Seriously what is the point of having Kenny on the pitch as a cb in this system? Just laughably redundant.
Late winner from Tammy Abraham. Pretty awful all round imo. Boothroyd awful setting the team up and persisting with it. He seemed to be attempting to throw the game. Dasilva had a decent debut I thought. Quite a few of the squad regulars have been really quite poor for a while. Tom Davies and Jonjoe Kenny in particular. I must say I’m really not sure why Lewis Cook is even close to the senior squad. I feel he’s struggled at this level this season. Maybe just another case of being a young ‘warm body’ playing PL football.
Cook has had a good season. I don't even care about the changes Boothroyd did today, the problem is he picked the squad which left him with such a lack of options in the first place. We're so bad at the U21 level for investing loads of time into the same old safe names. Toulon has usually been an exception to that. The performances in this cycle have really been awful so far, but I don't think the U21 manager ever gets any scrutiny.
I just think Boothroyd wants versatile players full stop over more specialised players, I think our top two managers have become obsessed with covering every eventuality and sacrificed better players. I really don't like it, it just creates a ' Jack of all trades, master of none ' situation. Can't understand the lack of creative players that could have been selected tbh like Lookman, he must have been unavailable for some reason otherwise I would question big Boothroyds sanity.
We really did make a meal of that. The early Davies miss, in particular, was a very poor effort of goal. Someone needs to explain the off side rule to Dowell. Abraham played well, still keeping his pecker up after what must have been a very disappointing season for him..
📋LINEUPS ⚽️ (19:30)@miseleccionmx🇲🇽 : Hernandez - Sanchez, Vargas, Arteaga, Montes - Cervantes, Antuna, Gonzalez - Lainez, Alvarado, Aguirre@England🦁 : Woodman - Dasilva, Fry, Konsa, Kenny - Connolly, Choudhury, Cook, Dowell - Nketiah, Nmecha#MEXENG— Tournoi Maurice Revello (@TournoiMRevello) May 29, 2018
Only been watching the last 20 mins but not exactly great from what I've seen. Da Silva, Konsa and Ntekiah seem to be playing well but we don't seem to have much control of the game though from what I've seen.
At least a few of the new guys are showing their individual worth. Is Cook going to play two full matches back to back when he’s on standby for the WC?
Is it just me or is this referee blowing fouls for the way the Mexicans go down. Just feels like he's ready to play on then after a delay decides it's a foul after a bit of rolling around.
Well, that was pretty underwhelming tbh, guess it was better in the second half than what I saw of the first but lacking so much in creatively. I can't remember us testing their keeper once which is pretty poor! Just can't see an England DNA in all this tbh, just seems like a mess.
I really hope Boothroyd gets offered a club job somewhere. We've been even worse in this cycle than we were at the Euros.
The only way I see Boothroyd getting booted is if he does what Pearce did in the end and starts slating the players for what was largely his own coaching incompetence. I just can’t see anyone in the club game employing him in a manager role.
He will have a job for life while his best mate Ashworth is still technical director. I would love to hear Ashworth analysis of watching the U21's in relation to the England DNA? I just don't see it with Boothroyd in charge or see where we are going with it. We have the possession from defense to midfield, then back to defense, then eventually back to Woodman who then kicks it long, just to give up possession again, and repeat. Its all very predictable due to lack of creative, skillfull players further forward who can receive the ball in tight spaces and then give our forwards something to work on, who today had to live on bread crumbs. Just to add, do we really need two defensive minded midfielders in this set up? Cook and Choudary. Edit: Actually scrap that, with the Squad selected our midfield isn't particularly creative anyway so not really sure what our best combination or balance would be?
This is the problem. There is no real opportunity for self reflection or analysis of his performance in the role because Ashworth has a prior friendship with Boothroyd. Performances will all be excused with the reasoning being that the squad had too many pull outs etc. An issue that is going to come up is that some options might see the U21’s as pointless with Boothroyd as coach. Look at TAA pulling out of youth tournaments to focus on club level. Now he’s going to the WC. We need to provide players with a platform to want to be involved and create a structure worthy of the quality we now have. I know some will say it’s an honour thing and players should turn up regardless but it doesn’t work like that. The most annoying thing is that this same issue has already happened of players hating playing under a coach and pulling out of squads. It was happening quite often under Pearce and the FA have gone down the same road again with a coach that is out of his depth.
Very little threat from England. Just as well Mexico's finishing was under par. Nmecha seems to be a lost cause. And has done for years. Nketiah was one who did well though.
This is poor, Boothroyd putting square pegs in round holes because he refused to take attacking wide players. Nmecha playing right wing back??
I missed this game and it looks like Boothryoditis has effected us all by the lack of posts. Lineup looked pretty bizarre but can't comment on the game. Lovely goal from Vieira - 🦁 | @Ronaldo_Vieira8 was on the scoresheet for @England tonight as the #YoungLions defeated Qatar 4-0📺: @FreeSportsUK pic.twitter.com/WFXgTqnRNV— Leeds United (@LUFC) June 1, 2018
It was a poor first half but much better second half, it's was almost like someone said to Boothroyd at halftime, 'by the way you do realise we need to score four more to win the group', like he didn't realise. It would be great to have an England manager that positive and aggressive from the off would be nice for once. However, really gave it a good go in the second half and tbh we could have scored double figures but their keeper had a Worldy despite letting in four goals. I was puzzled at the end though, still chasing that one goal, Boothroyd takes off Abraham and puts on Connolly???
Yeah, the first half was alarming bad, particularly the totally inept attacking play. Very poor crossing, even when it came to just playing a relatively simple ball across the area. The Abraham cock up took some beating. And then having to rely on them to head the ball into their own net.