Euro 2024

[Gingerfinch]

Foden drifted all over the place and Tripper didn't really get forward which meant we had no balance. Everything was too central or came from Saka, who was superb in the first half hour. Trent made a couple of great passes but gave the ball away twice in dangerous areas. Kane was too high and isolated and hardly had a touch until he came back and won a couple of free kicks.
Overall players and set up needs to change for when we go in to the last 16.

[mikesiva]

Slovenia 1-1 Denmark
Netherlands 2-1 Poland

[Durhamfootman]

of course, England often draw their first game in major tournaments and pile pressure upon themselves, finish second and end up with a much more difficult route in the KO's, so at least they didn't do that

[bigfluffylemon]

of course, England often draw their first game in major tournaments and pile pressure upon themselves, finish second and end up with a much more difficult route in the KO's, so at least they didn't do that

Indeed. With the draw in Denmark v Slovenia, a win over Denmark would have us all but guaranteed qualification. So no doubt we'll lost and make it a must-win game for 2nd (although 4 best 3rd placed teams also go through as well - would have to be a right disaster from here to go home).

[sussexpob]

Can we get anymore of a damning statistic for England than the fact last nights match contained the few chances ever registered in a Euro game in its history? Southgate has taken England's best side laced with attacking talent and several players who banged in goals for fun, and turned us into a side incapable of creating chances against the team who qualified with the least points to get in the tournament.

The great Trent experiment turned out as expected. I have seen some commentators say he was good because he had a few shots (one blasted straight at the keeper from 25 yards, the other two killed someone in the crowd), or that he had "loads of energy". Typical charalatans in the football press of England to take something totally unquantifiable as a positive. Save for this mysterious energy he brought to the midfield...

Trent didn't win a header
Trent didn't win a tackle
Trent had the worst passing accuracy of all the England starters.
His pitch map shows his positional discipline was very bad.... looking at where he took his touches, its hard to know if he was playing RB or not. Because he kept drifting out wide.

[sussexpob]

In many ways I cant blame Trent. He has never played in midfield before, so how do we expect him to suddenly learn to be a world class DM in a few days, when it takes years for even the best players? A few passages really stick out...

1. He did it a few times, and just see the average position of England's midfielders and Trent's touches on the ball to see how much of a bias to his old position he had. His pitch map looks half-right back, half CM. But in one particular point which sticks out, he got the ball in his DM slot. He made a simple sideways ball to Rice about 30 meters from goal as Rice is being pressed, and his first instinct was to peel to the right touchline and bomb forward, running past Saka and Walker, the latter who had initially trigger to start his own overlap but was blocked by a player well out of position doing it for him. Rice then struggles because his natural easy ball from the press is back to Trent, who has left a gigantic hole to run forward like a maniac. Passed it back to Pickford, who launched it forward, and England lost the ball.

2. As with the last example but this time further up the pitch, he passed it to Saka then bombed again to the byline to cross it in. Ironically the ball was cleared back to the gap he should have been standing in but had deserted. This case it was a decent run as Saka found him with the pass, but seeing a DM playing 1-2s with a forward on the edge of the box and wanting to get to the byline to cross isnt going to bode well for the tournament. Cross caught by the keeper and quickly distributed against someone like Mbappe, you are in trouble leaving all that space in the centre.

3. The Mitrovic chance. Just a classic case of him not having the awareness to know in the centre you have less time.

4. The Mitrovic chance is being billed as his only error, but its not true. About 49-50 minutes in, he got caught miscontrolling a simple ball about 25-30 yards from goal. He attempted to turn with the miscontrol, and walked straight into the pressing midfielder, lost the ball, Serbia instantly switched it to the left wing, but the cross was poor. The ball came back out and Trent then under pressure again passed it straight to Serbia. Same thing, Serbia then crossed the ball in but it was cleared. A few moments later it came back to Trent, looking a bit rattled after too errors, and he just launched it back to Serbia's CB when he had easy passes on.

Against a ruthless side with quality, his errors cost you three goals.

Not a DM

[sussexpob]

Foden drifted all over the place and Tripper didn't really get forward which meant we had no balance. Everything was too central or came from Saka, who was superb in the first half hour. Trent made a couple of great passes but gave the ball away twice in dangerous areas. Kane was too high and isolated and hardly had a touch until he came back and won a couple of free kicks

Watch the first 30 odd minutes and see how many times Foden makes the perfect run into the box, but the pass isnt up to standard. Bellingham failed to find him 2-3 times early on, but the worst was Saka around the 25th minute mark when Foden made a run up the middle in acres of space to tap the ball in from a few yards, but rather than spot the run Saka instead puts a percentage ball in to what he thinks is a dangerous area not seeing Foden exact run, and the ball ended up 1-2 meters behind him. Should have been a goal, and it happened a few times early on. These though are the type of communication/understanding errors you get with players who dont play a lot together and can improve. Other than that, I thought everytime Foden got near the ball, he was fouled in the second half.

Kane's position seemed to be tactical. There was clearly a plan for England to play long, because for 60 minutes their entire plan with the ball was to launch it at Kane and to play off him, but against the tallest team in the competition and with no one supporting him, he just got dominated. Then towards the end, in another classic Southgate tactical move, he was England's most advanced player 35-40 meters from goal, so when he got the ball he had no one to distribute it too. Way too deep or way too isolated.

And tbf, he got one sniff at goal and forced a good save from that header.

[Gingerfinch]

Foden got played in and mis controlled it in first half and generally played poorly. One cross (possibly the one you're on about) he should have held his run but didn't. I like Foden and he needs to play but where?

[sussexpob]

Foden got played in and mis controlled it in first half and generally played poorly. One cross (possibly the one you're on about) he should have held his run but didn't. I like Foden and he needs to play but where?

Where he won player of the year for Man City, but Southgate prefers playing someone out of position to not accommodate it.

[Durhamfootman]

I have seen the game now

I thought the worst thing about TAA was his set pieces. The only credible reason for playing him as a DM is for his ability at set pieces, but he didn't get many and the ones he did get were poor efforts. At one point he pushed Trippier off the ball and then fired it straight into the mass of defenders who cleared it easily.

For 25 mins England were okay, but no better than that. After that it was Serbia all the way and they probably created more opportunities, but didn't have the quality to finish them. Pickford had to drop on a couple of balls, but he only really made one save. Better teams will shred us if they get the time and space we gave Serbia.

What was very noticeable was that we didn't have any presence at all down the left wing (as Ginger pointed out). Everything went down the middle or the right and yet Sir G made no attempt to change that. Both the goal and the nearly goal came from wingers getting in behind the defenders on the right, but Serbia didn't have to defend anything on the other flank

It's this dogged insistence on playing 2 DM's that throws out the whole balance of the side if Foden plays... and Foden should play. Leave Rice on his own (he's a big boy now and doesn't need a playmate) and get either Gordon or Palmer out wide on the left. There are too many players playing out of position to try and accommodate Southgate's security blanket

[Durhamfootman]

It's the only full game I've seen so far, but I have seen the odd 20 mins or half an hour here and there in some of the other matches. I haven't seen a VAR intervention once so far.

I thought the officiating was very good last night and worthy of comment

[sussexpob]

I thought the officiating was very good last night and worthy of comment

Was that Spanish guy who has done CL finals and WC key matches, so hes the pick of the bunch. But yes, so much less controversy compared to the PL

[sussexpob]

Just as you mention VAR, Romania score a goal that to me looked very slightly offside, but super tight.

Goes to VAR for a millisecond, just gives it. Surely couldn't have even drawn the lines, but refreshingly simple. Its going to be the difference between a toe nail slightly past the defender, give the goal and get on with it.

Putin will be happy, because Romania have dished out more of a beating in 60 minutes than he managed in 2 and a half years.

First Romania goal from Stancu will be contender for goal of the tournament. Second is a terrible keeping error. Third terrible defending.

Not been that uneven

[Durhamfootman]

It isn't very often that I watch matches involving other people's teams all the way through, but I did for that one. I hadn't intended to, but it was such a good game I stuck with it. I was really impressed with Slovakia and yes, they rode their luck at times; Lukaku wasn't on it for most of the game, De Bruyne struggled to get into the game and VAR helped them out, but the way they played, in attack as well as in defence, well... full marks, 100%. They deserved their victory tonight

Another good game for the officials

[bigfluffylemon]

I didn't see it, but I've read some griping about the handball decision being somewhat harsh.

Since the rules changed a few years back, the handball rule has been so open to interpretation it seems impossible to get consistent decisions, and funnily enough VAR isn't adding much clarity...