FIFA World Cup group stages

[SaintPowelly]

Tell me, 1 England player that had a good game last night ?? Henderson has been Englands best in both games, and hes been far from outstanding.

Both performances have been pathetic, of course Sterling and Welbeck will both have their performances defended because of their age, when the reality is, they did nothing, unless we include Sterling beating 2 players before diving last night.

Edison Cavani was good last night, covered every blade of grass, did Rooney OR Sturridge even come into the England half ??

[sussexpob]

Im not really seeing a point here. Your just chasing your own tail. England were made to look poor by Italy, but they themselves were rubbish? England then were made to look poor to the last man by Uruguay, by Uruguay were also a very poor side? So a side is very poor because another very poor team outplays them, this doesn't make the outplaying team anything but very poor, even though we are talking about teams that had both made the finals of their respective confederation's competitions?

At the end of the day England made mistakes, but they also played against two very good teams and more than held their own. What England don't have is a proven match winner, plenty of potential ones in the future, but at the moment no one with Suarez's class who can blast open a game with two touches of quality in 90 minutes. We need more chances to do that.

Finding a player like that is nothing to do with the manager, so the calls for Roy to be sacked are ridiculous. People criticised Capello for being negative, so Roy went positive, everyone agreed they needed to take young blood, and they can walk away with heads up. Mistakes were made, but they were never going to win the tournament.... you cant blame a manager for Rooney missing a header from 2 yards, or missing a chance against Italy he should sink, you cant blame a manager for Gerrard's crap defending for Suarez's second. We played well, we didn't take our chances, and we got punished by a few mistake....c'est la vie.

Your attitude actually drips with defeatism, which makes me laugh that you fault others for accepting a lower standard of performance as acceptable. Its attitudes like this that weigh down our players.... complaints that the manager isn't going ballistic on the touchline, complaints about not singing the anthem.... false arguments. The team tried their hardest, the manager made some good decisions, we just didn't have the world class player to open the door for us yet.

Changes need to occur at a much lower level than the national team, kids need the quality of coaching, etc. That's not the players fault, that's not the England managers fault....in fact, in 20 years if we crash out at this stage we can blame Greg Dyke for his idiotic plan to think B team divisions as a Vauxhall Conference Division 2 is the way forward, and ignore the fact coaching levels here for youth football and beyond professional level are a fraction of what they are everywhere else, and that its directly proportional to the rise of other nations fortunes in recent years...im sure if that is true, we will just sack the manager and claim all our players get paid too much and don't care.

Nothing to do with this team, nothing to do with the coaches, the management, etc. A good chef can cook a passable meal with crap ingredients, but he isn't going to win a World Cup of Cooking with Asda Smart Price beans.

Why don't you actually act as patriotic as you pretend you are and actually back the side for once. I watched Jag's last night be interviewed and he looked like he wanted to burst into tears...utterly dejected. Those guys tried their hardest, and they did well enough to earn some positive credit for it.

[SaintPowelly]

I haven't called for Hodgson to be sacked, but the team was wrong...how many of those 11 DESERVED to be in the team ??

You say that we lost to a good Italy and a good Uruguay side, but I disagree, neither side had to really get out of 2nd gear for most of the game.

Raheem Sterling and Danny Welbeck offered next to no threat, whilst Lallana who was in the Premier league team of the year sits on the bench ( if you can use that argument for Suarez, I can use it for Lallana ), then in searching for a goal, against Italy he sends on Wilshere and last night Barkley, whilst the best midfielder of the Premier League era (Lampard) is again sat on the bench.

Then with England having equalised and chasing a winner and lumping balls towards the box, he leaves the only target man in the squad on the bench, oh but he does throw him on in the 88th minute when already trailing, so thats okay.

"The team tried their hardest" if running around for 90 minutes is all you expect, then you are easily pleased..personally I want to see a game plan and stick too it, England had nothing, except 11 guys on a pitch.

[SaintPowelly]

Jagielka was probably upset because he knew he was wrongly positioned for both of their goals.

[SaintPowelly]

and is it okay to conveniently skip over Sterling AND Sturridge both diving ?? yet if Suarez had of done the same thing, there would be outrage.

[braveneutral]

Gerrard added: "Italy are a fantastic team and capable of winning both of their remaining games, but we're clutching at straws. We need to be professional and pray for that scoreline to go for us."

[The Waugh Twins]

There's a few things I'd like to say about the matter but clearly this is not the place or the time.

[Aidan11]

I'm going to pray that Gerard retires after the World Cup.

[The Waugh Twins]

Has any one read the book "Baby's revenge", by Nora Titsoff?

[SaintPowelly]

I'm going to pray that Gerard retires after the World Cup.

It was more or less announced before the WC that he has too.

[The Waugh Twins]

I hate making predictions, but if I had to I would say this is going to end up 5-5 with a slight advantage to Costa Rica.

[Dilbert]

A lot of people are saying Eng were poor in defence, but I’d say they were equally poor in attack. Many feel Rooney was their best player yesterday, but I feel he is one of the main reasons they lost. Rooney had 4 decent chances to score, 1 free kick went wide, a header went in the woodwork, one kick went straight to the goalie and 1 very simple chance was (finally) converted. As the main striker, he should have scored at least 2 goals out of those missed and Eng would have won. Suarez got 2 chances, which were much more difficult than the 4 chances Rooney got, and he converted both. As a No. 10, he has to lead the way, not throw away chances like that. He fluffed similar chances in the Italy game too. That has clearly cost Eng a place in the next round.

The opposition had scored 2 goals, but Eng had a chance to score 3 in both matches. They didn’t. So blame the defence for letting 2 goals in, but if the attack cant win you matches, you aint going far.

[shankycricket]

If England were surprisingly good for the first hour against Italy, they were unsurprisingly ordinary for the first hour against Uruguay. If Welbeck was surprisingly good for an hour against Italy, he was unsurprisingly ineffective against Uruguay. If Sturridge surprisingly scored against Italy, he was back to his usual profligate self last night.

Yet as SP rightly points out, we weren't overwhelmed by either of these two teams. We lost, but we weren't overwhelmed.

I said it before the tournament even began, once we get this over and done with, we can get rid of the last remnants of the 'golden' generation' who won nowt, yet racked up 100 caps each. I can't imagine there would be another country in the world where so many players can win 100 caps, let alone win 100 caps despite winning nothing.

I wouldn't get rid of Roy. He's probably the most experienced manager who would want to do the job. (Maybe Hoddle, tactically, but he has lots of baggage).

Time now to invest in youth, the way the Germans did before the 2006 world cup qualifying began. Find some systems to combat the various styles and conditions found in global events, and pick the players who can fit into those systems. Make sure that all the young hopefuls understand that if their agents negotiate them a big money move to a huge club in order to sit on the bench, then they won't be considered for England selection. It won't give us a team capable of winning the Euro's in 2 years time, but it might give us a team who go into the next WC with some realistic levels of national expectation, for a good tournament, and it might give us a squad of players that could genuinely compete in the Euro's of 2020.

Thoroughly agree with this post. Both sussex and Powelly have gone on the extreme but this post sums up my thoughts. Keep faith in the manager and the youth but get rid of this so called "Golden Generation" baggage. We may reap the fruits in a few years' time.

[shankycricket]

A lot of people are saying Eng were poor in defence, but I’d say they were equally poor in attack. Many feel Rooney was their best player yesterday, but I feel he is one of the main reasons they lost. Rooney had 4 decent chances to score, 1 free kick went wide, a header went in the woodwork, one kick went straight to the goalie and 1 very simple chance was (finally) converted. As the main striker, he should have scored at least 2 goals out of those missed and Eng would have won. Suarez got 2 chances, which were much more difficult than the 4 chances Rooney got, and he converted both. As a No. 10, he has to lead the way, not throw away chances like that. He fluffed similar chances in the Italy game too. That has clearly cost Eng a place in the next round.

The opposition had scored 2 goals, but Eng had a chance to score 3 in both matches. They didn’t. So blame the defence for letting 2 goals in, but if the attack cant win you matches, you aint going far.

Pretty much sums up yesterday's performance. No one played well. The only thing is that the team wasn't timid unlike in South Africa 4 years ago.

[GGAS]

Costa Rica have started well against Italy. Ominous for England fans.