UEFA Euro 2024 Thread

[Grumpy Git]

1 minute ago, StaffsRam said:

Against Switzerland I'd go:           

                                              Pickford

                    Trent         Konsa          Stones          Walker

                                      Rice             Bellingham

                                               Foden

                           Palmer                                Gordon

                                                Kane

Konsa cos Guehi's suspended.

Does Bellingham play that deep at RM?

[Srg]

3 minutes ago, Grumpy Git said:

Does Bellingham play that deep at RM?

Bellingham plays as a false 9 at Madrid. But they also have good width and pace with the likes of Vinicius.

[StaffsRam]

No, but trying to accommodate both Bellingham and Foden I think Bellingham's more capable of playing further back than Foden is out wide on the left. We've tried that for 4 games and it's not really even remotely looked like working. The left side is a huge problem, it's almost completely ineffective.

[Malagaram]

12 hours ago, Van der MoodHoover said:

Spain would tear today's England back 4 to bits on this performance.

Clinical demolition of Georgia.

[therealhantsram]

7 minutes ago, StaffsRam said:

Against Switzerland I'd go:           

                                              Pickford

                    Trent         Konsa          Stones          Walker

                                      Rice             Bellingham

                                               Foden

                           Palmer                                Gordon

                                                Kane

Konsa cos Guehi's suspended.

I'd go

                     Pickford
Trent Walker Stones Konsa Shaw
                        Rice    
     Palmer Bellingham Gordon
                       Kane

With Stones to step up and play a bit in front of Konsa and Walker the way he does for City.
Shaw if fit, otherwise IDK.

I am convinced we can't play Foden and Bellingham in the same team. 
 

[The Scarlet Pimpernel]

The defence are passing far too slowly. The midfield are not busting a gut to recieve the ball. Trippier cannot play left back. We looked far more balanced with Saka at left back and Palmer on the right. 

Very predictable that as soon as we went 2-1 up we sat back. Not saying we should go gung-ho but we very nearly conceded an equaliser. I wish during interview someone would ask the players or Southgate who is responsible for the slow sideways play with minimal shots on goal. Is it incompetence from the players or are they playing to instructions? Needs to be asked directly. 

Very diappointing despite going through to the quatrer finals. 

[therealhantsram]

9 minutes ago, Grumpy Git said:

Does Bellingham play that deep at RM?

He played that deep at Dortmund. But in my opinion, you don't take the tournament's best goal threat and give him a DM role.  That would be suicide.

[StaffsRam]

1 minute ago, therealhantsram said:

I am convinced we can't play Foden and Bellingham in the same team. 

I'm nearly there. I'd like to try Bellingham playing next to Rice with Foden in front, but if that doesn't work then I'd agree, and Foden would be the one to drop out of the side. Either way I think it's hugely important that we get Gordon and Palmer into the side. They offer width, urgency and trickery. I don't think we've seen much of any of those things outside of the first half against Serbia.

[1of4]

When Southgate was appointed as a stop gap manager after Allardyce was sacked. I wasn't expecting much from him and he would quickly be replaced. But after the way he got the team playing and listening to an interview talking about some of the coaching methods he wanted to introduce. I was happy for him to remain has England's manager. 

Unfortunately over time he has become to negative in how he sets up his teams. To often when going in front in the big tournament matches, the team stop pushing forward and start sitting deeper and deeper.

This was shown in the Euro final against Italy. After we scored the Italians were in turmoil they couldn't cope with our movement and pace and we should have had the match tied up by half-time. Instead we allowed them to get to half-time, regroup and change their tactics.

Since that final we have become more and more stayed and cautious in our approach to games. To often in important games this means our flare players are being stifled by Southgate's approach to how he sets up and wants the team to play.

[Alph]

With the booing... 

When your team is in a run of poor results and heads are starting to drop then booing imo is only going to contribute to further decline. 

I think it's a little different with England though. Bellingham said about fans being supportive of what they're trying to do but it's hard to accept players selling themselves short of what they're capable of. That's when booing is justified. 

Had Bellingham's overhead kick gone wide then could England really say they gave everything? No. Whether it's hampered by tactics or by players not doing their jobs... It still lands at Southgate's feet. 

That's what fans want. Just to feel like we've put our best team out and they've played to their ability. No way can anybody claim that's happened. We've had 4 games against weaker opposition to change that. 

There's enough experience, enough quality and enough winners to know that this isn't how you give yourself the best possible chance of winning games. Nobody is being told, at club level, that the ball must stop rolling at every pass. That's not a thing. Stop waiting for the game to come to you or you'll find a team does bring it and then does a much better job of seeing out. 

I hate safety first football. It's like a racing driver not going for a gap, a boxer looking to survive 12 rounds. 

[G STAR RAM]

4 minutes ago, 1of4 said:

When Southgate was appointed as a stop gap manager after Allardyce was sacked. I wasn't expecting much from him and he would quickly be replaced. But after the way he got the team playing and listening to an interview talking about some of the coaching methods he wanted to introduce. I was happy for him to remain has England's manager. 

Unfortunately over time he has become to negative in how he sets up his teams. To often when going in front in the big tournament matches, the team stop pushing forward and start sitting deeper and deeper.

This was shown in the Euro final against Italy. After we scored the Italians were in turmoil they couldn't cope with our movement and pace and we should have had the match tied up by half-time. Instead we allowed them to get to half-time, regroup and change their tactics.

Since that final we have become more and more stayed and cautious in our approach to games. To often in important games this means our flare players are being stifled by Southgate's approach to how he sets up and wants the team to play.

How is playing a front 4 of Foden, Bellingham, Saka and Kane being cautious?

[TimRam]

Slovakia beat Belgium in a group game so were no mugs. Decent result in that sense. Hope Southgate gets the initial selection right this time, It is difficult to beat 11 defenders which seemed to be Slovakias game plan most of the time.

[G STAR RAM]

19 minutes ago, Alph said:

With the booing... 

When your team is in a run of poor results and heads are starting to drop then booing imo is only going to contribute to further decline. 

I think it's a little different with England though. Bellingham said about fans being supportive of what they're trying to do but it's hard to accept players selling themselves short of what they're capable of. That's when booing is justified. 

Had Bellingham's overhead kick gone wide then could England really say they gave everything? No. Whether it's hampered by tactics or by players not doing their jobs... It still lands at Southgate's feet. 

That's what fans want. Just to feel like we've put our best team out and they've played to their ability. No way can anybody claim that's happened. We've had 4 games against weaker opposition to change that. 

There's enough experience, enough quality and enough winners to know that this isn't how you give yourself the best possible chance of winning games. Nobody is being told, at club level, that the ball must stop rolling at every pass. That's not a thing. Stop waiting for the game to come to you or you'll find a team does bring it and then does a much better job of seeing out. 

I hate safety first football. It's like a racing driver not going for a gap, a boxer looking to survive 12 rounds. 

I very rarely watch football outside of Derby and England these days but I did watch Man City vs Real Madrid in the Champions League semi final.

Their play last night is very reminiscent of how England play, slow passing from one side of the pitch to the other, so it's clearly not just England that struggle against opposition set up to defend.

That night Guardiola put Doku on and it made very little difference, so just thinking that changing your possession football and putting someone fast on the pitch will fix the problem doesn't always work.

[Mucker1884]

2 hours ago, JuanFloEvraTheCocu'sNesta said:

Results wise, Southgate is doing his job. Performance wise it's atrocious. He got his pants fully pulled down tactically in the first half yesterday and we only applied real pressure when Slovakia opted to sit in and when he took Foden off which helped balance us out (far too late).

There is a clear imbalance in the squad as he sets it up and he doesn't seem to know how to fix it. He was bemoaning the lack of a replacement for Kelvin Phillips recently, all that says to me is that Southgate is too tactically unimaginative to figure out a solution. He's got the players, he's just not got the managerial ability to adapt to them.

As for the players, they aren't helping Southgate. The system they are playing isn't ideal, but they are executing poorly on top of it which just compounds the issue.

We have scraped through so far, but we haven't played anyone decent yet. The Swiss looked lively against Italy, and lively is not what we are right now.

Not wishing to disagree with your main points, as I agree on the whole... and I'm loathe to "defend" any of the England performances thus far, or indeed GS's tactics... but as a fully paid up Platinum member of the UK Pedants Society, I can't help but pull you up on those 3 little words in brackets.
It wasn't "far too late".  It wasn't even a little bit too late.  It was close run thing, sure.  It was unattractive, but not ineffective.  We got the win, so nothing was "Far too late".

 

 

*As an aside/unrelated... I've predicted (in this thread) that England will go all the way to lifting the trophy.  Whilst that still wouldn't surprise me, I'm only clinging to that prediction out of patriotism.  If I had to put my hand in my pocket and lay a bet out, not only would my money go on England to fail to win the tournament, my money would also go on it being Switzerland to knock us out on Saturday.  We've been THAT poor!

Patriotism over realism/expectation, sure.  I'm not proud!  (Nor am I a successful gambler!)   😁 

[1of4]

6 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

How is playing a front 4 of Foden, Bellingham, Saka and Kane being cautious?

If they're not being given the ball in positions that can hurt the opposition, they may as well not be on the pitch. Passing the ball back and forth across our back four, for large portions of the game isn't good enough. We need to be adventurous in our approach, if that means we then lose possession and we have to work to win it back, so be it. 

Last night our cautious approach gave the opposition the confidence to press our defence. At times Slovakia had six players closing us down

[StaffsRam]

6 minutes ago, 1of4 said:

Passing the ball back and forth across our back four, for large portions of the game isn't good enough.

There were times in the second half where you really would have thought it was England who were winning 1-0. There's a difference between not panicking and being overly cautious. Tempo has been an issue across all 4 games and that starts at the back. Pickford is really the only one who shows any level of urgency in getting the ball out from the back. Of course it's not just the back four who're at fault for this, there's so little movement in front of them.

[1of4]

8 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

I very rarely watch football outside of Derby and England these days but I did watch Man City vs Real Madrid in the Champions League semi final.

Their play last night is very reminiscent of how England play, slow passing from one side of the pitch to the other, so it's clearly not just England that struggle against opposition set up to defend.

That night Guardiola put Doku on and it made very little difference, so just thinking that changing your possession football and putting someone fast on the pitch will fix the problem doesn't always work.

Last night Slovakia weren't set up to defend they pressed high up the pitch with up to six players. Even when they went in front they continued to press. We were to caution in our play, to win games you somethings have to take risks with the ball. And Southgate is reluctant to take risks.

[Alph]

15 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

I very rarely watch football outside of Derby and England these days but I did watch Man City vs Real Madrid in the Champions League semi final.

Their play last night is very reminiscent of how England play, slow passing from one side of the pitch to the other, so it's clearly not just England that struggle against opposition set up to defend.

That night Guardiola put Doku on and it made very little difference, so just thinking that changing your possession football and putting someone fast on the pitch will fix the problem doesn't always work.

Yeah I don't think the solution is pace. I remember the Chris Martin critics well enough. 

But surely there has to be pace on something in somewhere. Whether that's inviting the press then springing a trap or stretching the pitch (which is a nightmare with Trippier) and reacting to the gaps or simply just having players to carry the ball and drag that possession higher up the pitch. 

I think with Man City v Real Madrid (I didn't watch it) that it's going to be two evenly matched teams that are well aware of the danger of any opening. So therefore the game gets bogged down. 

Would it be fair to say that with England there's this "safety first" feature that has players turning down opportunities too often. Which will harm us when we play better opponents? On the very rare occasions we do things quickly we look a threat. For large chunks of matches though our possession has no purpose, the pitch shrinks and the gaps closed off. 

I have to say, what Southgate has done with England is great. The players take all the credit for being so gifted but Ferdinand, Cole, Lampard, Gerrard, Rooney were gifted. Southgate has created something better from arguably less. 

I just feel it's going a bit Nigel Clough. 

[Ram-Alf]

1 hour ago, Alph said:

I hate safety first football. It's like a racing driver not going for a gap, a boxer looking to survive 12 rounds. 

Twice we got 2 good balls 😁 in the box, Flick on from a long throw for JB to score and a corner that was punched away by their keeper for Eze to miss hit a shot for Toney to head into the 6 yard box and HK to head home, Then we reverted to type...watching John Stones with the ball at his feet in the 18 yard box just standing there until closed down for the ball to go to the left...Saka I think then to Pickford, Frustrating to watch 🙄

  

[Ram-Alf]

23 minutes ago, Alph said:

Yeah I don't think the solution is pace. I remember the Chris Martin critics well enough. 

It may not be the solution but it sure is a way to frighten the defenders as Corporal Jones says..."they dont like it up em" If you have the pace and ability to out fox a defender you're onto a winner, IMO we look quite happy to hold onto the ball and wait for something to happen, No you have to make something to happen.