Daly's one of my faves too. She's come in as a late sub in ENG 3 out of 4 games. Here might be a couple of reasons why she seems like a fringe player for her NT(even though I think she's one of ENG best) 1) don't know for sure with Neville. but lot of NT coaches not like their players in foreign or overseas leagues(Ellis was really bad about this). They might make an exception for an experienced vet on a temp basis(like Jody Taylor or Alex Morgan) but In Daly's case, she first played at St John college & than for the Dash for for the next years. 2) different style than what Daly's used to. Neville insists on playing with what's just one attacking player,. In fact his two main strikers, Taylor & White, usually sub each other out instead of being on the field at the same time together/the rest of the tam plays more compacted, short passing game. Daly with her speed, but not all that disciplined would be way more comfortable in the sort of open field/double wide attacking setting of Ellis/Pauw/Wiegmann
They had a try with her up front in the last two years. England are short of defensive players and Rachel has played there from u15 to seniors. It was a joke, it is an injury she has had for a long time, but carried on playing .
Yea, Daly thrives in a more width-oriented, direct game--and Houston's been a counter-attacking team, which very much suits a forward with her pace. Taylor's game is much different. She seems a smart player, has some ball skills, makes smart runs, can pass and can finish if she gets good service--but doesn't have the athletic dynamism that a lot of top forwards have: not that big, not that strong, not that fast. Some Reign fans are not keen on her. Sometimes you need your forwards to beat an opponent and make a great play. I haven't yet seen her do that for the Reign.
yeah, definitely correct about Taylor. She's got possibly the best mid/ wingers/feeder lineups in the world with the Reign. yet's only managed 3 goals so far this season Taylor, looked bad last time vs the US(at SBC); didn't have the speed to get behind the US high/back line, tried to take them from the front(1v4, since the English don't believe in helping out their lone strikers, lol), but with obvious lukewarm results. This is where Daly would of been really good, not just with her speed, but her unique strength to criss cross entire defenses, while looking for the open gap. But can understand, the English don't face teams like the US in most of their encounters, rather instead face a host of 2nd/3rd tier NT's in Euro qualifiers who tend to bunker(does invalidate Daly's speed)
Faroe Island 0 Slovenia 4 Sweden 4 Croatia 0 Wales 1 Bosnia 0 . Wales 4 wins two draws 4 goals only 1-0 and 0-0 results so far
Spain 2 Israel 0 Scotland 2 Belarus 1 Wales go top of Group 1 tonight, Only for one day probably. Spain nearly there in Group 7, Finland can catch them up if they win their 4 remaining games.
Hosts won't produce pictures from the Ireland v Norway game tonight. Crew from NFF will try to use an amateur one camera solution and broadcast it on their website. Could be geoblocked. Kick-off 6:30 CET.
England concede their first goal of qualifying. Another awful team error. Bronze poor at the back post and nobody near the Russian scorer as she heads in. Every goal conceded in the Phil Neville era has involved a really a poor individual error. Walsh played a lovely pass for England's third.
...is anyone else bothered by the fact that the UEFA website hasn't posted a single news story since November despite the March tournaments and two rounds to qualification have happened/are happening since?
Could this mean that no-one is going to update website anymore and everyone will choose to update social network's accounts only? Tha would be a very sad day...
Italy-Portugal 2-0 at HT from two Corner-Kick actions. I am quite excited: WWC looks so close right now!
Summary from last night: GROUP 1 Wales 1 - 0 Bosnia & Herzegovina Green 62 GROUP 2 Scotland 2 - 1 Belarus Cuthbert 45+2, 65 - Olkhovik 27 GROUP 4 Sweden 4 - 0 Croatia Blackstenius 16,67, Rubensson 63, Folkesson 90 GROUP 5 Faroe Islands 0 - 4 Slovenia Ivanusa 10, Zver 21(p),65, Prasnikar 88 GROUP 7 Spain 2 - 0 Israel Maria Paz 51, Alexia 88(p) And tonight... GROUP 1 Russia 1 - 3 England Danilova 31 - Parris 22, J.Scott 27,36 GROUP 3 Republic of Ireland 0 - 2 Norway Utland 21,61 Northern Ireland 0 - 5 Netherlands Beerensteyn 37, Van de Donk 61, Van de Sanden 65, Spitse 75(p), Groenen 89 GROUP 4 Ukraine 1 - 5 Denmark Ovdiychuk 90+3 - Nadim 6,52(p), Harder 33, S.Troelsgaard 81,90+5 GROUP 6 Italy 3 - 0 Portugal Girelli 4, Salvai 13, Bonansea 90+1 GROUP 7 Finland 0 - 2 Austria Koivisto 6(og), Schiechtl 72
No words. 3-0 FT, and Italy at WWC after 20 years of waiting. Time to party, guys. Sniff. Patrizia Panico was commenting the match for Italian TV: 4 years ago she missed WWC at play-offs, while playing with many of the girls on the pitch tonight; now, she can see them living the dream. Bonansea totally deserved the goal: she was deserving it for many actions she made in this game, in particular the one that hot the crossbar after a long run from the center-circle. Scoring at 90' was the icing on the cake.
Trivia: of the 9 other teams currently qualified for the tournament, Italy hasn't been in a WWC with five of them (Chile, France, S.Korea, Spain, Thailand) despite only one of the nine (Chile) being a debutante. I looked this up after noticing Italy hadn't been in the same WWC as both other UEFA nations thus far. (To be fair to Italy, Spain and Thailand debuted in just the previous tournament)
Congrats. Italy has been a nation that for several years I said would improve mightily in women's football and eventually become very competitive against top teams. Still waiting for Spain to come around. They look great, but they need to do it on the BIG STAGE, and not just in qualifying and in the Euro (2013 Euro, they were very good). They need to perform at the World Cup. They were a disappointment in 2015. Spain is a serious contender for Round of 16 in 2019, and Quarterfinal or even Semifinal in 2023. Depending on who they match up with in the Round of 16 in 2019, they may even sneak through and get to the Quarterfinal. It will all depend on the bracket.
No video-highlights have surfaced yet (I assume this video of the full-match from Italian TV is geo-blocked). Meanwhile we can settle for the players celebrating after the match:
there's hasn't been too many highlights of the last round (still waiting for the ENG-RUS), but here's a decent one between Scotland & Belarus. Can't figure out why the Scots are so underwhelming despite a plethora of quality players? for me she's closing in as one of the top ten players in the world, but then there's so many that look good coming down the left/wide; Martens, Rapinoe, Le Sommer, eccedra