New International Football thread

[sussexpob]

Why is Tuchel not coming in till March 2025? He's unemployed isnt he?

[Durhamfootman]

I heard 1st January, but your point remains.

I have no idea. Perhaps he wanted Christmas at home

[Durhamfootman]

Seemingly the Greek police used riot shields and tear gas to herd England supporters about before the game last night.... so that's nice. Just a shame they couldn't be quite so robust about dealing with the person who was using a green laser pen to try and put off the England players. That light was shining all match long every time England were on the offensive. There was even a camera angle where the light source could be seen in the stands, so it wouldn't have been too hard to track down the culprit

[Durhamfootman]

well, that was an interesting game. Anyone could be forgiven for thinking that at half time the telly had switched to a different game with different teams.

First half was full Southgate.... keep the ball and never take a chance. Not so in the second half. England got after Ireland.... a fabulous pass from Kane from out wide into the box for Bellingham to run onto, forcing the defender (on a yellow) into bringing him down... penalty and a second yellow... 1-0. England gave Ireland no time whatsoever to reorganise. Within 5 minutes they were 3-0 up and the game was done. A triple substitution yielded a further 2 goals and it could easily have been a few more than that

Rather interestingly the last 4 goals were all scored by players who had never scored for England before. Gordon, Gallagher, Bowen and Harwood Bellis. The two halves were poles apart and Carsley deserves credit for changing the way England came out for the second half, because they didn't allow Ireland to continue with their game plan. Ireland were really solid in the first half, but despite having all the possession, England just didn't put them under enough pressure

[Durhamfootman]

I've perhaps been guilty of not fully appreciating Connor Gallagher in recent times, but he was terrific tonight. In that first half he was the player constantly fighting to get the ball back when an attacking move broke down and he fully deserved his goal in the second half.

Bellingham looked somewhere near his best in these last 2 games, but he picked up a yellow card in each match for lipping off at the ref. Had England slipped up and had to go to a play off in March, he would have missed it.... pointless, really.... unnecessary and sloppy

Kane was still a long way off the pace as a lone striker. When a ball was played ahead of him to run onto he looked as if he was running in treacle and couldn't get into the game at all in the first half. His quality is there though.... his pass that led to the penalty was a thing of beauty, but he couldn't have made that Bellingham run into the box. He was much better and much more involved when Solanke came on for Gallagher and England switched to a 4-4-2. I can't see how he plays as a lone striker. He can still hold the ball up, but he just can't run any more

Gordon frustrated me a bit in the first half. He didn't seem to want to run down the line. He cut inside every time, despite Madueke causing Ireland problems by driving down the right. The only time England attacked down the left was when Gordon slipped the ball to Hall on the overlapping run. Gordon isn't shy about attacking the byline for Newcastle, so it's a puzzle. Maybe it was because he had a whippet tracking back to help the Ireland defence, or maybe he just couldn't see how Kane would get onto a ball whipped across the box and figured it was a waste of energy.

Hall has done himself a lot of good in these 2 games. Looked the part. There was one moment when he brought the ball out of defence, drove forward and layed it off for Bellingham, then sprinted as fast as he could for Jude to play him in behind... must have sprinted 60 or 70 yards, only for JB to miss the chance and end up squaring the ball to someone else. Poor bugger... all that effort. At least he had the sense not to complain too much, he's a newbie after all

Liveramento was tidy. A little cautious in the first half, but made a few runs in the second and set up the goal for Gordon en route. Harwood Bellis looked solid when he came on for Walker. Bowen was a live wire when he came on. Guehi was assured and composed. There were no capers from Pickford, who had nothing much to do all night, and he did well against Greece. Another decent performance from Jones in the holding role... covered a lot of ground

[Arthur Crabtree]

David Squires again. I don't know who these people are, but still laughed at quite a few.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/pi ... wing-board

[Durhamfootman]

first squad named by Tuchel

unbelievably Henderson and (to a lesser extent) Rashford are in there.... so much for the notion of a new broom

a first call up for Big Dan Burn, which feels a bit unusual, so perhaps he's there as a LB option now that Hall is ruled out

[Durhamfootman]

England must have a hunger for winning and not a fear of losing, says TT

bit of a dig at Sir Gareth?

[bigfluffylemon]

Qualifying process is overly convoluted again.

It still seems silly to me that Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Israel qualify in UEFA. I understand some of the reasons, but still.

[Durhamfootman]

Japan have qualified for the WC already and England haven't even started their qualification campaign yet

[Durhamfootman]

Chris Wood scored a hat trick for NZ, then got a standing ovation after he was subbed off. After coming off, he went into the crowd to sign autographs and was yellow carded for doing so

am I missing something here? Depending on his card situation, he might have potentially missed the next game, for signing autographs after he finished playing in the game. Is there a good reason for this or is football just losing the plot?

[Durhamfootman]

well, that was all a bit underwhelming

dull, dull, dull. Dull enough to be Southgate-esque

I was looking for the positivity that the manager went to great pains to talk about, but to me it still looked like walking football. Ponderous

Still... a win is a win, but not a great watch. I think a fair number of the crowd had gone home by the time the ref blew for full time

[Durhamfootman]

Lewis Skilley did well and took his goal really well. HK took his goal well

Bellingham was great in the first half. Konsa was very good. Burn did okay, but kept it very, very safe. He only once failed to win his header, nearly scored and blocked the ball 3 times on the only occasion that Albania looked as though they might score, but he did get caught out by Broja a couple of times He'll probably make way for Guehi on Monday, I'd imagine. Everybody else in the side looked bang average. They made hard work of that, because the build up was generally slow and gave the Albania defence all the time in the world to get into position and keep their shape. England almost never tried to get in behind them down the flanks, which was disappointing and Foden spent the entire game aimlessly meandering across the front of their defence

work to do

[sussexpob]

We are 30 games into the PL season. I imagine trying to gee up the players to get stuck into Albania when auto-pilot is all that is required for a comfortable win, is difficult.

The group for England is pitiful. None of these games are going to test our mettle for a major tournament.

[Durhamfootman]

The group for England is pitiful.

indeed