Diego
Well-known member
He will probs become available again with his stock not as high if he carries on way he’s begun at Chelsea
Southgate
- Thread starter Scrug
- Start date
sambaDTR
Well-known member
Maguire got near him. Giroud’s header came off Maguire’s shoulder. Another inch and it would have gone for a corner. Small margins yet again.
BoroMart
Well-known member
No, because we've made a semi a final and a quarter. Two tournaments prior to that we came bottom of a group that had Costa Rica and Uruguay in it and got knocked out of the euros by Iceland
BoroMart
Well-known member
true, Giroud made an awful contact with the header, but got lucky that he redirected onto Maguire and it rocketed of the right side of his 50p piece head. Could have gone anywhere. I thought Maguire let him get the space too easily though
Randy
Well-known member
That's your opinion. That's fine. My opinion hasn't changed. Your entitled to yours just as in entitled to mine.
Brings Mount on before Grealish, because he didn't want to lose by more given Grealish's cavalier approach to attacking football. But as I said it's a shootout.
His **** fell out again like it did at the last world cup against Croatia.
Otto42
Well-known member
Thought we were without doubt the better side tonight. Pickford maybe should do better for their first and obviously we need to score from twelve yards out, but overall it’s fine margins and unlucky we played the French in the quarterfinals. Definitely one of the best four teams this World Cup!
Other managers underperforming isn't the same thing as winning. The squad is also much better now.
Don't get me wrong, I don't think Southgate is bad and his performance in qualifying and the mentality to always beat the minnows is great. I just don't think we will win anything with him but I think our squad is good enough to win something.
Colgates_shaving_foam
Well-known member
Mount won the pen didn't he??
BoroMart
Well-known member
That's your opinion, but he brough Mount on, because he regularly plays that position and is better suited to it. Plus Grealish wins free kicks, it's his biggest asset, the ref wasn't giving free kicks most of the time. Not sure how his **** fell out, he played a team that dominated large parts of the game, should have had 3 or 4 pens, and the other team should have had one chalked off. He can't control the ref, but he set us up to be the better team. If was setting up to not lose by more why did he take a defender off for Grealish? It's your opinion, that's fine, you've doubled down on it, that's your prerogative. It's my prerogative to ask you to give a sensible justification for your view, you've failed to, that again is your prerogative.
Colgates_shaving_foam
Well-known member
As do about 10 other teams, we can't all win something without a cheat code which we don't apparently have.
I love this England team, talented, honest, hard working.
I wouldn't swap it for all the dirty oil coated cash in filthy Qatar.
Centralscrutinizer
Well-known member
Who's the person who made England look like they could win something ?
Colgates_shaving_foam
Well-known member
Erm big Phil scolari innit? Fat Sam? I dunno
BoroMart
Well-known member
This thread and the board is littered with people saying our defenders are not that great, and other than Kane we've got no other CF options. So the squad isn't much better. It's got flaws. We've had teams stacked with world class players at their peak do much worse. We've seen in this competition better squads than ours perform worse such as Brazil and France. We didn't win, but we didn't under perform. We haven't won anything in 56 years, it takes, the right players, at the right time, with the right culture, and the right on field moments to align. We've come close and we'll be right in their again at the next euros under southgate.
BoroMart
Well-known member
I'm actually embarrassed for people who have entrenched themselves so much that they can't give an ounce of credit without it being through gritted teeth and accompanied by a veiled slight to Southgate.
There's also some bizarre inflation of our squad to the best we've ever had and seemingly one superior to every other nation on the planet.....while at the same time deriding certain players like Maguire, Rashford, Stones, Sterling and sometimes even Kane as just not up to it. Logical gymnastics rather than showing some contrition, pragmatic thinking, and reality.
The idea that Southgate set us up tonight to not lose is daft, we had opportunities to win, if we went gung-ho we would have been picked off, that's blatantly obvious against a team with the quality they had in the top third. Foden plays after people complaining the other day, now they complain that Grealish isn't getting long enough. Some people are just systematically opposed to Southgate, and will probably be the same to the next manager because psychologically it's easier to slate than to give credit.
Every squad had weaknesses but ours is as good as anyone's except France (with a fully fit squad).
We did exactly as expected. Lost to the first good team we played. You make it sound like it just takes luck to win, and it does to a degree, but I think mentality and tactical decisions trump luck and I don't think Southgate will ever master those which means we're relying on luck alone to win anything with him.
It's easy to get carried away by hammering **** teams but it's very different against the teams that have a genuine chance of winning the tournaments.
I know I won't convince you now but I said this exact thing multiple times over the last few weeks/years and I expect I will still be saying it when we comfortably qualify, ease through the groups and then lose against the first good team we play at the Euros.
Theyalwaysletyoudown
Active member
Taking Saka off for Sterling on that side was just a bizarre change, Saka was torturing Hernandez and Upamecano running across them / inside then Sterling didn't seem to want to get within 20 yards of them.
BoroMart
Well-known member
The French squad is probably better than ours even with injuries. Brazils squad is better too.
We lost to a higher ranked team, that should on paper beat us, it took a dodgy goal a missed penalty and poor reffing not giving maybe 2 others they got out of jail.
What exactly did France do tactically to defeat us? Bribe the ref maybe? We weren't beaten by tactics, we were beaten by missing a pen and very poor ref decisions at critical moments. Stop harking back to the safety of tropes that have been adopted by the anti-southgate brigade. We did not lose because of 'tactics'.
Agreed, we beat this exceptionally talented Croatia last tournament and Denmark who are one of the most under rated teams in the world. We beat Germany in WC, and Croatia again and Netherlands in NAtions League. We beat good sides and sometimes lose to them. That's what happens with good sides.
I've just proven that we beat a good one, here is Croatia in another WC semi, we beat them. You aren't going to win every game against good sides, if you win 50% of them you are right in there. Anyone can make a prediction that we will lose against a team with a better squad that doesn't prove poor management.
BoroMart
Well-known member
Think he might have been struggling after being cracked in teh back of the legs for the 4th time.