by Durhamfootman » Wed Nov 01, 2023 8:20 am
well it was a frustrating game in many ways. Like they did against the Dutch, England rather cut their own throat.
In a carbon copy of Friday, Belgium dropped deep, defended for their lives and then hit England hard on the counter and it worked even better for them in Leuven than it did in Leicester. England, for their part, controlled possession, but were once more far too slow in their attacks, so when Belgium did suddenly burst forward in numbers, England gave them lots of time to get back in position. The penetrating balls behind the defence were regularly over-hit and rolled out of play. The attackers kept getting caught off side in their attempts to get behind the back line and eventually England were throwing so many players into the attack to try and find a way through the defence that they kept leaving themselves exposed at the back (as they did on Friday, but which they were made to pay for last night). I lost count of the number of times England fluffed their chances at scoring... Russo more than anyone. It's been over a year since Russo was given the number 9 shirt and I remain unconvinced.
It was actually a rollercoaster first half. England went behind to a free kick on the edge of box after Kelly, under lots of pressure, went to ground looking for the foul and did what every footballer seems to do these days and grabbed the ball to make the ref blow the whistle. The ref duly obliged and awarded the kick for handball, which was brilliantly taken, lifted over the wall into the bottom corner with Earps on the other side. Then there was the clash of heads and a long delay, after which England became a different team. They pierced the defence twice in a few minutes and were suddenly well on top and looking threatening with every attack, but then they gave the ball away in the Belgium half and one pass later.... one pass.... the striker was in behind and slotting it cooly past Earps.
Second half looked to be a stalemate as England failed repeatedly to get in behind and squandered chances. Belgium snuffed out every half chance that England managed to create and forced them to recycle instead of shoot, but then right at the end, as England got caught out again on the counter, they gave away the penalty for handball that handed Belgium the win. Now qualification for the Olympics looks very, very difficult. They have to beat the Netherlands comfortably and make sure they beat Scotland, whilst hoping that Belgium don't do something similar.
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