PaulHartman71

We don’t, but I think he’s a very good manager tactically. I think for the next Euros and World Cup he’s the only available and realistically candidate out there who would be worth a gamble on. No guarantee he takes it of course, he may not want to manage another country, but if he is interested I think he’s the only option worth exploring. Dyche would be my choice out of the English candidates (assuming Howe and Potter wouldn’t leave their clubs ATM) but I really feel like Tuchel could get more out of players like Bellingham, Rice, Saka, Foden etc than Dyche could.

For me it boils down to whether you can get someone better than Southgate in. If it’s Dyche, Gerrard, Lampard or Rooney then I wouldn’t bother. If you can get Tuchel then by all means go for it.

He had been kicked a lot and looked a bit leggy but he still looked the most dangerous player for me. Sterling has always delivered for England and Southgate so it’s not a terrible sub IMO, but Sterling struggled to get in the game and didn’t seem to be as physically capable as Saka had been down that right side. But again of course we can moan at Southgate but if Kane scores the pen or Rashford’s free kick goes in we’re into extra time with them and it’s long forgotten. Small margins at the end of the day.

Thought we played well on the night. It’s top level football, **** happens. I don’t think it’s a game we can look back on and think we played badly or did anything tactically horrendous. I thought in the second half we were much the better side. Kane scores the penalty or Rashford scores the free kick and who knows what happens, it’s narrow margins at this level in a tournament like this. Think we can be proud of the team and their performance. Probably should’ve beaten them on the night, ref wasn’t great, personally wouldn’t have taken Saka off, but overall think we did very well over the 90 minutes or so and it’s the narrow margins that cost us.

I don't really see how it works in practice though. With the greatest respect to Brazilian domestic football, I think more or less as soon as anyone below a certain age (say 24-25) starts performing well or attracts attention they're going to gain interest from Europe and elsewhere, which in most cases will see the club and player want the move sooner or later due to the finances involved. The South American qualifying and Copa America for example will take place 2-3 years before the next World Cup. If they did use more players from the Brazilian league or all players from there surely the increased exposure will just fast-track moves abroad for a lot of those players. Likewise if say hypothetically Brazil did have an all Brazilian league side at the next World Cup, are all of those players going to be 100 percent committed to the team etc like a Croatia, Morocco type side, or will a lot of those players be keen to impress to put themselves in the shop window for a move to Europe with a good showing? Will they handle the pressure of playing on the big stage like that? I don't really think you can compare pre 2000s Brazil squads with now as the landscape of football has changed so much in the last 3 decades. Modern scouting involves global networks. In the early 2000s for example a player like Gabriel Martinelli is probably still playing in Brazil or has possibly only just been bought/signed by a club in Europe, but the way modern scouting works means he was hot property by the time he signed 18 with clubs in England and Italy after him already. I get your point that since the 2006 World Cup you've not had as much success, but for me the biggest problem you have is not less domestic based players but a lack of experience and talented Brazilian managers to choose from. None of the managers you've had in that time frame had much experience at the top level. I'm not saying you need to have that, but it certainly helps. Ideally if you've not got an experienced manager you need to play more pragmatically at tournaments. The squad of players you have is one of the best in the World Cup, your depth of talent is far greater than Belgium or Germany like you mention and I would say Spain as well, but were the tactics and selections Tite went with the most pragmatic or best tactically to beat everyone you had to play? In my opinion not really, it only really worked against Serbia and a South Korean side who couldn't have set up tactically to play in an easier way for your side to deal with if Tite had been managing them as well. The reason you haven't won this tournament is because you can't win a big international tournament or domestic league or European trophy with a midfield two of Casemiro and Paqueta, with two attacking wingers, Neymar and an attacking striker. PSG have learnt the hard way in the Champions League that you can't carry 2-3 forwards who don't want to do the work defensively/pressing in top level football anymore. Real Madrid for example won the Champions League with a midfield 3 of Casemiro, Kroos and Modric. I'm not saying you have to play a 3 man midfield, but setting up like he did was going to get you found out against a better side sooner rather than later.

The overall point you’re making is fixed entirely by having a better tactician and disciplined manager in charge. I agree with the general point you’re making about the players not being disciplined enough on the pitch and most of the forwards being more interested in personal glory and goals/assists etc, but look at the above image. It’s 115 minutes into a World Cup knockout game, you’re 1-0 up and you have 6 forward players in the final 3rd whilst your opposition is desperate for an equaliser. That boils down to the manager more than the players. Tite doesn’t seem to be a very conservative manager at all from what I’ve seen at this World Cup. In the Serbia game when you went 2-0 he put Fred on for Paqueta then made like for like subs on all the forwards who were all desperate to get a goal etc instead of managing the win. They never seemed great at keeping the ball the entire tournament. Better sides in your group would’ve punished you earlier on. They narrowly beat Switzerland but the rotated side lost to Cameroon and I think the South Korea game being so easy gave them a false sense of security. I’m assuming Brazil wouldn’t consider a foreign manager and even if they hired one it would be tricky for them due to the pressure and them not being Brazilian, but if you went into this tournament with a coach with experience at managing in the top level in Europe who was more pragmatic and disciplined with the squad I think a lot of the problems you mention wouldn’t have been there. I think even someone who is past their best like Jose Mourinho gets you to at least the Semi Final with this squad. He would set you up more compact and not allow any of the big name players to not work for the team. Given he speaks the language and can handle big egos and manage games etc I actually think he’d be the best choice for your next manager and I think he would probably take it.

I don’t think it’s insane for people to speculate that something dodgy happened when his own brother is saying he believes that’s what happened. Would be one thing if he’d died and people were speculating that, but his brother has said he received death threats and believe that’s what happened. Clearly wasn’t feeling well and not much merit in speculating but I think questions will have to be asked by American authorities.

If the Dutch made Argentina that head’s gone I can only imagine what Croatia are going to do them.

I wanted the Dutch to win as Argentina were annoying but to be fair a Netherlands/Croatia semi would be pretty underwhelming. Argentina/Croatia better. Kinda **** we didn’t get Argentina/Brazil

Who got booked in the shoot out Lucky it weren’t someone already on a yellow surely

That’s the ballsiest and most genius set piece routine since that Trent corner against Barcelona. But to do that in the last second of a World Cup quarter final as your facing elimination Argentina were head’s gone glad the Dutch got back in it.

Portugal/Morocco and Argentina/Croatia are all tough games at this level. Silly to assume us of France walk the rest of the tournament or bottle it if we lose. Everyone wrote Croatia off last time we played them at a World Cup and when they played Brazil today. Argentina have Messi. Portugal have possibly the best depth of anyone at the tournament and just smashed Switzerland 6-1. Morocco have looked good and like Croatia are hard to beat as shown in the Spain game. Edit: See look at this tournament ffs. Netherlands still in it now

They didn’t do them over, but Brazil weren’t clinical enough, Croatia defended well, won the midfield battle and generally frustrated Brazil like Cameroon, the Serbians in the first half and the Swiss for most the game. I think the South Korean win gave them a false sense of confidence and they just assumed they were in the Semi Final already. Even when they scored the goal instead of keeping the ball and protecting the lead with like 10 minutes left all 4 forwards were still up for every attack and not really tracking back that much. Brazil had the game won but they just didn’t seem to have anyone on the pitch or the dugout to remind the younger players and Neymar to manage the game out.

I thought Brazil were very naive once they went ahead. They seemed to think they had it one and it kind of felt like Neymar and the other attacking players were more keen to add to their World Cup goals totals than actually see out the game. They did the same against Serbia in the first match. Once they’d scored the 2nd they should’ve been a bit more conservative, not saying you go full Unai Emery but Tite was making like for like substitutions with all the attacking players until the final whistle other than Fred for Paqueta. The players that came on were all desperate for a goal but were bombing forward and taking risks to try and get past people and score etc when they should’ve been more patient and kept the ball to kill the game off. They’ve not been great at keeping the ball the whole tournament, I think even against South Korea it was very similar in terms of possession. Not sure if smashing them gave them too much confidence but they were frustrated by Serbia for an hour, Switzerland for 80 minutes and the rotated side lost to Cameroon. It was only against South Korea their very attacking formation actually paid off in terms of controlling and dominating the game IMO. I feel like going into the Croatia game against a Kovacic and Modric midfield with the team they did was naive. Sort of game that was crying out for Bruno Guimareas alongside Casemiro IMO.

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Yeah, Ben White is irrelevant to Soutgate’s England set up really. He’s only got 4 caps and has been in this and the Euros squad as a versatile back up. Makes no sense they’d go out of their way to protect him like this if he just fell out with Steve Round. Could maybe see someone like Sterling who’s done a lot for Southgate getting protected if something like that had happened but would still be weird and unlikely.

I don’t see a scenario where both club and country put out a statement like they did for a bust up with a coach. Why wouldn’t he be in Dubai with Arsenal? The Daily Star story makes no sense.

Even if he did have a bust up with this coach it’s clearly not the reason why he went home. Why on earth would England and Arsenal put out those statements if they sent a player home for that reason Saka in an interview and many other Arsenal players have put out tweets and messages in his support suggesting there’s clearly something else that’s happened. The only source for this is The Daily Star ffs.

What a finish

Thing is all of Brazil’s subs will be young and hungry players desperate to get assists and goals. This could be double figures if Korea don’t just pile 10 men behind the ball to keep it respectable.

I don’t remember that France game in 2012 at all Nowhere near as memorable as the 2004 one which had that insane ending

I think it will be a very difficult game. I think France probably beat us 6 times out of 10 but we are good enough to beat them if we defend well and are clinical with the chances we do get.

Yikes, pushing the Infantino FIFA line when England took the knee before the game and have been very outspoken on LGBTQ rights throughout the build up and tournament itself. It also comes off a bit disrespectful to Japan, a country he’s well respected in and spent a lot of time in. Japan didn’t knock Germany out because the German side were distracted and not focused, it was because they were simply much better on the pitch than them over the 3 games they played.

Pleased for Woj to get a big moment for his country saving a penalty like that especially against Messi who’s usually always had the better of him at club level (certainly against us).