England National Team Discussion

[Reluctant Striker]

Apparently there is a Jobe Bellingham, midfielder, currently 17 & at Birmingham City. Some brothers get to similar levels, but not all.

I have been reading lots of fear stories that England will be struggling for a striker soon. Well, at 2026 Kane would be 33 & already looks 35 to me. And Wilson is 31 already.

But then Ivan Toney 26, Tammy Abraham 25, Ollie Watkins 26, Marcus Rashford 25. Only a couple more options need to appear & I'm sure England will have a couple of Number 9's at the next few tournaments, with reasonable backup options missing out.

[Stan]

Southgate staying on as manager.

[Danny]

I don’t fully back Southgate but I’m not against him staying on

[Devil-Dick Willie]

He's a sticky ol manager. He's not gonna win you a trophy, but you can't yet sack him because he's overperformed compared to the utter rubbish that preceded him.

[Dan+]

7 hours ago, Devil-Dick Willie said:

He's a sticky ol manager. He's not gonna win you a trophy, but you can't yet sack him because he's overperformed compared to the utter rubbish that preceded him.

Exact mentality that keeps England as nearly men. Not saying you're wrong either as this is the FA's thinking.

Southgate for me is just par. It's been par every time for the opposition we've faced. But as ever that's enough.

[Rick]

There’s another tournament with these players wasted. 

[Danny]

Fact is there arent really any managers available who would clearly do a better job, and as we’ve found out with Luis Enrique being successful at club level isn’t a guarantee at international level

[Dan+]

The nearest thing we have to a guarantee is that Southgate is going to come up short. I would roll the dice on a manager who could totally flunk but could also go further and I believe Tuchel could do that. I think in a tournament it's worth shooting for the stars. They aren't frequent. I would genuinely be less annoyed with the FA if they gambled on Tuchel and we ended up having a crap Euros than stuck with Southgate and had another 'okay' tournament.

I think if you asked 100 people in this country who had had the better last four years out of England and Italy, the vast majority would say England. I'd personally take two shockers if it meant the other was a trophy.

England need to triumph against adversity before being considered a serious contender. Qatar was another failure to do that.

Southgate staying absolutely typifies everything about England. Cautious and don't truly believe we can mix it with the best.

Edited December 19, 2022 by Dan

[Danny]

This is the problem with Southgate hysteria, the alternatives are batshit crazy but banded around because people need anyone but him. 

Let’s get Robert Di Matteo as well, he also won a Champions League after taking over someone elses job midseason and providing a temporary morale boost.

[Cicero]

I'd love for Tuchel to manage England just to see the Mount critics' reactions. 

[Dr. Gonzo]

18 hours ago, Dan said:

The nearest thing we have to a guarantee is that Southgate is going to come up short. I would roll the dice on a manager who could totally flunk but could also go further and I believe Tuchel could do that. I think in a tournament it's worth shooting for the stars. They aren't frequent. I would genuinely be less annoyed with the FA if they gambled on Tuchel and we ended up having a crap Euros than stuck with Southgate and had another 'okay' tournament.

I think if you asked 100 people in this country who had had the better last four years out of England and Italy, the vast majority would say England. I'd personally take two shockers if it meant the other was a trophy.

England need to triumph against adversity before being considered a serious contender. Qatar was another failure to do that.

Southgate staying absolutely typifies everything about England. Cautious and don't truly believe we can mix it with the best.

I'd rather have Mourinho than Tuchel.

And I hate Mourinho.

[Tar-Mairon]

The next England manager needs to be English (in fact, nations should be barred from having foreign coaches) so what rules Tuchel out is the fact that he is German. Should Tuchel want to get into national management, he needs to keep an eye on the Germany job.

Having Southgate stay on is fine with me when you look at what he's done. The anti Southgate hysteria is utterly pathetic.

 

[Azeem]

England's most capped player is a goalkeeper with 120 something caps, teams like Norway Ireland have these kind of stats. English players need to take NT job seriously like it's that "one" thing they need to prove themselves like Messi started to around 2019 for Argentina. 

Until then anything beyond QF is more than expected.

[Carnivore Chris]

3 hours ago, Tar-Mairon said:

The next England manager needs to be English (in fact, nations should be barred from having foreign coaches) so what rules Tuchel out is the fact that he is German. Should Tuchel want to get into national management, he needs to keep an eye on the Germany job.

German managers get chances at big German clubs though. 

It's alright saying employ an English manager but your club doesn't.

Edited December 20, 2022 by Carnivore Chris

[CaaC (John)+]

It just had to be Harry Maguire to receive the yellow!!  

Quote

England win a World Cup trophy!

Gareth Southgate's team claim the Fair Play award for having the best disciplinary record of all 32 teams in Qatar... with only ONE player booked

• England were given the Fair Play award following the World Cup final
• The Three Lions picked up just one booking throughout the tournament 
• Harry Maguire recived their only yellow card on their way to a last eight exit 

England haven't returned home from Qatar completely empty handed after winning the Fair Play award for their disciplinary record at the tournament.

The tournament came to a close on Sunday with Argentina beating France in penalties.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-11552583/England-home-trophy-World-Cup-trophy-Southgates-team-claim-Fair-Play-award.html

 

Edited December 20, 2022 by CaaC (John)
Spacing correction

[Spike]

1 hour ago, Carnivore Chris said:

German managers get chances at big German clubs though. 

It's alright saying employ an English manager but your club doesn't.

Irish, Scots, Welsh need not apply

[Danny]

I think the nations with big footballing infrastructure, that have big populations and football is the national sport or one of, should have a manager from their own country.

There should then be a second tier for nations like Ireland where the football infrastructure is quite weak compared to other sports in the country, or countries like Uruguay and Croatia where theyre actually sick at football but have a small population, or countries like Scotland who are both shit at their national sport and also really tiny. These nations should get to have foreign managers.

Personally I want an English manager for England, simply because that is the point of international football.

[Carnivore Chris]

17 minutes ago, Spike said:

Irish, Scots, Welsh need not apply

Apart from Scaloni, who has just won the World Cup, most managers who manage at international level have experience in managing at club level. If English managers aren't given chances off bigger clubs in the Premier League, it makes it much more difficult to find the correct candidate. The fact is, in reality, top English managers are unfortunately a rarity so for this, it would probably make sense to bring in a foreign one, especially if they have managed in the Prem and fancy a crack at international football.

England just won the fair play award, nobody who wins the tournament wins the fair play award, think about it. You need to be more ruthless.

Edited December 20, 2022 by Carnivore Chris

[Carnivore Chris]

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Gonzo said:

I'd rather have Mourinho than Tuchel.

And I hate Mourinho.

Diego Simeone 

[Carnivore Chris]

8 minutes ago, Danny said:

I think the nations with big footballing infrastructure, that have big populations and football is the national sport or one of, should have a manager from their own country.

There should then be a second tier for nations like Ireland where the football infrastructure is quite weak compared to other sports in the country, or countries like Uruguay and Croatia where theyre actually sick at football but have a small population, or countries like Scotland who are both shit at their national sport and also really tiny. These nations should get to have foreign managers.

Personally I want an English manager for England, simply because that is the point of international football.

The big issue in this regard for me is that you have say, Mexico facing Argentina and Mexico's manager is Tata Martino, who is Argentine, it just doesn't work in that regard.

England vs Portugal in the final with Mourinho as England manager. Both teams shithouse through the game, England win on pens, then Mourinho runs up the pitch celebrating Portugal's loss. @Machado

 

[CaaC (John)+]

4 hours ago, Carnivore Chris said:

England just won the fair play award, nobody who wins the tournament wins the fair play award, think about it. You need to be more ruthless.

You read my brain, I was going to add that into the post I posted above but the bit about Maguire getting the yellow made me laugh, but when you think about it maybe if they (England) had a bit of aggression from the players and a few more bookings then England might get somewhere, gone are the days where you see the likes of Terry Butcher and Paul Ince with blood streaming down there faces you then know they got stuck in and fuck the blood.

I know you would not see the likes of that nowadays but being a bit ruthless and aggressive just might help England out, has Southgate made them squeaky clean? 

Edited December 20, 2022 by CaaC (John)
Spelling check

[Dr. Gonzo]

43 minutes ago, CaaC (John) said:

You read my brain, I was going to add that into the post I posted above but the bit about Maguire getting the yellow made me laugh, but when you think about it maybe if they (England) had a bit of aggression from the players and a few more bookings then England might get somewhere, gone are the days where you see the likes of Terry Butcher and Paul Ince with blood streaming down there faces you then know they got stuck in and fuck the blood.

I know you would not see the likes of that nowadays but being a bit ruthless and aggressive just might help England out, has Southgate made them squeaky clean? 

Just for the record, they never won anything with England either.

[Waylander]

Reading Dad's Dailymail and a very interesting point from sports writer Martin Samuel said Gullit claimed England got the South American ref in the Qtrs because of the media attack on the human rights issues.

He was not sure if Gullit was serious, I think he was after recalling some of those decisions or lack of them. 

[Danny]

I'm bored at work and have been thinking about the England team. The current strengths that seem to be thrown around a lot is that we have a great squad with players capable of winning a competition and that is what is levelled at Southgate, that he is not using them properly.

For me when I look at the current England team I can break it down into 3 categories; good players that ultimately aren't that great, top level players and then elite level players. I'll break the starting eleven and subs down into those categories:

Good: Pickford, Ramsdale, Rice, Phillips, Mount, Shaw, Maguire, Coady, Trippier, Dier, Gallagher, Wilson, Pope

Top Level: Sterling, Rashford, Grealish, Saka, Foden, Maddison, Henderson, Stones.

Elite:  Kane, Trent, James, Walker, Bellingham.

There are two main issues with this squad based on how I rank them. The first is that is our best players are competing for the same positions, we have three world class right backs competing for the same position and then we have 5 top level wingers competing for 2 positions. Yes we have strength in depth there, but ultimately you can only ever play two wingers at once, you can only play one right back at once. Depth is great for injuries or subbing players on to change a game, but it's not great when our second main issue for me is that the rest of the first eleven is actually fairly average by top 10 international team standards.

Looking at our starting elevens throughout the tournament, teams that most England fans were actually happy about, players like Pickford, Shaw, Maguire, Rice, Henderson and Mount, these are players imo who would struggle to get consistently picked by Argentina, Brazil, France, Netherlands and Croatia.

So the team has this lack of balance where we have a really good strike force available but then a fairly average midfield and defence, and specifically looking at the midfield, we lack players who can dictate possession and thread passes through for forwards to run onto. Henderson is a great player when it comes to energising a midfield, leading players and also making world class players perform even better. But he is not the man who is going to step up and be the difference maker in midfield, and that can't solely be relied on from Bellingham either. Because away from Bellingham we don't really have many creative players. Now I did mention Maddison above, and so hopefully in the future we can see more of him, I think Maddison is the only real option as an attacking midfielder that we have moving forward, but again the options are minimal.

When you look at the list of players available for England some fans see a potential world cup winning side, but we are so stacked in positions where we can only play max 3 of the 8 or so players available, the rest struggles to compete at the very highest level.

The issue for me is that we do not have a good enough first eleven currently and I don't think sacking Southgate will change that, I'm not completely sold on Southgate but you can argue that he's best placed to work out where we can up the quality around the first team.

[Dan+]

It should be a rule that the manager follows the same rules to be eligible as players. But it isn't so why impose it on yourselves.