Solving the England promblem

[Delicate Dave]

First, let me say I don't have the answers and I'm not anti-Southgate. In fact this thread is not about managers at all.

For some time now, I'm 65 this year, and I've witnessed the Briths Game stand out as one of the best footballing nations in the world.  Yet, if you disregard the luck & basics of the 66 World Cup almost all the tournaments have ended in disappointment. England has no right to expect to win these tournaments but based on logic, they should have won more and got further in a lot of them. I mean look at Germany, a country more like England than most of England itself, they always seem to perform at least up to expectation apart from the odd World Cup.

For me the problem is they are always going into tournaments with an unsettled style of play, no real rules of engagement, and no plan of how they are going to progress through the stages. I would suggest as a country or a body that controlled the England set-up we need these as a foundation. It shouldn't be difficult to produce a master plan that if followed gives the players the best possible chance to perform well. 

I think Southgate knew this when he took charge but I also think he's gone the wrong way with his plan. So typically we are through the group stage - which was the objective so 100% success rate so far - but we've played ****-poor boring football. If Southgate had a plan that used the squad and the fans understood that the game meant nothing then the result wouldn't have been so upsetting and the players or the manager would now be under pressure to perform better.

My plan wouldn't be to try to play great football it would just be a framework for navigating the tournament using the players you have. Yes some players are reserves only if your stars get injured but others are not, some players are fighting for their place and some might consider are the best option, How can they prove that if you don't play them and how can your stars perform well if they are playing so many minutes. Kane for example, do you want him to be at his best for 3 games in ten days? then play him for only 70 mins and don't play him if not needed. This might not have been a big issue a few years ago but most games now are more like 100 minutes. 

Another side that the plan needs to include deadball situations - who and how, why you take it quick, and why you don't. England seems to lack all this.

Anyway, just saying if we had a national plan, then the manager wouldn't be so exposed or need to be so great. We used to have something similar, the England team used to be picked by a committee so I'm sure they had some sort of game plan too. 

 

[thefmveteran86]

Southgate is just set in his ways and even though we've had some great tournaments albeit defensive in the last 1 or 2 we really need to floor it and not just be a average team that just keeps passing it side to side and backwards which is in laymen's terms recycling the ball too much and get it on a head or a foot whatever

[thefmveteran86]

Also I don't think we should be experimenting but how about change it to a 3-4-3, I mean the 4-2-3-1 hasn't been doing us wonders recently

[Rick87]

Having a clearer pathway between the England youth teams into the senior squad would help, having them all play the same formations and such as the senior side, etc.

Maybe introducing rules like Bundesliga has regarding homegrown players, four trained in the country and four by that club to encourage better youth development rather than big clubs just buying English players to sit on the bench to meet a quota, or farming them out on endless pointless loans, wasting their career.

[ceefax the cat]

https://www.theguardian.com/football/article/2024/jun/27/austria-are-everything-england-are-not-and-never-have-been-euro-2024