Rob1981

Why are you still talking about England? Why are you trying to disprove a point that I’m not making? Let me be really clear. Spain have been really good. England have been poor. Attacking football is more fun than defensive football. Setting up to sit behind the ball or play a slow tempo when you have great attacking players is frustrating for everyone to have to watch. But none of this changes the fact that big international games are usually decided on a couple of odd moments. You can be the best attacking team at the tournament and you STILL need to rely on one-goal wins and squeezing through games in extra time. And sometimes the best teams don’t win the competitions. You can talk about xG all day. But they don’t hand trophies out based on xG. They hand trophies out once the actual results are in. And Spain’s actual results have been 1-0 vs Italy, 1-0 vs Albania, 2-1 vs Germany (aet), 2-1 vs France. Even though they are CLEARLY the best team at the tournament they have needed narrow wins. Because this is what tournament football is. I’m sorry if this is confusing for you. But at no point have I said that you HAVE to set up and grind out results with a defensive approach because it is the only way to win.

“That blonde man” Graham is so flustered here he can’t even remember Koeman’s name.

Of course it’s true. Spain only beat Germany with a goal in the last minute of extra time. They were inches away from going out at the other end. What’s that if it isn’t grinding out a result. I’ve never said teams shouldn’t set up and try to attack ffs. But even if you do, you don’t generally win tournaments by playing seven perfect games and getting seven comfortable wins. You generally win tournaments by playing well three or four times. Then finding a way to drag yourselves over the line in the other games even though they’re really tight. People are talking about this Spain team like they are the 1970 Brazil team or something. They are fun to watch but they aren’t steamrollering their way past everybody with ease and racking up massive scorelines. They are winning games by narrow margins just like the other teams that everybody is sick to death of.

No argument from me. You are the only one talking about England here.

I honestly can’t tell if some of these posts are sarcastic or not. Nobody is saying they prefer defensive football to attacking football. But these big tournament games swing on odd moments either way. Spain have played the best football by far. But they have still won four of their six games by only a one-goal margin. And they were still a fluffed German chance away from going out in the quarter final whether you like it or not. I’m not sure their fans would be taking much comfort from their xG if that had happened.

Seriously? I have literally never said this. Grow up.

Rio still seems surprised that the best team are better than the side with the best individual player.

Come on France ffs. At least take it to extra time and knacker everybody out a bit more. The team that plays the semi final a night earlier has a big advantage otherwise.

It does happen. If they will let me post.

Not sure where I’ve said otherwise. I wasn’t blaming their inexperience for conceding the goal. But I thought that gunman was, which I thought was funny because before the tournament we had an exchange where he said it wouldn’t matter. That’s literally it. If gunman was joking then it has been an utterly pointless discussion.

Not saying they should be playing ffs But you take out a GK-CB that have played 80-90 games together… replace them with defenders and a GK that have only got 15-20 caps. They don’t have the same understanding. Not sure why this such is a controversial point of view. It hasn’t cost them so far. But it might. As far as I know they aren’t handing out any trophies until Sunday.

Most tournament winning teams have GK-CB-CB partnerships that have played a lot of games together. It’s not complicated

Might be a great comfort to them on the plane home.

Pretty sure you ridiculed me when I said they would miss Varane and Lloris and reminded everyone that the best international teams are built on experienced defensive partnerships. Don’t make me dredge up the post where you said all their defenders were great and it didn’t matter that they hadn’t played together much.

Held the record for longer than Rooney

Unused subs celebrating on the pitch again Small time.

Spain lead on xG!

Dunno if I am leaning the other way. In a boring game where nobody commits bodies forward then France can probably grind out a 1-0 a lot more efficiently than we can. Whereas if Spain come at us and the game opens up… we might finally remember we can play a bit. Got to get past Netherlands though etc.

If you take the Switzerland game in isolation. I mean, it was basically… fine? Pretty much what you would expect if you woke from a coma to be told Switzerland were in a quarter final against one of the favourites. Favourites dominate possession in the first half, but chances are at a premium. Switzerland settle into the game and have a spell in the second half where they are on top but can’t make it count. Favourites grind it out and find a way. If we’d looked sharper in the group stage I think we could have still played out almost EXACTLY the same match against Switzerland. And people would be praising us for getting the job done against a decent side instead of moaning that we still hadn’t improved enough.

It is going to be so good if we come out and play at 100mph because we have been conserving energy until the last two games.

The penalty shootout was genuinely one of the most impressive things this England side have ever done. Everyone focused. Everyone rehearsed, whether they were taking one or not. No nerves. Just go and execute on the plan. Done. It was only Germany that ever used to look remotely organised in shootouts back in the day. Pretty much every other country just used to be mass of players huddling around after the final whistle. And with the manager only asking if people fancied taking one after the game had already finished

Gareth Southgate. The whole of England is not with you, as it turns out.

Mate, I think reality wants another word. Trippier is a veteran of three previous tournaments. A La Liga winner, a Champions League runner up. Is it ideal playing him at left back instead of a left footer? No. But he’s played there for England before at major tournaments. He’s also played there for Atletico Madrid. He has just about done a job whether people like it or not. Plus he can cover RB if anything happens to Kyle Walker. It’s not hard to understand why he’s in the squad, especially when they expected Luke Shaw to be back two or three games earlier and not to need Trippier covering LB for as many games. But Walcott? Walcott had never kicked a ball in the Premier League when he was randomly drafted in for 2006. Ever. Nobody expected him to be there. Nobody could understand why he was there. Then even after we’d lost Michael Owen to injury and Wayne Rooney to a red card he still never even got on the field because the manager was scared to risk him. Also, let’s not forget Trippier is in there as an emergency LB because there aren’t that many other options. Whereas Walcott was keeping people like Jermaine Defoe and Darren Bent out of the squad somehow, even those guys were coming in off decent PL seasons. I mean, don’t get me wrong. We should obviously have taken another left footer along. But comparing Trippier to Walcott is literally insane. Possibly the worst take of the entire Euros sub-forum. And the competition is fierce.

If Spain go out in the QF, nobody is talking about their xG in 10 years’ time. The record books just say that they went out in the QFs. That’s not to say England have played well. But these big tournament games are going to hinge on odd moments either way.

Honestly. The longer the month goes on, the less I think I am defending Southgate and the more I think I am just having to explain again and again how international tournaments work.