Match 37 | Slovenia vs England | June 23 | Post-Match Thread [R]

It might be better if England faces Germany than the other teams from Group D. I am serious. Germany is a young team with out of form striker(Klose shopuld be back, right?). They are beatable. If England beats Geramny, the team will fire up.

 

Yeah, there's more chance of us really going for it and playing like we should against someone like Germany. I could imagine us being complacent again with the other alternatives.

 

i think you have to assume that your competitor will score or make the putt, do whatever will turn out badly for you. you cannot count on favorable results that you cannot control.

 

except the result in the USA game appears to be a little tainted, by the majority of post-match analysis. it's certainly a bummer for them, the smallest nation in the tournament, but they had their share of luck.

 

Careful what you wish for, Germany played really well their first game. They are young but that have a lot of talent. The farther they go through the tournament the more they will gel and the last thing you want is for them to come together all at once on your head. I think Serbia is more of a known element to prepare for....

 

Not getting carried away, we were average against the USA, shockingly poor against Algeria and decent against Slovenia. I haven't seen anything yet from the England team that has shown me they can go far in this tournament, they really need to step it up. Still think that the team selection will be our downfall, Gerrard is not a winger and playing against the bigger and better teams i think it's essential to play 5 in midfield and something Capello hasn't done, and i fear if he changes the formation now they will be teething problems this should have been done in the friendlies.

 

Honestly, I might have had some sympathy for them were it not for their constant trash talking and cocky attitudes. Before and after the US match they had plenty to say (guaranteeing a win, then talking about how they were disappointed in the US because they didn't play quality football). If they packed it in against England thinking the USA was going to draw, then it's all the more fitting that it bit them in the rear end.

Congrats to England!!! I was starting to wonder if they'd survive or not.

 

To be fair that "guaranteed win" statement attributed to them was nothing of the sort. Some lazy journo expanded a nothing statement from one of their players

 

Well it was taken out of context, however he did say "We are going to win this match". So maybe not a guarantee, but that coupled with the other statements from them just really gave off this sense of overconfidence. I just like to see sportsmen act sporting by showing respect for their opponents.

Anyway I don't want to take this thread any further off-topic. Back to the team at hand, glad to see England get through, should be interesting to see who the match-ups are from Group D. Hopefully England can shore up the areas they need to. Honestly I wouldn't mind seeing a re-match between the US and England before this whole thing is through.

 

Slovenia were too meek to try England. Meek, weak, pathetic.

England haven't done anything worthy still.

 

Make no mistake...England were the better team and deserved to win, but to suggest that they played well? Not in my opinion. And just look at Capello during the game if you think he was happy with the way they played.

The game could have gone very differently if the officiating was a little bit consistent.

Johnson was VERY lucky not to be on a yellow card from the first couple minutes onward. That would have changed the game alone. Much like the rest of this tourney...the officiaing was a bit of a mess today.

Slovenia gave up half way through the game and then realized that they were still in it. Either way...they never looked all that dangerous. The same won't be said for England's next performance....and if they play the way they did today...believe me...nobody will be saying they played well.

 

Nah, England played very well. We did everything but score a few more goals.

 

England did play well against Slovenia, creating a slew of chances. This was their best game in the tournament, while their weakest showing was against Algeria.

 

A significant improvement for England, apart from the lack of goals it was a good performance. I didn't see anything there which suggested England are good enough to really challenge for the World Cup but it was good, chances were created and the defence looked solid enough. If it is Germany in the next round then more improvements will be needed but, unlike after the Algeria game, I have hope, England looked like they really cared today.

 

His exact words were: "It's going to be a hard match, but we will go into it with the attitude that we can win it." A few hours later, I've seen an article on some webpage saying a Slovenian said we're going to win this match, and there were responses of Howard and another player (I think it was Donovan) under it.

Cesar was happy he didn't get red (or his second yellow in 2 matches, at least) for that elbow, too. The ref was really not card happy, which I do think was better for England than it was for Slovenia, although we could be down to 10 men from the 20th min. if the ref was more strict.

In my opinion, England obviously was the better team today. They had more possession, more chances, they controlled the game. I do give our players credit for the time before the first goal, though, because they didn't pack themselves into a bunker, but played for 20 and some minutes as equals, also having shots on goal. After the goal, they lost their composition, and they were lucky it was just 1:0 in the halftime. I expected them to get some faith during the halftime, and they did seem better after it, but English players played even better, controlling the ground all the time. The change only came 15 min. before the end when Capello decided it's worth more to defend 1:0 than to try to score another one, because our guys could score from counterattack, and took the attackers out, and Kek changed the midfielder for a third attacker. That's when the English pressure has ended and the teams looked more balanced again, but that was not because Slovenes would wake up and play better, but because of the changes in the field.

After the goal from England, it was an interesting gamble from our side, though. If the US would win 1:0, we would need to attack, because we would need a draw. If Algeria would win 1:0, we would still go to the round of 16, even if we lost to England 1:0, but 2:0 for England would mean Algeria going forth. And the whole time it seemed it's going to be 0:0, but both sides had numerous chances. I believe Kek had a really tough decision between opening up and attacking for a draw, at the same time risking 2:0, or closing up at 1:0, believing USA will not win.

But England really played better than they did in the previous matches, and our team really wasn't up for it. I was kind of expecting that, and hoping that the Algerians can pull another draw. And by the way, the last five minutes of both matches were more nervous for me than any game in the international football I've been watching so far.

 

I hope that means Slovenian NT, not Slovenian league ... That one sucks .
You can PM me if you want to know more, as I don't like writing off-topic.


And no, I'm definitely not pleased with how things went today, but it was fair enough. Congrats to teams that went to the round of 16. For me, it was enough seeing Slovenia getting first point on any WC (4 points, actually). See you in the next WC, if we get a good draw for UEFA qualifications .

 

I have to say Prenn, as a fellow Englishman, I think you're too easily pleased. We were infinitely better than in the other two games, but that wasn't difficult. Bottom line is that on a couple of occasions we were very, very lucky not to let in an equaliser that would have put us out.

On the plus side, at least Defoe took his goal well and hopefully Capello will keep him in. Maybe his mind will be made up for him, depending on what Rooney's injury is. To be honest I thought that Rooney was poor again today, certainly by his own standards - not as poor as he was against Algeria, because that would be impossible, but he still lost the ball far too often, was greedy twice trying to shoot through defenders when he should have played Milner in and just didn't seem to have any spark.

I'd love to be wrong, but I didn't see anything today to suggest we can go much farther in the tournament.

 

I didn't catch much of eng/slov as was intent on the USA match. I saw Jimmy milner made the nice cross for the goal but don't see much praise for his contribution. Seems lots of talk about Joe Cole needing to be in. Was hearing he's been left out much of Chelsea's season tho. Seems odd the calls for him. Is it just a factor of Chelsea being a side that has picked up so many fair weather fans in recent years?

England has been frustrating to support for years in big competitions... And a shakeup of the 11 has been in order ... But the most famous 10 names And a shaky keeper end up out there most often.

 

I'm not saying I doubt you at all, but I am curious where you saw that. I've seen 3 different accounts, all of which included in quotes the phrase that I showed above. It doesn't really matter, but certainly if I got the wrong impression I'd like to know it.

 

I heard it from his mouth directly on Slovenian national TV, before the translation. An article reporting this, called "Lost in translation", has been in at least 2 Slovenian newspapers the next day. I still believe one of our commercial media houses (equally good in reporting as The Sun is) quoted him wrong even before the translation, and ESPN quoted them, and FIFA quoted ESPN. However, I can still find you the video in which he says the words (in Slovene), but the commercial media house erased the article, and so did FIFA on it's website, you won't find it anymore. I didn't check ESPN, though.

Sadly, we live in a world where hyped stories are better than normal news, because they sell better. Slovenia is no exception.

 

I was finally able to see both group games tonight and I'm shocked at how slow the pace was in this game compared to the other game. I was expecting Slovenia to really put some pressure on to get the tying goal but I saw no evidence of that. I only saw two substitutions in the second half and most of the time the ball was on Slovenia's half. What exactly was going through Kek's mind at that moment? Why didn't they chase after the tying goal? Why didn't they try to get first place? Why no game plan to kamikaze for the tying goal in the last fifteen minutes? It's very incomprehensible to me.

To me, Slovenia's participation can be summed up as good players, excellent tactics but in the end not enough conviction to advance to the next phase.

 

How was England's pace in this game? Brisk, sluggish, or somewhere in between?

 

To me, brisk yet unhurried like a team that has the game under control.

 

Ah, a positive sign for the English then. And they didn't give up any (soft) goals, either!