The Euro 2024 Thread

[White Wolf]

Look at the comparison with the defeat to Italy! It was met with anger.

I wouldn't go that far. There was some horrible racism experienced by players on social media (not all of which came from British-based accounts I should add) but I am struggling to recall a great deal of genuine anger directed at Southgate and the players for any of our tournament defeats, save for the Nations League embarrassment. Croatia and Italy were missed opportunities but compared to the treatment other England teams have got, until now it has been rather soft. England were utter rubbish in the cycle leading to Russia but the atmosphere was weirdly very positive, that has mostly been maintained.

Those who follow England have also been pretty supportive, I can only recall frustrations being aired at players after the loss to Hungary at Molineux and then the most recent two games; I was in Cologne fwiw and the atmosphere during the match against Slovenia was actually very good, it was only at FT that a small minority of idiots made the headlines.

Most people can remember Iceland very well and we were one last minute wonder goal away from replicating it with a better group of players. The criticism in this tournament has all been very valid.

 

[Tony Towner]

@ROVERT47 Made a gesture to the Slovakia bench which involved doing something with his cock. Which as you'd expect was just an in-joke to his mates in the crowd .

Rice called their manager a bald cunt after the game so there was definitely some animosity there.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

Most people can remember Iceland very well and we were one last minute wonder goal away from replicating it with a better group of players. The criticism in this tournament has all been very valid.

Absolutely.

And while I'll still continue to largely defend his reign as a whole, this tournament exists in its own sphere, especially in real time. You can't play like shit and say "well we were good in X game six years ago", what value is there in that? You wouldn't do it with Wolves in isolation, there's no writing off or mitigating the Coventry game in 2024 because we beat Man Utd at the same stage in 2019.

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

I wouldn't go that far. There was some horrible racism experienced by players on social media (not all of which came from British-based accounts I should add) but I am struggling to recall a great deal of genuine anger directed at Southgate and the players for any of our tournament defeats, save for the Nations League embarrassment. Croatia and Italy were missed opportunities but compared to the treatment other England teams have got, until now it has been rather soft. England were utter rubbish in the cycle leading to Russia but the atmosphere was weirdly very positive, that has mostly been maintained.

Those who follow England have also been pretty supportive, I can only recall frustrations being aired at players after the loss to Hungary at Molineux and then the most recent two games; I was in Cologne fwiw and the atmosphere during the match against Slovenia was actually very good, it was only at FT that a small minority of idiots made the headlines.

Most people can remember Iceland very well and we were one last minute wonder goal away from replicating it with a better group of players. The criticism in this tournament has all been very valid.

"I wouldn't go that far" followed by "there was some horrible racism...." I mean come on!?

There is absolutely genuine anger directed at Southgate now, and just like above with you trivialising the racism, you're trivialising that he had stuff thrown at him.

You only have to scrape the surface of twitter, Facebook or instagram to see more anger too.

 

[ROVERT47]

@ROVERT47 Made a gesture to the Slovakia bench which involved doing something with his cock. Which as you'd expect was just an in-joke to his mates in the crowd .

Rice called their manager a bald cunt after the game so there was definitely some animosity there.

Is that all, Michael Jackson made a career out of doing it.

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

England were utter rubbish in the cycle leading to Russia....

Sorry? What?

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

You can't play like shit and say "well we were good in X game six years ago", what value is there in that?

I haven't done that.

But actually, you can do that to an extent.

We would all give Nuno far more benefit of the doubt for a poor performance or result than we would say Lage for the same thing?

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

We would all give Nuno far more benefit of the doubt for a poor performance or result than we would say Lage for the same thing?

Maybe, but I was in no mood to let him off the hook for going out of the cup to Southampton in his final season (when he bizarrely prioritised the league game against them a few weeks later when that meant nothing at all).

Love(d) the fella but he fucked up, like Southgate has on multiple fronts here. It's a week and a half since I wrote that piece detailing four tactical issues...have we fixed any of them? We've cycled through midfield partners for Rice but I wouldn't say it's working!

 

[White Wolf]

The racism is awful, I'm not attempting to trivalise that. I simply don't consider the 'anger' at Southgate at all comparable to what is a truly reprehensible act done by vile people online.

I'm not sure why you are posting those results, they prove my point. Which of those results you are showing me is 'good'?

Struggled past a very poor Malta team home and away while playing very terribly. Narrow win over Slovakia. Last minute win over Slovenia and they should have beaten us away. Scraped past Lithuania (incredibly dull game). Two 0-0s at home in friendlies. Beat a rubbish Dutch team who missed the World Cup and a draw at home to Italy. Those performances were all incredibly stale.

 

[GLASGOWOLF]

It's such a simplistic view. Look at our record in knockout tournament football. Yes, we've managed to get some easy draws and thanks to that got to a SF/Final, but it's built on fucking sand.

2018 - beat Colombia on pens, and beat Sweden, lost to Croatia
2020 - beat Ukraine and Denmark, lost the final on pens
2022 - beat Senegal and lost to France.

We beat teams we should - sometimes convincingly, others less so. As soon as we face a decent team we shit ourselves and play like an underdog. Looking at the route in each tournament, we've achieved the minimum expectation then failed every serious test.

That's all on the manager.

I must have missed beating Germany I a knockout gane

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

I'm not sure you are posting those results, they prove my point. Which of those results you are showing me is 'good'?

I'm posting those results because you're talking nonsense, we sailed through qualification, winning the group by 8 (EIGHT) points.

It's genuinely ridiculous to suggest we were "rubbish" in the lead up to Russia, but you crack on. You are well and truly proving my "entitlement" point correct.

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

Struggled past a very poor Malta team home and away while playing very terribly. Narrow win over Slovakia. Last minute win over Slovenia and they should have beaten us away. Scraped past Lithuania (incredibly dull game). Two 0-0s at home in friendlies. Beat a rubbish Dutch team who missed the World Cup and a draw at home to Italy. Those performances were all incredibly stale.

"Rubbish" but didn't lose a single game that you quote and "struggled" past Malta away, a game we won 4-0.

 

[Kenny]

"Rubbish" but didn't lose a single game that you quote

To be fair, we are unbeaten in this tournament and have been rubbish

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

To be fair, we are unbeaten in this tournament and have been rubbish

We won the group by 8 points Kenny, it's farcical revisionism.

 

[White Wolf]

Arguing yourself into a corner here defending results from the buildup to the Russia World Cup... They weren't good.

We did pretty well at that World Cup, there is some justified criticism for how he managed the Croatia game but I am quite pleased with how we did, I thought Croatia were simply better than us. I feel similar about the last Euros. In Qatar we went toe-to-toe with one of the best international sides and came out unlucky. I think between Russia and Qatar Southgate did really well, with some room for improvement. We have regressed since then and his strengths (managing the media, maintaining a positive atmosphere in the squad) aren't showing at this tournament while his weaknesses are looking more glaring. I don't think that observation is unfair.

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

Arguing yourself into a corner here defending results from the buildup to the Russia World Cup... They weren't good.

No I'm arguing your ridiculous point! I'm not even slightly in a corner, the facts speak for themselves.

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

We have regressed since then and his strengths (managing the media, maintaining a positive atmosphere in the squad) aren't showing at this tournament while his weaknesses are looking more glaring. I don't think that observation is unfair.

And I would agree with this.

However, we are still in the tournament, it could be a lot worse.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

"Rubbish" but didn't lose a single game that you quote and "struggled" past Malta away, a game we won 4-0.

We absolutely did struggle in that game, we were dreadful and it was 1-0 on 85 minutes.

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

If you win a game by a 4 goal margin, you have not struggled. That's ridiculous.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

From the BBC report (and it's a fair one):

England's performance must be placed in the context of opponents who are physical, resilient, organised - and ultimately the scoreline had a convincing appearance.

This was still, however, a largely colourless display until Malta, one of the minnows of the game with a world ranking of 190 and with a record of six defeats from six Group F games, tired and conceded those three late goals.

It does not make for the easiest task but this was, in large part, a conservative and uninspired England display, lacking spark and relying on Spurs pair Alli and Kane to finally make the breakthrough.

Southgate's side, however, have provided little compelling evidence in this group that they will make a serious impact at the sharp end of the finals, should they qualify.

There is still time for England to develop, but this has been a campaign short on thrills and one not designed to send fear through the first tier of European nations.

We were never going to LOSE to Malta, but we were very very poor to watch.