ariotofmyown

Interesting what to do for this match regarding booze. No doubt when I was younger I'd have up for a few beers and watching in a crowd. Would be epic if we win, but been there too many times when it's the opposite.
These days I usually stay sober for huge games as want to follow every minute of it. Just me and kids watching it at home tonight as wife booked weekend away months ago.
Kids have never been that excited by football on tv before but are mad for tonight. We listened to Vindaloo, 3 Lions, World in Motion and Footballs Coming Home again yesterday and Vindaloo has been sung a lot since. Unfortunately, I found one of my kids looking up football songs again later and they discovered We're on the Ball. Sad times.
Think might watch a few highlights of old England tournament games on youtube with them this afternoon.

What a weird and entirely true thing to be saying.

At the moment if you were to rank those players you may struggle to know who 1 and 2 were, but you'd know neither would be Rice or Phillips.

What?  And she's still not back yet?
I'd give it up mate.  It don't look promising!
 
Oh... erm... 

Maybe we all fall into the trap of thinking about team selection first. Maybe we need tactics and formation to start with, then work out who goes where.
Phillips and Rice have already had more success for England than Lampard and Gerrard did in the centre of midfield.

Maybe we all fall into the trap of thinking about team selection first. Maybe we need tactics and formation to start with, then work out who goes where.
Phillips and Rice have already had more success for England than Lampard and Gerrard did in the centre of midfield.

Going to the pub at 6.00 then home at 7.30 to watch the match.
Dont want to be drunk enough to forget owt. 
 
If I was your age I’d be doing exactly the same as you ?????????

Difficult to draw comparisons when the systems were so different. 
Maybe that's the point of the England manager - get the right players for your system. 
My Chelsea supporting mate said that Frank Lampard was always much more effective when they played with one striker. So when sven stuck rigid to a 442 you may as well not bothered playing Frank. 

You are probably right, could be a long time.
I still think the PMs I can remember (Thatcher onwards) would have all been much better at saying:
a) this is the situation
b) this is what we think is the best course of action
c) this is what you have to do
The only time we've had that was when we finally lockdowned the first time.
So many of the decisions have just invited obvious questions that have been ignored/glossed over.
Not just with the current regime, but we need decision makers with the requisite experience and leadership qualities. 
These are some of the most important jobs in the country. We need to find a way of getting highly competent people to do them.
Javid seems a big upgrade on the joke of Hancock and Sunak seems decent so far.

Great point. I am as bad as anyone when waffling about team selection, tactics, formation but the most effective talent any manger can have  is the one that gets a team to play as a unit using their combined strengths. 

Probably another thread but not sure when we've had a better squad. Maybe 2004?
Probably doesn't matter, it's all about getting decent players to play as a team. Such as when Greece and Danes won the Euros.

Well it is personal choice isn't it? They appear to have just modified the tone a bit - as you say. 
By the way, I look forward to the day when a government, of any persuasion, achieves your ambitions. 

The importance of his man management simply can’t be understated. It’s not just an optional bonus. It’s a huge part of our current relative success.
And something I keep hearing from people who know what they’re talking about is international tournaments aren’t won by swashbuckling teams. Something to bear in mind before calling for the shackles to come off.

I don't think I've ever been against Southgate, I probably thought at the time of his appointment it was a safe option and would have liked someone a bit more charismatic - but here we are ? 
Southgate exudes calmness and intelligence, he clearly has all the players focussed no matter what their status in the squad.  He is probably helped by the fact we have no real superstars in the squad  - certainly no superstar ego's, but its still a talent to keep players that aren't playing, or those subbed on and off after 30 mins happy and the squad moving together as a unit.
Makes you wonder what he might have been able to do with previous squads that had more talent and more personality.

I think the narrative needs to change,
something along the lines of "my nan would've won the euros managing this squad and probably 5-0 each match"
He's done a good job of getting them all to buy in, play as a team and trust him and each other. He's England's Steve Clarke.

Always backed Southgate. I never understood why people thought he was a bad manager. 

I'm presuming some may have seeing as he was called everything from a yes-man to tactically naive prior to the Euros.
When I lived in t he US I didn't watch much Premiership and very few England games so I really didn't have much of an opinion and was on the fence.
But I was worried that he'd taken Boro down and not managed/coached at this level, but I thought the last WC looked promising.
Then I thought the open letter he wrote prior to the start of the tournament was utterly brilliant.
Of course that didn't mean he'd do well here, but it did show a real awareness of stuff other than the football, most importantly his players.
Then when I have seen interviews with other people who have known him from way back and who have talked about his approach to every level of the England organisation in terms of making it inclusive whilst giving autonomy for people to do what they do best, my admiration shot up.
That is how you lead rather than just manage.
He's also incredibly gutsy and not at all swayed by the media and fans clamouring.
Sir Alf was like that with Hurst over Greaves. He stuck to what he thought was the best thing to do even when millions disagreed.
To bring Grealish on and then take him off again required gonads of biblical proportions.
I also love that this team is almost egoless in an era where that is so unusual. That's not an accident.
So I've gone from ambivalence to thinking I don't care what happens today, I'll still be glad we have him going into the World Cup and I think this team will be a real force for years to come.
Anybody else changed their mind?
More importantly, anybody else still not impressed?

Hope you remember some of it!

Parents have really got into footie in the last year or so. Were never fans of it before. Same with sis in law and neice. Watched all the England euro games.

Well I hope the footballing gods work in your favour. ?

When originally buying the tickets it was just to experience a final at Wembley.
Never really thought /believed  England would make the final! 

It’s coming home!!!!!!!! ???

UEFA didn’t think the laser pen and booing was all that bad. 
We got worse for doing our accounts a different way to the rest.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/57788267

England coach is scheduled to leave St. George’s park about 4pm & through Burton. People heading down to wave them on. 

That will be very comforting to someone worried about an older parent with lung cancer.
A colleague knows someone in hospital with Covid. Had two jabs but also has underlying health issues. May I forward your post on so they know it's all being exaggerated for reasons you have still never been able to reveal.

Maybe cos the 37bn figure was bought up by Corbyn as per the fact link check I posted earlier;
https://fullfact.org/health/test-trace-march-2021/
and another one here;
https://fullfact.org/online/37bn-test-trace-spending/
“...if £37 billion can be found to pay Serco for a failed track and trace system, the money must be available to pay NHS staff properly.”
JEREMY CORBYN MP, 8 MARCH 2021.
 
Also according to the Fact Check link;
 
 
Budget vs cost
Finally, much talk in recent weeks has revolved around the £37 billion earmarked for Test and Trace.
This comprises £22 billion in 2020/21 and a further £15 billion in 2021/22.
However, this should be understood as the budget for Test and Trace, not how much has been spent so far on Test and Trace. 
Again, we don’t have up-to-date figures on this. When the NAO reported on the programme in late 2020, it noted that, as of October 2020, Test and Trace had spent £4 billion despite budgeting to have spent £6 billion.
It noted that the largest underspend was related to laboratories, machines and mass testing.  
Earlier this year, senior health official David Williams told the Public Accounts Committee that the spend to November was £5.7 billion and that it expected that the eventual spend for Test and Trace in 2020/21 would be in the “low 20s, or maybe the very high teens.” He added that testing “continues to be the principal driver of cost.”
 
But lets not get facts get in the way of a good story ?  And I can pretty much guarantee that despite evidence to the contrary 37bn will continue to be thrown around in the thread as stick to beat the Tories with.  We have more than enough actual things to criticise them for without falling for media distortions.

37BN, is a lot entire NHS budget pre Covid was c. 150BN.
It thats enough context. It would cover the club's debt, buy back the stadium, get us 2 a couple of decent wingers. Not sure about the plaza though.
 

Would probably just have been easier to admit that you'd repeated something that has been proven to be complete nonsense?