Match 51 THE FINAL: Italy vs England - 8pm Sunday BBC1 AND ITV1 LIVE FROM WEMBLEY !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[themadsheep2001]

3 minutes ago, GunmaN1905 said:

Believe what you want, but I'm not trying to kid anyone.

Playing such a ridiculously defensive setup at home when you have so many quality players of the bench is inexcusable.
You almost sh*thoused your way to the trophy, but football doesn't reward sh*thousery. Not when you have so much quality to play better and be the best scoring team in the tournament.

Good god enough with the drivel. Greece and Portugal both shithoused their way to trophies.

Last time I checked Chelsea are Champions League Champions and they were remarkably dull.

Stop passing off your terrible opinions as facts. Stop telling people how they should feel after a final. It's nonsense

[craigcwwe]

9 hours ago, Paul Bacon said:

Few questions need answering by Southgate

1 - Bringing on pen takers isnt a bad idea, but why bring them on so late that their only real touch of the ball was the penalty? Give them some feel for the game first

2 - Why did none of the senior players step forward (apart from 2) to take one?

3 - Rashford never looked at the ball once during his run-up or kick. He was only concerned with the way the keeper was going. We supposedly practice pens all the time. That cannot be a planned tactic surely? No one trains someone to not look at the ball

He's done this many times for United, it wasn't something new he decided upon last night. 

Edited July 12, 2021 by craigcwwe

[Coulthard's Jaw]

 

[GunmaN1905]

Just now, themadsheep2001 said:

Greece

As I said, teams that have the quality to play better.

That was the only way Greece could play without getting destroyed by other teams.

I'll give you Portugal, but even they had better defenders than attacking players. And they proper sh*thousd it.

But then they lost right away in first round of the two following tournaments.

1 minute ago, InigoPatinkin said:

Gunman  we all know your two favourite things in the world are telling other fans they aren't upset enough about how **** their club/country played and hating Juventus, in that order. Like I said it's harmless stuff but come on... at least own it!

I don't think the players played sh*t. Only Mount and maybe Kane.
I think they were prevented from playing well because of your setup.

You were provided with two golden opportunities, especially this one.
There were plenty of teams who lost big games when most players were young and it was all about "they'll be back at it in no time", but second chance never came.

Especially because I'll believe in draws being rigged if you get the easiest possible road to the final third time in a row.

[Yuko]

7 minutes ago, themadsheep2001 said:

Good god enough with the drivel. Greece and Portugal both shithoused their way to trophies.

Last time I checked Chelsea are Champions League Champions and they were remarkably dull.

Stop passing off your terrible opinions as facts. Stop telling people how they should feel after a final. It's nonsense

How exactly did Greece do that? 

Apart from the semi final, Greece did not get any underserved result in 2004. 

 

Portugal got lucky with the 3rd place thing and was extremely lucky in the final on 2016, completely different story. 

 

This narrative of "crap Greece" has to end at some point.

Bosses Portugal in the first game, deservedly gets a point vs Spain, gets the benefit of luck to qualify on goal difference, beats holders France in an even game, beats the Czechs as underdogs over 90 minutes but the victory came after a dominant spell in extra time and not a random flukey strike, then beats Portugal again in a game that was less cagey than last night's final. 

 

Honestly, the only thing that's wrong with the Greek victory is that you (plural) didn't like the result. 

[GunmaN1905]

Just now, Yuko said:

Honestly, the only thing that's wrong with the Greek victory is that you (plural) didn't like the result. 

If you ask me, Herr Otto and his 11 brave warriors winning the EURO was the biggest f-you to modern football we've had since he did the same thing with Kaiserslautern.

Btw, funny how hosts keep losing these finals, especially because Portugal, France and now England were the favorites.

[themadsheep2001]

4 minutes ago, Yuko said:

How exactly did Greece do that? 

Apart from the semi final, Greece did not get any underserved result in 2004. 

 

Portugal got lucky with the 3rd place thing and was extremely lucky in the final on 2016, completely different story. 

 

This narrative of "crap Greece" has to end at some point.

Bosses Portugal in the first game, deservedly gets a point vs Spain, gets the benefit of luck to qualify on goal difference, beats holders France in an even game, beats the Czechs as underdogs over 90 minutes but the victory came after a dominant spell in extra time and not a random flukey strike, then beats Portugal again in a game that was less cagey than last night's final. 

 

Honestly, the only thing that's wrong with the Greek victory is that you (plural) didn't like the result. 

Not once did I call Greece crap. Nor did I complain about the result

[Yuko]

Just now, GunmaN1905 said:

If you ask me, Herr Otto and his 11 brave warriors winning the EURO was the biggest f-you to modern football we've had since he did the same thing with Kaiserslautern.

Btw, funny how hosts keep losing these finals, especially because Portugal, France and now England were the favorites.

It was a Euro where both Germany and Italy went home from the group stage and France still didn't shake off the 2002 failure completely. It was wide open for teams like Portugal, Spain, Netherlands and the Czechs to win it. Even England had a chance. That's why people are pissed about Greece ending up winning it. If Greece had beaten Germany or Italy they'd not be calling it a fluke or shithousery but a miracle, just like the Denmark result in 1992. 

[GunmaN1905]

2 minutes ago, Yuko said:

It was a Euro where both Germany and Italy went home from the group stage and France still didn't shake off the 2002 failure completely. It was wide open for teams like Portugal, Spain, Netherlands and the Czechs to win it. Even England had a chance. That's why people are pissed about Greece ending up winning it. If Greece had beaten Germany or Italy they'd not be calling it a fluke or shithousery but a miracle, just like the Denmark result in 1992. 

That was probably the best England team I remember.

I'd say the best team of the tournament.

Never felt like that after a big tournament game, lost 2-4 and felt like we got off lucky that it wasn't 1-6 or something.

[Yuko]

3 minutes ago, GunmaN1905 said:

That was probably the best England team I remember.

I'd say the best team of the tournament.

Never felt like that after a big tournament game, lost 2-4 and felt like we got off lucky that it wasn't 1-6 or something.

It was the best England team of the faux golden generation, but it wasn't really better than France, the Dutch, the Czechs and Portugal in 2004. 

Didn't like the Croatia side much from 2000 until 2008 honestly. 

[themadsheep2001]

2 hours ago, TM said:

I think it's just football fans really? we all love to analyse things to figure out where it went wrong and where it went right?

even if England had won last night, I'm sure there would still be some saying "there was things we did wrong though" could probably say it's "sports fans" rather than football ones, it's the same with NBA, NFL and other sports, you want to delve into the subject to get more information out of it and football nowadays has so many stats you can take out of it

Think it's also a coping mechanism for some as well. But ultimately think it's bad faith for people to be told how they should feel in this position. Their feelings are their own

[Reggiana]

10 minutes ago, Yuko said:

Bosses Portugal in the first game, deservedly gets a point vs Spain, gets the benefit of luck to qualify on goal difference, beats holders France in an even game, beats the Czechs as underdogs over 90 minutes but the victory came after a dominant spell in extra time and not a random flukey strike, then beats Portugal again in a game that was less cagey than last night's final.

Greece had one shot on target and scored with it in the final, fair enough that the narrative they weren't any good needs countering but you don't have to go to the other extreme of dressing them up as more than they were.

[GunmaN1905]

4 minutes ago, Yuko said:

Didn't like the Croatia side much from 2000 until 2008 honestly. 

Transition period.

Generation of '98 were all Yugoslavian school of football.
Due to obvious situation, it took some time for football schools to develop post-war.

Funny how we got to the final with by far the worst performances and roster compared to 2008, 2012 or 2016.

  

2 minutes ago, Reggiana said:

Greece had one shot on target and scored with it in the final, fair enough that the narrative they weren't any good needs countering but you don't have to go to the other extreme of dressing them up as more than they were.

So England almost Greeced Italy last night!

Edited July 12, 2021 by GunmaN1905

[Yuko]

12 minutes ago, Reggiana said:

Greece had one shot on target and scored with it in the final, fair enough that the narrative they weren't any good needs countering but you don't have to go to the other extreme of dressing them up as more than they were.

Portugal had 5 shots on target to Greece's 1. 

17 to 4 total. 

58% possession to 42%. 

Fouls were even despite this (18-19). 

Offsides were 4-3. 

Corner kicks 10 to 1. 

 

Want to compare with last night's final which was supposed to be an even affair? And this is over 135 minutes, not just 90. 

Shots 20-6 for Italy.

Shots on target 6-1 for Italy. 

61% possession for Italy to 39% for England. 

Fouls committed 21-13 (signals higher tactical awareness from the Italians given the possession figures)

Offsides 5-1.

Corner kicks 3-5. 

 

You are posting in a thread where the vast majority feels like they could have won the game or at least could have done more and it doesn't sound like a cat chasing a mouse type of game, yet the numbers scream this. 

So maybe either this number thing isn't the way to go about it, or something else happened in 2004 from what has remained in people's minds.

[HOORAY HENRIK]

ARREST THAT MAN

 

[Reggiana]

2 minutes ago, Yuko said:

Portugal had 5 shots on target to Greece's 1. 

17 to 4 total. 

58% possession to 42%. 

Fouls were even despite this (18-19). 

Offsides were 4-3. 

Corner kicks 10 to 1. 

 

Want to compare with last night's final which was supposed to be an even affair? And this is over 135 minutes, not just 90. 

Shots 20-6 for Italy.

Shots on target 6-1 for Italy. 

61% possession for Italy to 39% for England. 

Fouls committed 21-13 (signals higher tactical awareness from the Italians given the possession figures)

Offsides 5-1.

Corner kicks 3-5. 

 

You are posting in a thread where the vast majority feels like they could have won the game or at least could have done more and it doesn't sound like a cat chasing a mouse type of game, yet the numbers scream this. 

So maybe either this number thing isn't the way to go about it, or something else happened in 2004 from what has remained in people's minds.

I thought Italy were comfortably the better side last night, England could have won because it got to a shootout but it wouldn't have been merited.

I thought Portugal were the better side in 2004 but I always thought Pauleta was useless.

[Yuko]

1 minute ago, Reggiana said:

I thought Italy were comfortably the better side last night, England could have won because it got to a shootout but it wouldn't have been merited.

I thought Portugal were the better side in 2004 but I always thought Pauleta was useless.

Surely Portugal was the better side, but it wasn't a one sided affair. 

Last night was far more one sided but the early England goal would have you fooled. (Or be the reason for this). 

Edited July 12, 2021 by Yuko

[enigmatic]

Just now, InigoPatinkin said:

Gunman  we all know your two favourite things in the world are telling other fans they aren't upset enough about how **** their club/country played and hating Juventus, in that order. Like I said it's harmless stuff but come on... at least own it!

Those and BOTTLED!

 

33 minutes ago, GunmaN1905 said:

You almost sh*thoused your way to the trophy, but football doesn't reward sh*thousery. 

It's only a few days since you were moaning about Mancini conceding the midfield and focusing on defence and being happy with penalties, and having negotiated that game, now he's a champion...

 

2 minutes ago, Yuko said:

How exactly did Greece do that? 

Apart from the semi final, Greece did not get any underserved result in 2004. 

Portugal got lucky with the 3rd place thing and was extremely lucky in the final on 2016, completely different story. 

This narrative of "crap Greece" has to end at some point.

Bosses Portugal in the first game, deservedly gets a point vs Spain, gets the benefit of luck to qualify on goal difference, beats holders France in an even game, beats the Czechs as underdogs over 90 minutes but the victory came after a dominant spell in extra time and not a random flukey strike, then beats Portugal again in a game that was less cagey than last night's final. 

Honestly, the only thing that's wrong with the Greek victory is that you (plural) didn't like the result. 

If England defending deep for 30 minutes of a game whilst leading against a freescoring Italian team desperately searching for an opening counts as "shithousery" which I don't think it does, we can say the same about a Greece side that had very few chances all tournament but took them and conceded very little.

More generally I think Greece did superbly and were perfectly entitled to play the way they did, but nobody's going to remember them with the same affection for their style of play as the Total Football team that won bugger all or the names of any of their players, and no Greek should care

[GunmaN1905]

3 minutes ago, enigmatic said:

It's only a few days since you were moaning about Mancini conceding the midfield and focusing on defence and being happy with penalties, and having negotiated that game, now he's a champion...

And?

Compare English and Italian benches.

Other than Locatelli, Bastoni and the keepers I don't think a single Italian makes the English squad.

Southgate had options, didn't use them.

 

Edited July 12, 2021 by GunmaN1905

[TM]

I guess Roberto is a fan of Braveheart then?

look at the paper underneath the title, that's from a video their aircraft company did of the players getting picked up and arriving back in Italy

[Baptista_8]

The problem with England is central midfield. We had no one to run with the ball and pass consistently through the lines. We all cried out for him to try Mount deeper with either Grealish or Foden in the 8, or even play Bellingham as a box-to-boxer, but he didn't experiment in that area at all.

[Baptista_8]

Having said that about passing through the lines. In some games it appeared as we were actively trying not to play 'risky' passes, so have to wonder if Southgate requested our CMs to keep it simple.

[Vynal Seven]

1 hour ago, GunmaN1905 said:

You almost sh*thoused your way to the trophy, but football doesn't reward sh*thousery.

We lost to Italy last night, who now have 2 European Championships and 4 World Cups. Football definitely rewards ****housery.  

[Citizen Sandman]

Agreed. Bellingham might be young but he's special and again I believe foden could play cm.

**** me xavi was the best player in the world at one point (briefly!) Let's have someone gorgeous there for once. 

[enigmatic]

20 minutes ago, GunmaN1905 said:

And?

Compare English and Italian benches.

Other than Locatelli, Bastoni and the keepers I don't think a single Italian makes the English squad.

Southgate had options, didn't use them.

Seems like shithousery, or standard tournament play in tight games can prosper. Italy are masters of it, they'd never scored three goals in a Euros before this year despite being finalists three times. 

Don't see what the benches have to do with it; we used our bench and switched formation and it didn't exactly cut Italy open. Rashford and Sancho are great but Italy didn't have all that midfield possession because we didn't use aggressive wingers to defend a lead. I don't think a single English centre mid makes the Italian starting lineup, and that (and Italy's attackers coming deep and narrow) is where the domination-on-paper came from. 

 

 

Edited July 12, 2021 by enigmatic

[craigcwwe]

12 minutes ago, Baptista_8 said:

The problem with England is central midfield. We had no one to run with the ball and pass consistently through the lines. We all cried out for him to try Mount deeper with either Grealish or Foden in the 8, or even play Bellingham as a box-to-boxer, but he didn't experiment in that area at all.

See this is surely going to be an ongoing issue? 

Is Southgate brave enough to go 433 and play two 8s in a KO game at a tournament against another top nation or are we again going to play a back five and cede possession and barely get a counter going? 

[Christmas]

32 minutes ago, HOORAY HENRIK said:

ARREST THAT MAN

 

I actually saw Carol Codwalloder? who i normally really like retweet a tweet which said what Chiellini did was racist. 

 

Sorry just checked can see she's deleting it dint know who was originally 

Edited July 12, 2021 by Christmas

[Reggiana]

37 minutes ago, Vynal Seven said:

We lost to Italy last night, who now have 2 European Championships and 4 World Cups. Football definitely rewards ****housery.  

Maybe it just rewards Italy being quite good at football?

[Vynal Seven]

1 minute ago, Reggiana said:

Maybe it just rewards Italy being quite good at football?

Yeah, quite good at football and grand masters at ****housery. 

[Yuko]

Just now, Vynal Seven said:

Yeah, quite good at football and grand masters at ****housery. 

The salt is strong with this one

[Reggiana]

Just now, Vynal Seven said:

Yeah, quite good at football and grand masters at ****housery. 

I think they do a lot more of it when they're not such a good side though, for example in 70 and 82 they were a very good watch, played in a couple of the best games of all time.

[Vynal Seven]

Just now, Yuko said:

The salt is strong with this one

Ha you couldn’t be wider of the mark.  

I don’t begrudge Italy at all, but gunman trying to suggest football doesn’t reward ****housery it’s just nonsense. 

[Vynal Seven]

1 minute ago, Reggiana said:

I think they do a lot more of it when they're not such a good side though, for example in 70 and 82 they were a very good watch, played in a couple of the best games of all time.

Absolutely, I’m not having a dig at Italy. The point was that ****housery is a part of football and historically there isn’t really anyone better at it than the Italians. 

[themadsheep2001]

1 minute ago, Vynal Seven said:

Ha you couldn’t be wider of the mark.  

I don’t begrudge Italy at all, but gunman trying to suggest football doesn’t reward ****housery it’s just nonsense. 

This. That was the only point being made before it got twisted into people apparently hating Greece or something

[bestbrother]

3 minutes ago, Vynal Seven said:

Ha you couldn’t be wider of the mark.  

I don’t begrudge Italy at all, but gunman trying to suggest football doesn’t reward ****housery it’s just nonsense. 

It didnt reward England last night... so maybe it dosent all the time

 

 

[Vynal Seven]

1 minute ago, bestbrother said:

It didnt reward England last night... so maybe it dosent all the time

 

 

Well, I don’t think there was really any of it last night anyway. England dropped too deep and conceded too much control of the game to Italy after the first half an hour but I wouldn’t really call that ****housery. 

[GunmaN1905]

Apparently there's nothing inbetween not making a single shot for 90 minutes and going full 1982 Brazil.

[Vynal Seven]

2 minutes ago, GunmaN1905 said:

Apparently there's nothing inbetween not making a single shot for 90 minutes and going full 1982 Brazil.

From the guy who thinks you either win or “bottle it”. 

Edited July 12, 2021 by Vynal Seven

[Federico]

2 ore fa, GunmaN1905 ha scritto:

Put a proper coach in Southgate's place and England wins this in regulation 9 out of 10 times.

This tournament has proven that coaches do make a difference.

Bah.

Even Capello could do only that much with a wonderteam.

[XuluBak]

5 hours ago, VamPook said:

Not sure why everyone is saying Southgate will learn from this

Literally the same pragmatic tactics from game 1 this tournament. Read every match thread and you have the same comments and complaints.

The same criticisms were made before and throughout. He manages to not lose. His preference for and/or against certain players is baffling to say the least. 

[DJ]

7 minutes ago, Vynal Seven said:

From the guy who thinks you either win or “bottle it”. 

Have to say, that is an attitude I see far more often. What match was that? Italy-Spain, I think, where basically all the players were called 's**t' because, I guess, people weren't entertained enough. 

Fair enough, during the match. The time for subtleties is after the match. But c'mon. In reality, not one player on the whole tournament is or was 's**t'. Every single one earns a very nice wage playing professionally. It's all relative to the level they are playing at and some are better than others, is all. 

[Smallen]

13 minutes ago, InigoPatinkin said:

Given it's gotten us to a semi-final and a final, probably yes, unless an obvious solution presents itself. International football is absolutely the worst place to try and play open, flowing football. 

I agree with this, but playing two 8s (let’s say Foden and Mount ahead of Phillips/Rice for example) =/= open flowing football. Not necessarily, anyway.

[XuluBak]

6 hours ago, Rob1981 said:

It’s not about tearing at them all game whilever it’s level, it’s about keeping it at 0-0 and then putting yourself in a position to win in the last 20-25 minutes. Played the Germany game like this and it worked to perfection.

When you spend an hour sitting on a 1-0 lead it’s really really hard to then get any forward momentum back once you concede the equaliser.

Tends to happen when the other team can't finish. They had two breakaways and a couple other premium chances despite your extremely defensive setup. Rice was fortunate to not be sent off breaking up another. 

[enigmatic]

18 minutes ago, Vynal Seven said:

From the guy who thinks you either win or “bottle it”. 

And that we had a 90% chance of beating an Italian side unbeaten in 30 games 

At some point it's probably worth giving Italy credit...

[GunmaN1905]

By the end of the week, you guys will be trying to convince me that England's achievement of getting to the final while playing all games on Wembley is a beautiful underdog story about a team going against all odds.

[Rob1981]

2 hours ago, GunmaN1905 said:

This tournament has proven that coaches do make a difference.

Can't argue with this.  I mean look how badly England have done before now, even when they've had a crop of brilliant players.

[BadAss88]

4 minutes ago, GunmaN1905 said:

By the end of the week, you guys will be trying to convince me that England's achievement of getting to the final while playing all games on Wembley is a beautiful underdog story about a team going against all odds.

While defeating Croatia, Czech Republic, Germany and Ukraine and drawing against Scotland and Denmark to get there! What a performance!

[Marc Albrighton]

Did good coaches making a difference need to be proved to anyone that's actually watched football though or for that matter any sport.

[skybluedave]

7 minutes ago, BadAss88 said:

While defeating Croatia, Czech Republic, Germany and Ukraine and drawing against Scotland and Denmark to get there! What a performance!

Must have missed the draw with Denmark

[Ackter]