World Cup Qatar

[Anag Ram]

7 hours ago, DarkFruitsRam7 said:

And yet he gets an absolutely ridiculous amount of stick. Completely baffles me. Football fans don’t deserve good things. 

The bloke has given me two of the best summers I’ll probably ever have.

Too much fantasy football mentality amongst England fans. Shoehorn in all the best players and hope it gels seems to be the typical view.

When you are playing the best in the world, you need to win the midfield. That means winning an often physical battle against top players. You therefore need two midfielders minimum who can tackle and hold the ball under pressure.

At the back, we don’t have an embarrassment of riches so he has gone with a tried and tested pairing, plus ‘safer’ fullbacks defensively.

We know there are probably eight players who could fill the four ‘attacking’ options (inc one more progressive midfielder)

He will shuffle the pack and may occasionally get it wrong but our bench must be one of the best. 
 

Going into the tournament a lot seemed to rest on Harry Kane. On top form he’s undoubtedly the best we have but Callum Wilson has shown he can play with good players around him.

I think we should be proud of our team, though I suspect France may be too strong. They may well win it.

[sage]

19 minutes ago, Anag Ram said:

Too much fantasy football mentality amongst England fans. Shoehorn in all the best players and hope it gels seems to be the typical view.

When you are playing the best in the world, you need to win the midfield. That means winning an often physical battle against top players. You therefore need two midfielders minimum who can tackle and hold the ball under pressure.

At the back, we don’t have an embarrassment of riches so he has gone with a tried and tested pairing, plus ‘safer’ fullbacks defensively.

We know there are probably eight players who could fill the four ‘attacking’ options (inc one more progressive midfielder)

He will shuffle the pack and may occasionally get it wrong but our bench must be one of the best. 
 

Going into the tournament a lot seemed to rest on Harry Kane. On top form he’s undoubtedly the best we have but Callum Wilson has shown he can play with good players around him.

I think we should be proud of our team, though I suspect France may be too strong. They may well win it.

This.

I would add that we don't have another Kane to act as target man. The resrvadevsubs for me.

On a different scale it reminds me of our reliance on Chris Martin.

[G STAR RAM]

8 hours ago, DarkFruitsRam7 said:

And yet he gets an absolutely ridiculous amount of stick. Completely baffles me. Football fans don’t deserve good things. 

The bloke has given me two of the best summers I’ll probably ever have.

Yeah but you're forgetting that had he listened to all of our expert supporters we would have won both tournaments without conceding a goal.

Football management is easy, all you have to do is put all of your best attacking players in the team and you automatically win every match.

What amazes me most is that all of these experts that slag off Southgate will also have been the ones creaming themselves over the appointments of Erikkson and Capello.

 

[kevinhectoring]

47 minutes ago, sage said:

Which people should [he] be listening to?

No one in particular. Seems there is a clamour from the fans, fed by comments from pundits and journalists, which Southgate’s team can’t help being aware of. So he’s being prepped for interviewers asking him questions like “people are wondering why Foden isn’t starting, what are your plans for him in this tournament?”  I think he may be influenced when there is an opinion that is so widely held - and of course he’s aware of it.  Could be a bad career move if he ignores it and things go wrong. And I don’t think he’s stubborn, it’s more that he’s a bit limited as a tactician 

(... or he could cut out the middle men and just listen to Gary Neville who seems to be in a league of his own. )

[Ram-Alf]

11 hours ago, Steve Buckley’s Dog said:

I thought Wales looked like a pub team. 

Wales Manager Page thought they were excellent in the 1st half, If excellent is putting 11 men behind the ball, Having 1 shot off target, Having your 2 best players in Bale and Ramsey doing didley squat, Then they were excellent ?‍♀️

[Ram-Alf]

10 hours ago, Mr. P said:

Don’t think it would’ve made much difference, but I didn’t think that was a free kick that led to Rashfords first goal. 

Well it can be added to the 100s of wrong free kicks that's been awarded in this competition ?

[Ram-Alf]

52 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

 

What amazes me most is that all of these experts that slag off Southgate will also have been the ones creaming themselves over the appointments of Erikkson and Capello.

 

Southgate is to reserved, He has some very talented players that sometimes he's wary of playing them, Instead he'll go safety 1st, He's more preoccupied with the opposition, Where the opposition should be preoccupied with us.

As for Erikson and Capello the only creaming I'd do would be with a custard pie in their mush

[G STAR RAM]

5 minutes ago, Unlucky Alf said:

Southgate is to reserved, He has some very talented players that sometimes he's wary of playing them, Instead he'll go safety 1st, He's more preoccupied with the opposition, Where the opposition should be preoccupied with us.

As for Erikson and Capello the only creaming I'd do would be with a custard pie in their mush

Tournament football is about winning matches, if safety first wins you matches then thats exactly what you should do.

We have fans moaning about how rubbish Maguire is and then also moaning that we play with 2 CDMs infront of him.

If football was just about all out attack, Kevin Keegan would still be manager.

Not saying I agree with all of Southgates decisions here by the way, just that people need to be careful what they wish for.

[sage]

55 minutes ago, kevinhectoring said:

No one in particular. Seems there is a clamour from the fans, fed by comments from pundits and journalists, which Southgate’s team can’t help being aware of. So he’s being prepped for interviewers asking him questions like “people are wondering why Foden isn’t starting, what are your plans for him in this tournament?”  I think he may be influenced when there is an opinion that is so widely held - and of course he’s aware of it.  Could be a bad career move if he ignores it and things go wrong. And I don’t think he’s stubborn, it’s more that he’s a bit limited as a tactician 

(... or he could cut out the middle men and just listen to Gary Neville who seems to be in a league of his own. )

Or maybe Gary Neville could become a manager...oh wait...

[Ram-Alf]

14 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

Tournament football is about winning matches, if safety first wins you matches then thats exactly what you should do.

 

See my previous posts, Tournament football is about getting a foothold, Win the 1st game and it gives the manager breathing space for what happens in the next game, USA were better than us, Could have/should have won...but didn't, We got the point that made our 3rd game more thought provoking, A Welsh team that had only turned up in the 1st half against the USA, After that bloody awful, We played cat and mouse with the Welsh in the 1st half, Saw their weaknesses and took full control.

I expect a cautious approach from Southgate against Senegal, Pretty much like the 1st half last night, See how they set up and play, Find their weaknesses and exploit them, It's not going to be a walk in the park, Knock out competitions are different as you know

 

[kevinhectoring]

3 minutes ago, sage said:

Or maybe Gary Neville could become a manager...oh wait...

Yeah it’s a funny one. Very different job I guess. As I typed my post I did wonder whether he’d try it again but frankly I think he’s not that foolish. Funny I used to detest him as a player but his punditry is just so incisive. (“In the kingdom of the blind...” some would say?)

On one of the preview shows he was accused by Carragher (the dolt) and TV’s Jack the lad Rednapp of lazy analysis of defenders. Neville’s response was hilarious, he said something like, ‘what are you on about, I spend most of my waking hours thinking about defenders, I’m obsessed by it. That’s my problem ...’. Maybe some indication there why he might not be the ideal manager ? 

[kevinhectoring]

12 minutes ago, Unlucky Alf said:

USA were better than us,

Hmmm. Certainly they played to more of their potential. But the US have it in them to beat the Dutch ... 

[Ram-a-lama fa fa fa]

1 hour ago, Unlucky Alf said:

Wales Manager Page thought they were excellent in the 1st half, If excellent is putting 11 men behind the ball, Having 1 shot off target, Having your 2 best players in Bale and Ramsey doing didley squat, Then they were excellent ?‍♀️

a poor manager IMO. i feel sorry the team he takes over if he goes into club management. thought they was awful last night

[JuanFloEvraTheCocu'sNesta]

12 minutes ago, Ram-a-lama fa fa fa said:

a poor manager IMO. i feel sorry the team he takes over if he goes into club management. thought they was awful last night

Apart from being passable at best in the second half against USA they have been desperately poor for the duration of their WC campaign. Regardless of if it's Page or someone else, the next Wales manager has a big job on their hands as the expectation is now set that they should be qualifying for tournaments based on their recent record, but as Bale, Ramsay and Allen fade away they simply do not have the quality coming through to replace them.

They need a manager that is capable of drilling them in to something greater than the sum of its parts. I don't think Page is that man. "Keep it tight and hope Bale does something magical" only works if you have Bale who is a fading force at this point.

[Srg]

Forgetting personnel and formations for a moment... the biggest issue with the way Southgate has us playing is the tempo. It's walking football at times. It was painful against the US and it settled into that pattern early against Wales. We go side to side with such speed that any low block is more than enough to make breaking the opponents down very difficult. We saw it in the Nations League, which was the reason were so dreadful, and we've seen it in the last 2 games of this World Cup.

Now, the big question mark is if that translates to actually a good thing against better opposition. Ones who will have just as much, if not more, of the ball than we do. We can counter using those attacking players well, and the deficiency in being ball dominant in the back 4 may not be as big of an issue. It remains to be seen, but I am not holding my breath with Southgate.

[JuanFloEvraTheCocu'sNesta]

4 minutes ago, Srg said:

Forgetting personnel and formations for a moment... the biggest issue with the way Southgate has us playing is the tempo. It's walking football at times. It was painful against the US and it settled into that pattern early against Wales. We go side to side with such speed that any low block is more than enough to make breaking the opponents down very difficult. We saw it in the Nations League, which was the reason were so dreadful, and we've seen it in the last 2 games of this World Cup.

Now, the big question mark is if that translates to actually a good thing against better opposition. Ones who will have just as much, if not more, of the ball than we do. We can counter using those attacking players well, and the deficiency in being ball dominant in the back 4 may not be as big of an issue. It remains to be seen, but I am not holding my breath with Southgate.

I agree with the tempo point. When we upped the tempo last night Wales were immediately in trouble every time. I'm not sure what instructions Southgate is giving as to when to speed up and slow down, and I appreciate that you can't play at full tilt for 90 minutes, but the balance does seem off a lot of the time.

I think part of the problem in Southgate's mind is that we aren't blessed with a load of brilliant defenders so he feels the need to protect them with a screen of two midfielders, that typically means we lose an extra player making things happen up top. If we play too high against the likes of France, Spain, Brazil etc they will absolutely slice and dice our back line if we expose them too much.

[Ram-Alf]

1 hour ago, kevinhectoring said:

Hmmm. Certainly they played to more of their potential. But do the US have it in them to beat the Dutch ... 

Added do for ya Kevin...did you miss that out? if so, Then the USA  have the ability to beat the Dutch...depending which Dutch team turn up ?‍♀️

Whether they played to their potential and we were not at the races...they were better than us. 

[DarkFruitsRam7]

9 minutes ago, Srg said:

Forgetting personnel and formations for a moment... the biggest issue with the way Southgate has us playing is the tempo. It's walking football at times. It was painful against the US and it settled into that pattern early against Wales. We go side to side with such speed that any low block is more than enough to make breaking the opponents down very difficult. We saw it in the Nations League, which was the reason were so dreadful, and we've seen it in the last 2 games of this World Cup.

Now, the big question mark is if that translates to actually a good thing against better opposition. Ones who will have just as much, if not more, of the ball than we do. We can counter using those attacking players well, and the deficiency in being ball dominant in the back 4 may not be as big of an issue. It remains to be seen, but I am not holding my breath with Southgate.

 

1 minute ago, JuanFloEvraTheCocu'sNesta said:

I agree with the tempo point. When we upped the tempo last night Wales were immediately in trouble every time. I'm not sure what instructions Southgate is giving as to when to speed up and slow down, and I appreciate that you can't play at full tilt for 90 minutes, but the balance does seem off a lot of the time.

I think part of the problem in Southgate's mind is that we aren't blessed with a load of brilliant defenders so he feels the need to protect them with a screen of two midfielders, that typically means we lose an extra player making things happen up top. If we play too high against the likes of France, Spain, Brazil etc they will absolutely slice and dice our back line if we expose them too much.

Listening to people more intelligent than me around the Euros and this World Cup, I've heard a lot of talk about England having "moments" in the game, i.e. bursts of fast attacking play amidst the more controlled, slower stuff.

Whether this is deliberate on Southgate's part, I've absolutely no idea. I just prefer to enjoy the fact we've reached the latter stages of the last two tournaments and had a blast along the way.

[Srg]

5 minutes ago, JuanFloEvraTheCocu'sNesta said:

I agree with the tempo point. When we upped the tempo last night Wales were immediately in trouble every time. I'm not sure what instructions Southgate is giving as to when to speed up and slow down, and I appreciate that you can't play at full tilt for 90 minutes, but the balance does seem off a lot of the time.

I think part of the problem in Southgate's mind is that we aren't blessed with a load of brilliant defenders so he feels the need to protect them with a screen of two midfielders, that typically means we lose an extra player making things happen up top. If we play too high against the likes of France, Spain, Brazil etc they will absolutely slice and dice our back line if we expose them too much.

This tournament though, he actually hasn't screened the defence with two midfielders. He's just had Rice there, Bellingham with a box to box role and usually Mount further on. So he has learnt in that regard, and you're right, playing at 100mph for a full game is impossible. That said, we barely broke 5mph at any point against America.

[Brammie Steve]

Rashford's second goal reminded me of Our Archie's goal for Scotland that made him a legend North of the Border!

Keep it going Marcus!

 

Edited November 30, 2022 by Brammie Steve