SEE YOU! A brand spanking new modern fitba thread 2025-2026

I suspect if they met in the final this would not be the scoreline unless it was penalties.

 

No, he wants the goals.

 

This game is starting to look like the futbol equivalent of Chisora-Slow Joe Joyce

 

Bellendingham ready to come on.

 

So many narratives born and then dying a few minutes later in this game

 

It's a load of pointless shite, but it's been very entertaining pointless shite.

MTF

 

Pretty good game for an essentially meaningless one.

I don't see much to "take away" from it but that won't stop people who get paid to do so come up with things.

 

Far too little, far too late, but great fun to watch I suppose.

MTF

 

I'd have rather England had played like that on Wednesday and lost 6-4 than gutlessly hid like cowards after scoring one lousy goal.

MTF

 

Yes but that's easy to say when you know the result I'm not saying i disagree at all, but it if they did play that way and lost 4-1 or 5-2 the complaining would just be as loud.

 

England salvaged the day after Harlem eubankS lost

 

Honestly, it wouldn't have been. I said this on Wednesday and will say it again - this bloke was hired at £5m a year to rectify the Southgate problem - namely the inferiority complex among a team of proven winners at home and in Europe which saw them score against decent sides and then hide like fannies and wait to get beat. That's exactly what he did on Wednesday.

England always have problems with elite sides - their knockout record against proper teams is dreadful - but at least they used to go out fighting. Southgate coached them to fail like mice. Tuchel did the same. The English can deal with glorious, balls-to-the-wall failure. Waiting to get beat is shameful.

MTF

 

Also, and I can't stress this enough. Argentina wouldn't have beaten England 4-1 if they'd continued to play on the front foot on Wednesday. They aren't actually that good and I expect Spain to swat them fairly easily tomorrow.

MTF

 

Tonight has had one great benefit :- the "England must attack with great abandon we will destroy all" narrative was born and died just quickly.

Tuchel can say, with some reason, that the attack-attack-attack mantra needs to be seriously tempered.

Apart from that, I turned it off the minute it ended. Too hard listening to the wank.

 

Well, then something seems way off. If that was communicated and he was hired specifically for that reason why did it go down that way?

 

I think they would have probably won as well.

 

He's a fraud and a coward.

MTF

 

I don't think anyone sensible would suggest we go all Keegan 96. But scoring and hiding has never worked and will never work. The answer is something in the middle.

MTF

 

What does he have to be scared about? Losing his job? He would get hired again no problem.

Just because I root for Germany in football events doesn't mean i'm a supporter of him. I've never been a fan. He's nothing but a mercenary.

 

I've never really had a strong opinion on him until Wednesday. But I've someone shows you who they really are, I believe them.

MTF

 

Sadly it does and has worked, for some sides just not for England historically.

I'm happy when it's punished regardless of who it happens to, i've been around long enough to know when a team wins the big prize nobody cares.

It's a guarantee that if playing that way won England this world cup he'd be getting adoration. I also predicted that if England went out there would be calls to sack the manager.

I was more confident in that than the result of any match so far.

 

Um ok, but that didn't answer the question.

 

Agreed - my post was in the context of England, who have never been successful doing that, or indeed much else.

England have a very good group of players. Historically, this is probably the best since 1966. A semi-final is the bare minimum edition with this group. Again, the manner is the defeat is the issue, rather than the defeat.

It was the same with Southgate. On paper, losing a Euro final to Italy isn't a terrible result. Not even close. It was the manner of it which was unacceptable: scoring early, dominating and then sitting in a low block while a bunch of 30-sonethings were given free reign to apply pressure without any attempt whatsoever to get out of their own half.

The same thing happened on Wednesday. No-one is suggesting that England go kamikaze against Argentina after scoring, but you at least defend higher up the pitch and leave some strikers on to stretch them on the break. Maybe try keeping the ball for a bit as well instead of giving one of the best players ever all the time in the world to pick out passes and crosses into your box.

That's the criticism. It isn't the loss.

MTF

 

My honest answer is I don't know. He has no logical reason to be scared but you saw from his actions that he clearly was. Only he will know why.

MTF

 

I would think it might involve the powers that be who hired him (and all the preceding managers) since it's quite apparently a bad pattern that is repeated.

 

There's a inferiority complex within the whole set up, largely based on decades of useless failure. That's obvious, I think.

MTF

 

From my viewpoint it's more if a superiority complex and expectations going in to every tournament. As if everything is there for the taking as long as you don't make any mistakes. That's a bad mindset to go in with.

The scapegoating is unreal and the media machine is unbearable after every misstep. I think that's the psychological effect and not an inferiority complex.

 

There are competing positions here.

Firstly, England should have high expectations for their national team. Football is the national sport here and the PL is the richest, most popular league in the world. It is also the deepest, in terms of quality, by far - teams regularly win UEFA comps and even Palace and West Ham are able to beat comparable continental sides to win trophies. The FA is extremely wealthy and has spent millions on facilities and managers to win big prizes. England regularly produces elite players who regularly win domestic and international competitions with their clubs. At youth level, England have been very successful lately, winning multiple international comps at various age groups.

On the other hand, England supporters are actually extremely fatalistic about their national team. The Three Lions Anthem thing, for example, is horrendously misunderstood outside of England - it's not an arrogant boast but instead a lament, bemoaning England's consistent failures. The scapegoating, as you describe it, is simply the search for answers to these consistent failures, which are usually fairly obvious to identify. England international record is frankly terrible when you take into account the quality of players available and the success those players and teams have at club level. It would be weird if questions weren't asked, frankly.

MTF

 

Do you think Tuchel would have received arguably more criticism if they had blown a 4-0 lead and lost? Likely answer is no because it was a much changed team and a 3rd vs 4th place game. Different mentally where the pressure is completely different and pressure is off.

 

But that was a fun watch last night. Well, the first 45 minutes. Then the French made four changes and immediately made an impact. It went from being fun to watch, to nerve-racking. I didn't think I was going to feel that way, with it being a bronze medal game. But, you just don't want to blow a lead like that in any type of game. The reaction from the media and fans would have been diabolical.