Football - Euro 2020 Championship

UnclePsychosis

The idea that Chiellini should be sacked because he literally did his job (there's a reason it's called a professional foul) is really quite funny. Even Rio Ferdinand - one of the biggest cheerleaders for England out there - was full of praise for Chiellini after the game. Its a yellow card, take it and move on. 

I didn't realise at the time that none of Grealish, Sterling, or Henderson had taken a penalty. What a failure of leadership from the senior players and Southgate to instead send the young lads out. For me, that caps a terrible tournament for Grealish who as far as I can see offers absolutely nothing in an England shirt. 

The Jorginho foul toward the end of the game looked bad but its one of those 50-50 challenges that you sometimes get away with. Bit fortunate to stay on the pitch but after playing 6 out of 7 games at home, a fortunate draw, and beating Denmark courtesy of a dodgy penalty England should probably not make too many noises about bad fortune. 

The much lauded Harry Kane was completely anonymous and Sterling offered nothing beyond falling over. The second time Kane touched the ball in the penalty box was his penalty. For a "star" striker to play 120 mins in a final, at home, and be so completely invisible means something horrible went wrong. Not sure if a Southgate is telling him to drop deep or if he's doing it himself - if it's the latter he quite genuinely may end his career with no major trophies. 

I see the usual suspects have begun their racist abuse of the young lads already. Much like the shameful scenes in and around Wembley (and seemingly repeated across much of England) there's an element of English "supporter" that is nothing less than a national embarrassment. For all the talk of a rebirth of the England team and an England embracing a modern, multicultural society on the back of it its clear to see that the knuckle draggers aren't going to go quietly into the night. Such a shame. 

Overall I thought the tournament was a strange one. Other than Scotland actually being there I found myself not desperately caring for much of it. A few great games apart the quality seemed off to me (perhaps a factor of 24 teams allowing too many diddy teams in, and let's face it covid played its part). That said, overall I think the best team over the whole piece won it and that's not always the case so I maybe can't complain too much. 

jellyroll

   As my wife says, never peak in the second minute. It only leads to disappointment. 

Bidley

It would've been impressive if Henderson took a penalty, he was subbed off. He has missed his last two for England so that was definitely by design.

YellowLedBetterMan

It was a poor judgement call to put all the pressure on Saka when there were more senior players in the squad. I put just as much, if not more, blame on Rashford and Sancho for missing theirs considering they were brought on specifically for penalties.

In the end though, no major surprises. Think we allowed Italy too much respect for a lot of the game and at times were lucky to not concede more.

Also both pissed off and puzzled to see so many Villa fans on social media being stroppy that Grealish didn't start and didn't take a penalty. First major tournament final in 55 years and that's the hill they choose to die on... Could never be my club.

We go again. There's a world cup for us to win next year.

Grumpyrocker

I'm not a fan of that type of "play" but what Chiellini is common enough and the sort of thing that many professional defenders would have done. Rio Ferdinand praised him for it, the idea of taking a yellow for the team and moving on.

As I said, I don't like it. But I'm not going to make Chiellini a bogeyman over it or promote the "tackle" to being the focal point of England's loss or anything else. Wasn't a red for me though.

The other studs-up challenge arguably more deserving of red. 

guitars4you

Penalty chat

Can understand GS's logic to bring on Rashford - But why not Calvert- Lewin at the same time as he takes then on a regular basis for Everton - He obviously did not want Henderson anywhere near the place 

Surly Rashford had committed so much of his thought pattern to the 'lido shuffle and dance' before kicking the ball - So in many ways the end result was inevitable

Gary Linekar had already passed comment about such a big guy in goal - go low as it takes him longer to get down there - So Saka's miss was well within his comfort zone

Credit to all the lads who took the penalty as we don't know what nerves they were going through - But a question for Grealish and Sterling - Considered as our flamboyant classy skillful hero's etc and what other praise we can bestow upon such talented guys - Just wondering why they think they can't kick the ball 36 feet at a required target 

Agree that Saka will probably be considered the 'fall guy' in many ways, as it was the final moment, but all 3 are equal in that regard - And I dare say we'll forget to praise Pickford - Final save against Jorginho was excellent 

crunchman

YellowLedBetterMan said:

It was a poor judgement call to put all the pressure on Saka when there were more senior players in the squad. I put just as much, if not more, blame on Rashford and Sancho for missing theirs considering they were brought on specifically for penalties.

In the end though, no major surprises. Think we allowed Italy too much respect for a lot of the game and at times were lucky to not concede more.

Also both pissed off and puzzled to see so many Villa fans on social media being stroppy that Grealish didn't start and didn't take a penalty. First major tournament final in 55 years and that's the hill they choose to die on... Could never be my club.

We go again. There's a world cup for us to win next year.

Grealish should have started.  Mount offers nothing with the ball.  He did absolutely nothing all game.  He was basically a complete waste of a shirt last night.  With a back four I can understand Mount's selection as he offers more defensively, but with Trippier playing you have 5 defenders with Rice and Phillips in front of them.  You need to play the better attacking player to give Kane and Stirling some support.

If we had played Grealish, it would have solved a lot of our problems holding onto the ball, and brought Kane and Stirling into the game far more.

By the way I am most definitely not a Villa fan.  I'm not blinded by the fact that the likes of Mount play at "big" clubs though.

I don't know if Grealish is the long term answer, but he was the best available in that squad.  We do need to find a midfielder who can hold on to the ball in tight spaces and pass it.  The only player who seems to be able to do that at the moment is Kane when he drops deep.

Rice is a problem.  He just has no passing skills at all.  He's pretty much Carlton Palmer with a slightly better first touch.

munckee

@UnclePsychosis i agree that the professional fouls are just football, it’s up to the ref/var to punish. I don’t agree we were fortunate, we had two penalty shouts in the semi and got one - it was a bit soft but the Danish free kick was just as soft. 

I think Kane and Sterling were starved of service so I don’t think it points to them being useless, we were just outplayed for most of the game by the best team in the tournament who couldn’t beat us. 

Lunatics giving racist abuse can’t be controlled only punished. No one knows thy they are England fans it just suits people who want to criticize England to label them as such. Even if they are English which I’m sure some of them are they are not representative of England fans in general. 

I’m sure there are racists in Scotland, doesn’t mean Scottish fans are racist. 

Overall this tournament has to go down as a complete success for England. 

monkey42

Well done to England on an amazing journey. They are a decent side, but arguably had a better route to the final than Italy. Also, as I mentioned earlier, I was worried about 3 at the back. 3 works but when it becomes 5 at the back then it doesn’t…and Italy within 30 minutes tactically adjusted and then we were 2nd best. I also felt that we had no credible back up to Kane. He was up against 2 of the most experienced central defenders and as good as Kane is, he doesn’t have the pace to stretch defenders. All in all England are progressing , I just hope (and who am I to tell him) that Southgate looks at a better balance in the side as although we have looked solid at the back, the supply to the front line has been poor through out. Exciting times ahead when the likes of Bellingham and Foden become more central to the plans. Well done England for a great journey

Creed_Clicks

@digitalscream yep the rules is the rules . i’d rarely tune into a full game because of this carry on.

yocky

How do we know that the senior players weren't stepping up the plate? During the pre-pens huddle it looked like Southgate was just pointing to players and making a list.

YellowLedBetterMan

crunchman said:

YellowLedBetterMan said:

It was a poor judgement call to put all the pressure on Saka when there were more senior players in the squad. I put just as much, if not more, blame on Rashford and Sancho for missing theirs considering they were brought on specifically for penalties.

In the end though, no major surprises. Think we allowed Italy too much respect for a lot of the game and at times were lucky to not concede more.

Also both pissed off and puzzled to see so many Villa fans on social media being stroppy that Grealish didn't start and didn't take a penalty. First major tournament final in 55 years and that's the hill they choose to die on... Could never be my club.

We go again. There's a world cup for us to win next year.

Grealish should have started.  Mount offers nothing with the ball.  He did absolutely nothing all game.  He was basically a complete waste of a shirt last night.  With a back four I can understand Mount's selection as he offers more defensively, but with Trippier playing you have 5 defenders with Rice and Phillips in front of them.  You need to play the better attacking player to give Kane and Stirling some support.

If we had played Grealish, it would have solved a lot of our problems holding onto the ball, and brought Kane and Stirling into the game far more.

By the way I am most definitely not a Villa fan.  I'm not blinded by the fact that the likes of Mount play at "big" clubs though.

I don't know if Grealish is the long term answer, but he was the best available in that squad.  We do need to find a midfielder who can hold on to the ball in tight spaces and pass it.  The only player who seems to be able to do that at the moment is Kane when he drops deep.

Rice is a problem.  He just has no passing skills at all.  He's pretty much Carlton Palmer with a slightly better first touch.

You say this as though Mount didn't have a world class performance in a champions league final a few months ago. Like he didn't also put in top performance after top performance to get Chelsea to that final. Or that during that run, he did the "smart passes in tight spaces" thing regularly.

Some will call it big club bias, but any manager worth his salt considers things like carrying a team to a champions league when picking an 11.

Bidley

Big club bias is nonsense. Phillips played every game, as did Rice. Both their clubs are at a similar level to Villa in the PL.

guitars4you

Fantastic for 2 mins

But after that we did not muster any meaningful chance for any of our offensive style players in the next 118 mins - Would be interesting to see how many touches any of these guys had in the 18 yard box, but I bet it was very few - We barely ever entered the box from the front and/or got in behind their defence via the byline - 6 shots in 120 mins and apparently only 1 or 2 from an attacker - In many ways we did not loose the final in the shoot out out, we just did not win it in the 90 + ET 

Italy, throughout the tournament looked tasty and deserved to win - Our defence is obviously a major asset, but we need to find a way of adding more flair in the attacking half , either in build up against a sitting defence and/or counter attack

I'm not anti the idea of a back 3 with 2 wing backs - Shaw had a great game on his flank - But Trippier far less so - Would have been nice to see James there instead, on the left, as he plays that role so often for Chelsea and looks more than useful there - IMO far more naturally gifted going forward than Trippier and is more than handy in defense 

We had no control of the game in the 2nd half and/or ET - Whilst in the main we could handle their attack, we could not build a base to advance and on that basis I can see why we left it late to bring Grealish on - No use him trying his tricks in the defence 1/2 - But I don't understand the idea of bringing him on to play wide, with Saka in the middle - Surely it should be the other way round - Let him try and wrestle the game back in that #10 style role going deep/forward as required 

Overall I've enjoyed the tournament - less so the last kick of the tournament - Plenty of good games and entertainment - TBF before the tournament started we'd have accepted a ticket to the final, as I'm sure many would have fancied France + Belgium to have progressed further, probably supported by Portugal, Italy, Germany and Spain - The lads have kept us hooked and offered hope and the country needed it - But alas it was not to be - Oh well, only 12 months to go for another round of hope

Grumpyrocker

It's possible that Southgate was thinking that penalties might go past five and decided to save more experienced players for that even high pressure section - where it's instant win/lose.

I'm not a fan of the modern fannying around stop start and tap it version of penalties. I think you should blast it. 

guitars4you

duplicated for some reason

EricTheWeary

I had some cider at about 6pm and after that it was cups of tea and bannoffe chocolate bars ( not recommended) yet this morning I feel like I have a massive hangover and am struggling to piece together the memories of nearly three hours of last night. 
Almost as if something so stressful and disappointing happened that my subconscious is trying to save me from the pain.

Something to do with pulling shirts, odd use of substitutes and Gary Linneker looking like Fred Scuttle? 

YellowLedBetterMan

Bidley said:

Big club bias is nonsense. Phillips played every game, as did Rice. Both their clubs are at a similar level to Villa in the PL.

Not really the point I'm trying to make. It's not big club bias that Grealish didn't start. It's Mason Mount having a great season for Chelsea, Grealish being out for the majority of the last 6 months with "shin splints". Plus, after Mount had been the starter for the majority of the tournament, would it be fair to suddenly drop him in the final? I don't think so.

TheBigDipper

I'm too biased towards England to be able to make any meaningful comment about them. I'm proud of their achievement and it's no disgrace to come second against the best team in the tournament.

If Italy hadn't conceded early and lost their way for much of the first half, I think England would have struggled more than they did. Mancini has built a national team and a plan that knows how to win and knows how not to lose when winning is difficult. 

So, congratulations Italy and well done England. Onwards and upwards! 

crunchman

YellowLedBetterMan said:

You say this as though Mount didn't have a world class performance in a champions league final a few months ago. Like he didn't also put in top performance after top performance to get Chelsea to that final. Or that during that run, he did the "smart passes in tight spaces" thing regularly.

Some will call it big club bias, but any manager worth his salt considers things like carrying a team to a champions league when picking an 11.

He didn't do it for England last night, or through the tournament.

@guitars4you is right that Grealish should have been used more centrally as well.  When he did bring Grealish on Southgate stuck him out on the left for the whole tournament.

Southgate has his good points.  He's a good man manager and the players play for him.  Also he's willing to leave out big name players if he can't fit them into the team - see previous managers trying to shoehorn Gerrard and Lampard into the same team when we needed a Kalvin Phillips type player.  On the other hand his substitutions have been appalling, and some of his selections have been questionable at best.