Rob1981

People have been saying this for years That's why it's been a cliche for as long as any of us can remember.

Foden had a tap in disallowed because he had drifted just offside. Kane missed a free header from about three yards out. Rice hit the post. You play the game 100 times, one of those other chances often goes in. Then maybe we go on and win it in normal time. Then we haven’t spent a week wringing our hands about needing a last minute goal and the mood around the tournament is completely different. That’s not to defend the performance. But if you are going to do 100 hypothetical replays, you can’t just change the bit where a team scores to suit your argument and keep in all the times that they missed. These knockout games just swing on odd moments here and there. A goal on 95 minutes is no less valid than us scoring one of the other chances on 70 or 80 minutes. Same as Spain v Germany. Because Spain went and got a last minute goal and avoided penalties, everyone is still purring about them being this amazing attacking machine. But they sat on a 1-0 lead for over an hour and then in stoppage time they were inches away from conceding a goal to Germany at the other end. You replay THAT game 100 times? Quite often Spain are back at the airport after the final whistle and we are sitting here with a wry smile saying that they peaked too early. Again, this is just what tournament football is.

Some of this goes WAY beyond England though. The performative stuff where fans of big clubs hate on every aspect of international breaks... Like otherwise they are being disloyal to club football or something. It's genuinely weird.

Obviously not Of course England/Netherlands have had a good path to the final this year. But that doesn’t mean that it’s loads easier than the path that many other finalists have had down the years. If you find yourself with three big hitters one after the other, you don’t generally get through. Not sure how else to say it.

So, "never beat any strong opponents" apart from the Germany side that you immediately concede was a strong opponent Clearly, we could have played better in some of the other big games. But as a general rule, I don't think one top opponent + two inferior ones is an unusual run to the final. You often only need to turn in one really good performance against a team that's on your level. I mean the last two England tournaments prove this, right? 2020 - Beat Germany, reach the final 2022 - Don't beat France. Therefore we don't reach the final, even though we could have probably won a semi against Morocco if we'd got there. I mean, you're right. If we don't beat Netherlands... this certainly won't go down as a stellar tournament this year, even though we have another semi final in the record books. But if we do beat them, I don't think a run of Slovakia-Switzerland-Netherlands is any easier than the majority of those mentioned in the list above. So this constant refrain of "He hasn't played anyone good!" just gets really tiresome. Again, people are comparing him to the aspiration they have in their head, not to the reality of other international tournaments. Waiting for him to smash some hypothetical achievement where we go and beat three top teams one after the other. Even though most other finalists generally don't have to do this.

Christ, man Are we really doing this again? Look at some of the others runs-to-a-final: Brazil '94: USA, Netherlands, Sweden Italy '94: Nigeria, Spain, Bulgaria France '98: Paraguay, Italy, Croatia Brazil '98: Chile, Denmark, Netherlands Germany '02: Paraguay, USA, South Korea () Brazil '02: Belgium, England, Turkey Italy '06: Australia, Ukraine, Germany Netherlands '10: Slovakia, Brazil, Uruguay Argentina '14: Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands Portugal '16: Croatia, Poland, Wales France '16: Ireland, Iceland, Germany Croatia '18: Denmark, Russia, England England '20: Germany, Ukraine, Denmark Italy '20: Austria, Belgium, Spain France '22: Poland, England, Morocco Argentina '22: Australia, Netherlands, Croatia You don't have to go and smash three elite teams one after the other. In fact, most teams that have a KO path putting them against three good opponents generally go out somewhere along the way and therefore nobody remembers them. Even though they were probably "great in the group stage"! So you make sure you win your group and you give yourself the best chance of success in the knockout stage. Then you can turn in probably one great performance against a team that's on your level. And you can luck in with inferior opponents in the other games. And still find a way to get the job done even if you don't play that well... boom! You're in the final. This is LITERALLY what tournament football is. I don't know how people can keep forgetting what these tournaments are like in the two years between each competition. Somehow folk keep tuning back in with memories of elite winners having to dominate loads of heavyweight clashes one after the other to be successful. Even though this almost never happens.

Haha, what? That's the Graham Taylor that missed a World Cup because we couldn't beat Norway, right? At a time when Norway hadn't been to a World Cup for over half a century.

Yeah, it was. BBC got the first two group games. ITV only took the last group game out of the three, but then the trade-off is that they also got first pick for the R16.

Ahahahaha 3 semi finals in four tournaments is MEDIOCRITY lads. Italy have only managed this once in their entire history (1988, 1990, 1994). Portugal have only done this once (2000, 2004, 2006). Spain have only done this once (2008, 2010, 2012). Netherlands have only done it twice (1974, 1976, 1978 and 1998, 2000, 2004). England, it won't surprise you to hear, had never done it before yesterday. Ever. Even reaching the quarter final stage... we are the ONLY European team to reach the last eight at all of the last four World Cups and Euros. Again, I think people need to take a step back and recalibrate expectations somewhat. You can moan about the performances all you want, but you need to remember just how difficult it is to get to the business end of these competitions consistently. Nobody has a divine right to reach semi finals and finals every time just because most of their players are good. **** me.

Don't disagree with that. But that's a different argument altogether. Your previous post implied pundits were wrong to call it an improved peformance because we still didn't create many chances. But one doesn't necessarily drive the other, especially against an excellent Switzerland side that everyone was raving about before kickoff.

These things can both be true though? Yesterday was fairly typical of the cagey games you often get at this stage of an international tournament. It wasn’t a thrill a minute, but it was clearly a much improved England performance. We kept possession and looked comfortable for long periods. Players knew their roles. They weren’t out there misplacing basic passes and then glaring at each other because things weren’t working.

This thread My word.

Decent that. Well done everyone.

Looking good so far. Feels a lot like the Germany game. Better to be 0-0 at half time with another couple of gears to go up, than it is to be 1-0 up and already digging in defending a lead.

You realise the press are only allowed to watch the first five minutes of training sessions, right?

Ladies and gentlemen, England will be playing three ****ing four two one or something.

I’m not sure this is the gotcha you think it is. TAA hasn’t played many games at RB because we have had Walker, Trippier and Reece James all competing for that position. Mainoo has slotted in because we are absolutely crying out for someone that can come into that position and help us keep the ball. I don’t see it as a slight on TAA, just a reflection of where we are strongest/weakest. Plenty of great players don’t get that many caps because they are unfortunate that there is someone else around at the same time that is even better. It’s just the way it goes. But going forward, Walker is clearly going to retire after these Euros. And a good chance that Trippier will as well. So TAA probably makes that RB spot his own for the next 5+ years. Which, really, makes the decision to try and turn him in to a CM all the more baffling.

“If we create 12 great chances” I’ll have some of whatever you’re smoking.

Oh my days DULL TEAMS: England QUALITY TEAMS: France, who have scored fewer goals even though they have played a game more. And Portugal, who have just bored their way to two 0-0 draws and then gone out.

Come on lads. Do it for Graham.

I’ll watch 1-0s all day long. But people moan about international tournaments and wonder why these sides with loads of good players don’t just go and attack like they do for the clubs. But in the later stages of a tournament every game is pretty much a toss of a coin. Whereas when they play for their clubs one team normally has a bigger advantage over the other. Plus the teams are used to playing together a lot more which helps. Doesn’t mean the international tournaments aren’t still great. You just have to adjust your expectations about the type of football you are going to see.

Er, what? Four of the last five Champions League finals have finished 1-0 I don’t mind these types of games anyway. You don’t need loads of goals to be gripped by the tension and the drama of it. It’s not me that’s moaning they are bored.

Because once you hit the business end of the tournament the teams are too evenly matched to take too many risks. But that’s what gives you the high stakes drama. Games settled by a split second’s indecision or a header going one side of the post and not the other. If you want to watch 3-0 and 4-0 wins, stick to your club competitions that only a two or three teams can possibly win.

“But they’ve got all these top players, Gary! Mbappe, Griezmann, Ronaldo!” Every time without fail. It’s like they have literally never watched an international tournament before.

Pundits STILL confused that these lads aren’t just playing like they play for their clubs.