NOT SOUTHGATE'S LAST HURRAH: The England 2022 campaign

[sc91]

Anyone worried about England actually winning something can breathe a sigh of relief.

[skybluedave]

We ain't winning anything with Stevie Gerarrd or Graham Potter either

[The_jagster]

Di Matteo won the Champions League, flawed managers can win tournaments

[Darren Moores Mum]

We can't win them even with Southgate's luck of draws.

[Bliss Seeker]

Meh, happy with that.  Nice to know a few years out that we'd definitely be in a quarter finals next time under Southgate rather than chance the qualifiers with someone else.

Gives Potter a couple more years to cut his jib too. 

[Haguey]

2 minutes ago, Smallen said:

was wondering how many tackles Fernandez had made in this because it felt like a lot. He’s made 9  

[Smallen]

what you quoting me from another thread for, weirdo 

[git2thachoppa]

I still remember how awful the 2018 squad was.

Erratic goalkeeper, leaky defence, boring goalless and gappy midfield, and just Harry Kane to shout about. Gareth's club record wasn't exactly sexy either.

Took them to the semis. Still somehow gets the best out of Pickford, Maguire and out-of-form players.

Every player that would get dropped before a tournament if it was up to fans then drag England to non-Englandy levels. I remember when getting out of the group was a question, when you expected a 2nd-round knockout, losing to Croatia 2007 and Iceland. Going behind in every friendly against mediocre sides so they could get the late winner and feel better, while picking Hart and Rooney every game even against some island somewhere.

Right choice for now.

[Haguey]

Easy to forget we had Ashley Young at left back in 2018  The squad still had Delph, Rose and Phil Jones

[skybluedave]

Danny Welbeck and Gary Cahill. Was proper pony

[PMLF]

[Darren Moores Mum]

It's coming home

Well done, Gareth.

[skybluedave]

That's what really matters

[Haguey]

First win for 56 years.

[Weezer]

Typical of England tbh. If only we used as much shithousery as other nations.

[Rob1981]

11 minutes ago, Haguey said:

First win for 56 years.

Hate to be that guy (again) but we won the fair play trophy in 1990 under Bobby Robson.

And Le Tournoi obvs.

Edited December 18, 2022 by Rob1981

[Haguey]

How could I forget, the real 1997 World Cup.

[dafuge]

33 minutes ago, PMLF said:

[craigcwwe]

9 hours ago, skybluedave said:

His contract runs to 6 months after Euros so they can wait till then after Euros at least

Odd that his deal doesn't end after the Euro's, no? 

[skybluedave]

I think the contract is to see out Nations League not sure. It did seem a bit odd at the time

[Rob1981]

Nah, they announced a contact through to Dec 2024 which would cover the Nations League after the Euros as well. Doesn’t make a lot of sense, if we get someone else in for 2026 qualifying then those six NL games in Sept-Nov 2024 are the only chance for a new manager to experiment a bit beforehand.

[skybluedave]

I'm sure he'd just leave 6 months early paid off if it made sense. 

[Rob1981]

Oh yeah, unless he stays on until 2026 he will definitely go straight after Euro 2024 and not do those extra games. Just baffling that they offered a contract like that in the first place.

[Weezer]

Such a weird contract tbh, why would you end the deal after a Nations League when it's quite obvious he's either going after Euro 2024 or WC 2026?

[m_fenton]

I guess because of the type of guy Southgate is. If we have a dreadful tournament and it's time for him to walk, I'm pretty sure he would. If we have an OK tournament but the FA want some time to pick a successor without a rush, I'd trust him to professionally give his all during that spell. If he had a great tournament but doesn't know if he wants to stay on longer, there's no immediate pressure to sign a new deal.

[skybluedave]

I don't mind it really. In the past, when we have a contract running out straight after a tournament we panic and extend it before the tournament then go on to have a mare. 

[Anthrax Dave]

I wonder if Pep/Klopp would fancy it after 2024?

[oche balboa]

Southgate should have resigned. We have the players to win something but we need a coach who knows to get the best out of them and tactically astute. Southgate lacks this. We have done well but its feels we can do so much more with these players. 

[pearcey_90]

I’m not a fan of Southgate, but even I’ve unfortunately fallen into the camp of ‘There’s no other options right now’.

He showed signs of changing with the 4-3-3, but tactical changes still lack for him and getting the overall edge in the games against the big sides. 

We have a meh 18 months in terms of football going into Euros, so it just comes down to winning the Euros. Can’t accept anything less. I just want to see him try out more players in different positions over that time, so options are expanded. The big things for me:

Foden long term position. I want to see him central for England, Saka RW and endless options LW. 

The balance in the middle. Rice/Bellingham/Foden. Phillips/Mount/Maddison. Try stuff that has that bit more creativity, whilst being solid. It can be done.

LB options. Chilwell hopefully comes back like he’s not had an ACL injury, but if things are not good we just have Shaw who can be hot and cold, both form and injuries. So need someone else as an option that isn’t Trippier or Saka  

CB pairing. Maguire I just can’t see being a Man Utd regular, so unless he moves in summer, we have to look at edging him out the starting XI and try someone else alongside Stones. Even with Stones you can’t be confident long term at Man City he’ll be a regular. Had it been a summer World Cup, he’d have been going into it with just 13 prem appearances. So we need to try out some people, especially in the ‘tougher’ games. 

Start Ramsdale more in qualifying. Need to rotate between him and Pickford, again to keep options open.

[Rob1981]

21 hours ago, pearcey_90 said:

Italy X2 are the only meaningful games we have till the next Euros kicks off. Rest of the teams in the group are poor

I reckon we’ve got one free date for a friendly in October because we are in a qualifying group with eight teams instead of a qualifying group with ten teams. We’ve already put a friendly in with Scotland for our free date in September, but that still leaves one slot spare.

So quite likely we get Germany here I guess, since most other big teams will have qualifiers of their own and won’t have the date free.

[enigmatic]

4 hours ago, Anthrax Dave said:

I wonder if Pep/Klopp would fancy it after 2024?

Don't see why either of them would want the England job tbh, notwithstanding good relations with some of the players. 

Pep didn't enjoy the relentless pressure and unreasonable expectations of Barcelona who he genuinely felt some patriotic sentiment towards, not sure he's going to enjoy the main part of his job being hounded by the press for [not] experimenting in a random Nations League game for us, whilst having relatively little in time on the training pitch or actual trophies to win. 

Don't think either of their obsessive attention to detail and long ramp-ups to get players fully comfortable with their system necessarily translates well to international management either, though I think Klopp might give it a go with Germany eventually (and as it's Germany will probably do better than England anyway .

[Baptista_8]

https://www.skysports.com/football/news/11095/12771474/england-did-not-have-a-good-world-cup-and-any-manager-could-have-matched-gareth-southgates-results-says-jamie-redknapp

Finally someone in the media has called him out.

[Coulthard's Jaw]

Quote

Getting to the quarter-finals wasn't a big achievement and I don't think we should be celebrating it.

Absolutely no one is celebrating reaching the quarter finals  

Quote

Harry Maguire had a great World Cup, but in the long-term we need to find that centre-back that will take us to the elite level.

Everyone wanted Maguire dropped, so feel like Gareth needs some credit here. And finding and developing another centre back is as much about the system we have in place for player development (which is loads better than it used to be) than who the head coach is.

Quote

If you looked at the candidates right now, you'd see Graham Potter at Chelsea, Eddie Howe is doing a great job at Newcastle. Frank Lampard, who has a great history of playing for England, is at Everton. It didn't work out for Steven Gerrard at Aston Villa, but any of these could have done as good a job as Southgate.

But could they do a better job? Jamie doesn't say.

[cyclonus1010]

Southgate and ex-Belgium boss Martinez have very similar records, wins losses and draws.

I know Southgate hasn't had a "golden generation" to use but still the mood towards Southgate is a lot more positive than Martinez, despite them having similar records.

[Coulthard's Jaw]

I don't think they are exactly the same, 2018 was definitely an overachievement in terms of where we got to in the tournament. Martinez got three tournaments where winning was kinda expected before people ran out of patience with him and I suspect it will be similar with Southgate, 2024 will be his third tournament which we go into with a good chance of winning, if we come up short again I think he will step down (actually he will step down whatever, he'll have been in charge 8 years which is a decent stint).

[The_jagster]

Martinez is unfairly criticised imo.

It's just not that easy to win knockout tournaments, even with two legged ties in all years but one, Pep hasn't won the CL in 9 seasons now. And unlike at City there is a huge gap to the squad players in the Belgium national team.

 

[GunmaN1905]

3 minutes ago, The_jagster said:

Martinez is unfairly criticised imo.

It's just not that easy to win knockout tournaments, even with two legged ties in all years but one, Pep hasn't won the CL in 9 seasons now. And unlike at City there is a huge gap to the squad players in the Belgium national team.

 

Why am I not surprised you're the guy who likes Roberto Martinez?

[Coulthard's Jaw]

19 minutes ago, The_jagster said:

Martinez is unfairly criticised imo.

It's just not that easy to win knockout tournaments, even with two legged ties in all years but one, Pep hasn't won the CL in 9 seasons now. And unlike at City there is a huge gap to the squad players in the Belgium national team.

Yeah. Also stuff like Hazard being washed up at such a young age, when you're a country of that size you need a generational talent like Hazard.

Edited December 20, 2022 by Coulthard's Jaw

[darren1983]

Southgate took over an England side at a very low point, has brought through a lot of young players and has made them one of the most consistent national teams in the world in the past 5/6 years. People will moan but a semi final, a final and a quarter final in the past 3 tournaments is a level of consistency that England haven't seen in like 60 years. Yes he has his faults (what manager doesn't?) but he's done an excellent job and has England set up well for the coming years. Think the stick he gets is unfair and I'm no England fan. 

[skybluedave]

I think you could argue Howe could do a better job if given time but I'm not sure he'd leave Newcastle. And even then it isn't guarenteed he'd improve things.

And Potter I'm less sure of. He's seems a proper coach that likes 50 games a season, drills players day in day out and experiments with his team. He's hardly set world alight at Chelsea so far, his first proper big gig either. 

And less said about Gerrard and Lampard. I'm just not sold these guys would drastically improve results. Ask me again in 2 years time though

[Coulthard's Jaw]

Annoyingly I suspect Lampard would be quite good at the job.

[The_jagster]

I don't think a manager who has a reputation for managing teams that struggle to score is what England need in the case of Potter

[Weezer]

Are we just going to pluck an elite CB out of thin air? Can’t blame Southgate that Maguire is our best option alongside Stones. You can’t pick what you haven’t got.

[Barry Cartman]

3 minutes ago, Weezer said:

Are we just going to pluck an elite CB out of thin air? Can’t blame Southgate that Maguire is our best option alongside Stones. You can’t pick what you haven’t got.

He gave a Serie A winning centre back 1 game in the space of a year, during a time where we were awful in the Nations League and Magurie wasn't playing well for his club, then didn't even call him up to the World Cup squad over Ben White who had found some good form for Arsenal

You can't say players aren't there when he refuses to play certain players 

[Weezer]

Just now, Barry Cartman said:

He gave a Serie A winning centre back 1 game in the space of a year, during a time where we were awful in the Nations League and Magurie wasn't playing well for his club, then didn't even call him up to the World Cup squad over Ben White who had found some good form for Arsenal

You can't say players aren't there when he refuses to play certain players 

Is Tomori elite? From what I’ve seen Serie A is the equivalent of the Championship these days, I’m not changing my long standing defence because Tomori has had a handful of good performances in a farmers league.

[Barry Cartman]

Just now, Weezer said:

Is Tomori elite? From what I’ve seen Serie A is the equivalent of the Championship these days, I’m not changing my long standing defence because Tomori has had a handful of good performances in a farmers league.

Has Magurie ever been elite? He plays well for England, something you actually have to do to find out, giving a young centre back who has gone to Italy and won Serie A 1 cap in the space of a year is shocking in terms of developing your squad 

[Haguey]

Tomori got absolutely mauled vs Chelsea in the Champions League, as he was an outsider to 'the group' I'm not surprised it put Southgate off. Better the devil he knew with Maguire, and he was vindicated because once again, had a decent tournament.

[Haguey]

Tomori now has 18 months to be eased into the side for the Euros which I suspect will happen

[Robokid87]

Yeah much as I love Tomori he was rubbish against us at the Bridge and then sent off (if harshly) early at the San Siro, I think it's fair enough for Southgate not to change his mind based on that alone and I wouldn't be surprised if he gets jumped by at least Marc Guehi too. That being said I'd be much more surprised if it's not Stones and Maguire still come March.

[Weezer]

Let’s throw Tammy Abraham up top as well because he looks half decent in Serie A.

Tomori obviously hasn’t done enough to convince Southgate.