the time.

 

It would have been great for England to win it but reality came home last night. Pride has been restored in a big way which was good after some very tough times. Ye still have a lot to prove though. There has been a big resurgence at Youth level so its up to England now how best to use that feel good factor.

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11 hours ago, Russell sprout said:

I don’t buy all this ‘it’s a success’ bullshit,

weve failed again,

the mentalality kids are brought up on,

such as it’s the taking part that’s counts,

that second best is acceptable,

were england,anything other than success is failure,

Our record in this World Cup is 

won 3,

lost 2,

drew 1(won on penalties)

 

now we we might beat Belgium and come 3rd,we might lose,

that could be 3 defeats in 7 and folk are saying that’s a successful World Cup,

croatia are a solid team,but we’ve really missed an opportunity here imo,

vardy could have scored all the goals Kane did,who again was disappointing,

hes a number 9 who spent most of his time on the half way line

 

 

1990 was very similar.Won 3 drew 2 lost 2.Two of the wins were against African sides when at the time they were very weak.Our team was older but there was young talent coming through.

 

We went on to have a shocking Euro 92 and didn’t even qualify for USA 94.Ok we had Taylor but he had a very decent start if I remember rightly.Please don’t fall for they will be better next tournament.Heard it all before with the golden Bollox generation

 

The media will be ready sharpening there knifes just waiting for Southgate to fail

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7 hours ago, davieG said:

We don't have any world class midfielders to pick from.

 

For too long our academies have focused on speed, strength and stamina with clubs importing ready made risk free skilled midfielders let's hope there's a few of our own in the pipeline that are not just promising but can deliver on the promise

We don’t need World class players, look at Trippier, Maguire, Pickford. Nobody would have called them world class before the tournament but they thrived because they were playing in a position that played to their strengths. Biggest criticism of Southgate has to be that he found a formation that work. The back 5 with Pickford and Henderson was a real strength but Lingard, Alli Kane and Sterling did not click. We needed a proper midfielder in there, World Class or not, Wilshere or Drinkwater could have done that job if they had not had shocking seasons, the obvious choice would have been Shelvey. Lingard or Alli as an attic king midfield role not both. Loftus Cheek would have given us more balance, but not the creativity.

 

Southgate despite not picking the usual suspects at the back still fell into the classic England manager trap of picking the best players not the best team. Our 4 attacking players created very little the goals from mainly set pieces should have been a clue. We didnt need a world class midfielder we just needed a proper central midfielder who could grow into the team and tournament the way Maguire, Trippier, Pickford did.

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10 minutes ago, Captain... said:

We don’t need World class players, look at Trippier, Maguire, Pickford. Nobody would have called them world class before the tournament but they thrived because they were playing in a position that played to their strengths. Biggest criticism of Southgate has to be that he found a formation that work. The back 5 with Pickford and Henderson was a real strength but Lingard, Alli Kane and Sterling did not click. We needed a proper midfielder in there, World Class or not, Wilshere or Drinkwater could have done that job if they had not had shocking seasons, the obvious choice would have been Shelvey. Lingard or Alli as an attic king midfield role not both. Loftus Cheek would have given us more balance, but not the creativity.

 

Southgate despite not picking the usual suspects at the back still fell into the classic England manager trap of picking the best players not the best team. Our 4 attacking players created very little the goals from mainly set pieces should have been a clue. We didnt need a world class midfielder we just needed a proper central midfielder who could grow into the team and tournament the way Maguire, Trippier, Pickford did.

Agreed. Greece won the Euro’s without a world class player in sight. What they had was round pegs in round holes and a team that worked for each other and worked cleverly. They were boring as fuch, but they’ve won something we never have. It isn’t always about world class players. They do help though lol

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Having a coherent team and system is crucial to any international footballing success regardless of ability, for the first time in a long time we're all on the same page. We've got steady foundations now as there's no calls for "root and branch reviews" or "tear it all down and start again" and "we need to copy the Spanish or German model" anymore, I'm not a huge fan but Dan Ashworth deserves credit as there has been a quiet revolution in English football which is hard to discern whilst we're in the midst of it but it's ongoing. Tellingly, I think younger players heading abroad is a clear sign as any that we're heading in the right direction as we've reached a critical point whereby we've realised  the Premier League and the Championship aren't ideal for development.

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17 hours ago, Captain... said:

We don’t need World class players, look at Trippier, Maguire, Pickford. Nobody would have called them world class before the tournament but they thrived because they were playing in a position that played to their strengths. Biggest criticism of Southgate has to be that he found a formation that work. The back 5 with Pickford and Henderson was a real strength but Lingard, Alli Kane and Sterling did not click. We needed a proper midfielder in there, World Class or not, Wilshere or Drinkwater could have done that job if they had not had shocking seasons, the obvious choice would have been Shelvey. Lingard or Alli as an attic king midfield role not both. Loftus Cheek would have given us more balance, but not the creativity.

 

Southgate despite not picking the usual suspects at the back still fell into the classic England manager trap of picking the best players not the best team. Our 4 attacking players created very little the goals from mainly set pieces should have been a clue. We didnt need a world class midfielder we just needed a proper central midfielder who could grow into the team and tournament the way Maguire, Trippier, Pickford did.

Perhaps World Class was the wrong description as I'd already stated creativity but if you have a creative midfielder of any standing they tend to be considered world class based on the technical ability, vision  and creativity by default. One brings about the other.

Besides my point was that the English PL is not producing as of now this type of midfielder of any reasonable calibre.

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23 hours ago, SouthStandUpperTier said:

I too hope you're right. But I've a feeling we've just fluffed our best chance in a generation. When are we ever going to be in a semifinal with Italy, Germany, Argentina, Spain and Brazil out of the picture? Those teams are going to learn their lessons. They are going to retool and come back stronger. They are going to play with the raving hump in the next 4 years and we'll know about it. Conversely, we'll (falsely) think we've arrived because we beat Tunisia, Panama and Sweden. Southgate will go on picking roughly the same team in the same formation despite the fact Croatia showed the world the formula to beat it.

You're very cynical but I see a lot of truth in what's being said. I do hope the fact Southgate is turning down a parade which was offered is a sign that he thinks this is progress rather than success.

 

We'd be mad to rigidly stick to that team. The front four quite simply didn't work.

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It's a shame that Wilshere never grew into the player that he looked capable of being 5 or so years ago, a player like that could well have seen us over the line.

Let's hope that young Foden at Man City can become what we need, I also think Loftus Cheek will become a class player for England but will probably need to move club, and let's hope Maddison sets the PL on fire for us :scarf:

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All this talk of Shelvey, Carroll, reverting to 4-4-2 is totally missing the point. We aren't blessed with a crop of fantastic players, so Southgate decided to forge a togetherness ('No Dickheads' policy, that rules out Shelvey and Carroll) and a system that detracted as much as possible from our glaring lack of quality central midfielders. To do that he couldn't keep switching to other formations or styles at the first sign of trouble. He had to go all-in and believe in that system and those players. Doing so paid dividends and it got us through to the semi-final.

 

Yes, he should have reacted in the second half to Croatia's threat. Rashford was a mistake, as he spent most of the time walking when the Croatia backline had the ball, rather than helping Alli and Lingard, who somehow had to try and deal with the full backs forward runs AND trying to mark Modric and Rakitic. He should have taken Kane off, who may as well not been there from about 75 minutes onwards. He should have brought on someone like Delph to stop Vrsaljko getting forward or to just sit on Modric.

 

From 45 minutes onwards Southgate arguably lost of the game by not reacting or changing. But that is ok. He is an inexperienced manager, but one with an open mind, lack of arrogance and willingness to learn. He will improve from this experience. He clearly had faith that his first choice eleven would regroup and take back control. If we had kept the ball like we did the first half, maybe that would have happened. You have to admire that confidence in the players and the system. I think that mentality will prove to be important in future tournaments.

 

I'm sick of hearing people say we will never have a better chance to get to a final. Surely the whole point of being a football fan is to dream and always believe that the future will be bright? It's the hope that kills you, but also what keeps you coming back for more.

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2 hours ago, Ricey said:

All this talk of Shelvey, Carroll, reverting to 4-4-2 is totally missing the point. We aren't blessed with a crop of fantastic players, so Southgate decided to forge a togetherness ('No Dickheads' policy, that rules out Shelvey and Carroll) and a system that detracted as much as possible from our glaring lack of quality central midfielders. To do that he couldn't keep switching to other formations or styles at the first sign of trouble. He had to go all-in and believe in that system and those players. Doing so paid dividends and it got us through to the semi-final.

 

Yes, he should have reacted in the second half to Croatia's threat. Rashford was a mistake, as he spent most of the time walking when the Croatia backline had the ball, rather than helping Alli and Lingard, who somehow had to try and deal with the full backs forward runs AND trying to mark Modric and Rakitic. He should have taken Kane off, who may as well not been there from about 75 minutes onwards. He should have brought on someone like Delph to stop Vrsaljko getting forward or to just sit on Modric.

 

From 45 minutes onwards Southgate arguably lost of the game by not reacting or changing. But that is ok. He is an inexperienced manager, but one with an open mind, lack of arrogance and willingness to learn. He will improve from this experience. He clearly had faith that his first choice eleven would regroup and take back control. If we had kept the ball like we did the first half, maybe that would have happened. You have to admire that confidence in the players and the system. I think that mentality will prove to be important in future tournaments.

 

I'm sick of hearing people say we will never have a better chance to get to a final. Surely the whole point of being a football fan is to dream and always believe that the future will be bright? It's the hope that kills you, but also what keeps you coming back for more.

 

I think this is very important. The reason why Croatia won was simple. Ultimately they had better players. The Henderson video demonstrates our midfield giving the ball away time and time and time again in the second half. When do you see Modric or Rakatic do this?

Youthful exuberance, great team spirit and work ethic only takes a football team so far. People say this was why Leicester won the league. Actually it wasn’t. We had all this AND extremely good players in Vardy, Mahrez and Kante.

I get your point about not wanting ‘dickheads’ but a good manager will know how to manage players like this IF they are going to be needed for success. Rashford may be a nice guy, but he came on in that second half and did absolutely nothing. Dier might be a popular figure, but to be able to control the game, we needed Shelvey, not Dier.

Kane needed replacing at half time. Bollox that he’s ‘the skipper’, in the second half he was a spent force and we needed to give Vardy a chance.

Nice guys and team spirit will take a football team a long way. But to win, you need real winners. You need ruthless. Sometimes you need the creative ‘trouble maker’. They ultimately were just better than we were. Which I wouldn’t have believed after watching the first half.

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9 minutes ago, Col city fan said:

 

Kane needed replacing at half time. Bollox that he’s ‘the skipper’, in the second half he was a spent force and we needed to give Vardy a chance.

Nice guys and team spirit will take a football team a long way. But to win, you need real winners. You need ruthless. Sometimes you need the creative ‘trouble maker’. They ultimately were just better than we were. Which I wouldn’t have believed after watching the first half.

Maybe the fact half the team were Spurs players didn't help :D

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I think our biggest downfall was playing only one central midfielder. As the tournament goes on there's always going to be that added pressure when you're up against it. I know we had the wing backs and the extra centre half, which is fine aginast teams like Panama & Tunisia. But you can't do that against teams that have Modric and Rakitic in. It's a shame that we didn't have a proper plan B. 

 

Henderson was fantastic but there's a limit. Hopefully Wilshere can get a couple of decent seasons under his belt because him and Henderson would've completed each other well. That Video of Henderson is also quite misleading he's obviously trying to get Sterling in first time over the top like they'd been trying for a lot of the first half, which was effective. Then in the second half they just stopped doing everything that made us look so comfortable in the first half. 

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Sick of hearing now that we've overachieved, we haven't. All we have done is not underachieved. It's a step forward but people are going overboard. 

 

Tunisia, Panama, Sweden you'd expect to win. 

Colombia draw

Croatia and Belgium loss. 

 

There isn't a shock result there, more a surprising situation. The boys did well in a sense that they didn't embarrass themselves (like previous teams) but they came up against a half decent side and were found wanting.

 

What they should be proud of, as everybody is saying, is the reconnection with the fans. And so maybe with fans like me off their back, they'll find the freedom to express and improve. 

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47 minutes ago, Bert said:

I think our biggest downfall was playing only one central midfielder. As the tournament goes on there's always going to be that added pressure when you're up against it. I know we had the wing backs and the extra centre half, which is fine aginast teams like Panama & Tunisia. But you can't do that against teams that have Modric and Rakitic in. It's a shame that we didn't have a proper plan B. 

 

Henderson was fantastic but there's a limit. Hopefully Wilshere can get a couple of decent seasons under his belt because him and Henderson would've completed each other well. That Video of Henderson is also quite misleading he's obviously trying to get Sterling in first time over the top like they'd been trying for a lot of the first half, which was effective. Then in the second half they just stopped doing everything that made us look so comfortable in the first half. 

Henderson wasn’t fantastic in the Croatia game. This is part of the problem. Such hyperbole overshadows the reality. Henderson had a good tournament. But he was never ‘fantastic’ and was actually pretty piss poor in the final game. He needed help though. He had to do just too much on his own.

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7 hours ago, Col city fan said:

Henderson wasn’t fantastic in the Croatia game. This is part of the problem. Such hyperbole overshadows the reality. Henderson had a good tournament. But he was never ‘fantastic’ and was actually pretty piss poor in the final game. He needed help though. He had to do just too much on his own.

I'm talking whole tournament. 

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