Yes it was a grueling season - punctuated by the out of the blue Klopp announcement. And then the month of Euros and Copa. Feels like there hasn't been any down time.
I remember this very clearly. almost laughed out loud - at 75mins of Spain-England, just after Palmer equalized .... https://www.theguardian.com/footbal...nd-kyle-walker-throw-in-euro-2024-final-spain Can a throw-in encapsulate 58 years of English tournament dysfunction? Let’s find out! England have won the ball back after the goal, working it forward through Jude Bellingham and then through Saka. Palmer, adrenaline and endorphins still surging through him, then tries to jig past Fabián Ruiz, who puts in a desperate tackle and bunts the ball out of play. As he regains his balance, Ruiz stumbles a little. He looks exhausted. His shirt is absolutely soaked in sweat. The roar of the England fans is primeval. The clock shows 74:49. Kyle Walker trots forward to take the throw and Palmer gives the ball up for him. Walker studies his options – the long throw into the mixer, the short one to Palmer or Saka, who are wheeling around in front of him like bobbins – and doesn’t like any of them. So he waits. Perhaps he even freezes momentarily. By the time Walker finally releases the ball, it has spent 31 seconds – or 3.4% of the remaining time available in the match – in his hands. The noise has died down a little. Walker, a powerful man, takes a run-up. Winds up those fearsome, Carrington-carved core muscles. Hurls the ball with all his might. It skims through the Berlin night, skips across the turf, and eventually finds its way to … John Stones in defence, 40 yards behind him. But Stones is under pressure and returns it to Pickford. Pickford is also under pressure and boots the ball straight out of play for a Spain goal-kick. Ollie Watkins scowls at him. Pickford shrugs and grimaces at once, like a man who has stolen a hedgehog, stuffed it down his trousers and is now trying to play it cool in front of the parish elders. The clock shows 75:29. England’s little frisson of post-goal momentum has simply evaporated, gone, stolen off into the night. =================== Between the Stones back-pass in the 76th minute and a Bellingham aerial duel in the 88th, England did not have a single touch in the Spain half. In that time, Spain had 80 touches in the England half. Watkins goes 16 minutes without a touch. Spain have managed to kill off the England surge, quieten the crowd, take a rest and carve out three or four good openings.
A WC semi and two Euro finals. It's a better run than any other manager has ever put together for the country. It can't be all that bad - he hasn't lucked into this.
From the quality of the fields to the travel they threw on some teams to the onsite fan management, it's been really bad, hasn't it? Not a good look from a host which hosts 100k+ spectator events in every corner of the country all year long in every type of condition without much of a problem to then be completely undone by the Copa. Oy vey!
He certainly hasn't masterminded it either - he's relied on individual brilliance in almost all the tourneys - very little team play. And I'd say this specific tourney was massively lucky.
Honestly mate. They scraped through just about every round. Seconds to going out against Slovakia after a piece of magic pulled them out the bag. Bar 45mins against Serbia and Netherlands, they were complete trash. Saying he done more than the likes of Sven Goran, Capello, ********ing Hodgson etc is a pretty low bar. If only you were here and surrounded by the false hype and expectations, I saw a thing on Sky where voters were selecting their combined English/Spanish XI, check this out...they only had Carvaljal and Rodri from the Spanish side hahahahaha.
I wonder how much of the ineptitude is due to CONMEBOL. They may have negotiated a lot more control than they should have been given. I remember years ago, going to Gold Cup matches in Miami, where our federation had sold/surrendered the hosting rights to an outfit called InterForever. All of their events had this same sense of chaos. Like leaving the country without leaving the country. Of course that's redundant as I already said that I was in Miami!
I came down with dengue fever on June 16th and was basically bedridden for the next two weeks. As a result I watched all of the group matches in both tournaments live (when I was awake). After that, I felt as though I may as well watch the knockout stages!
Betfair: Next permanent England manager Graham Potter: 6/4 Eddie Howe: 5/1 Lee Carsley: 11/2 Thomas Tuchel: 6/1 Mauricio Pochettino: 7/1 Jurgen Klopp: 14/1 Ralf Rangnick: 16/1 Frank Lampard, Pep Guardiola: 20/1 Jose Mourinho: 25/1 Michael Carrick: 33/1 Sean Dyche, Gary O’Neil: 40/1 Brendan Rodgers, Steven Gerrard, David Moyes, Steve Cooper, Steve Holland, Wayne Rooney, Sarina Wiegman, Ange Postecoglou: 50/1 ============== I'd put the chances of Jurgen being interested at about a billion to one.
fact is that from that whole list, very few have coached at the top (ie CL) level. and none of them are English. anyone taking that job is out of their mind, or desperate. the UK media doesn't let you pick the best team, they just want the best-in-their-position individual picked. so it's simply impossible to implement any kind of true playing style - like trying to complete a jigsaw with pieces that each look good but simply don't work together.
Since the first half of the first group game I was telling anyone who would listen that Kane was main reason for our toothless attack. Not much more than a traffic cone upfront who would sometimes get in the way of players who actually want to move about a bit. Garef just didn't have the balls to drop him completely.
not that I really care, but how is it he scored so much in the BL? did he get injured just before the Euros? (I agree with your description of him)