enigmatic
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Posts posted by enigmatic
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41 minutes ago, Coulthard's Jaw said:
Technology in sport
At last a use of technology in sport we can all get behind. Proving Piers wrong
Now do we have the technology to prove Aubameyang should have left earlier and Wenger should have stayed
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Wurzburger Kickers. | 3. Liga
Opening | 2022/23
Germany is always a fun place to do this challenge, especially if you like fast starts, loans and not being broke all the time
Wurzburger Kickers are one of the bigger clubs which can be promoted from the German Regionalliga. The team suffered back to back relegations from 2 Bundesliga before the start of the game but has a decent core squad, and good income from sponsorship (seriously, Germans want big wages but a £3.6m annual wage budget is absolutely huge in a challenge like this). A few other strong sides to attempt this challenge with in Germany, but I really like this squad*: it's mainly young, not that bloated and the one place it needs a serious upgrade is defence (and since I'm picky about defenders, I much prefer bringing in my own). I also have a reserve squad with a couple of amateurs and miserable transfer listed players, and a single (rubbish) youth product
The token veteran Hagele is still a very good player who will start as my captain, Zaiser looks promising in midfield whilst Sane is the best striker I have by some distance and is happy to renew his contract
Wurzburg looks lovely too.
Kevin Keller is Wurzburg's inexperienced new manager. The board have said he can start coaching courses if he sorts out training so it's not overstaffed, which is nice.
The club has never won anything except local leagues, but did spend a fair bit of the last decade in Germany's second tier, so it feels like it could be a big club and has average facilities and a few thousand people turning up to watch each game. And that's before they've watched Kevin Keller's amazing football!
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59 minutes ago, pearcey_90 said:
Basically saying “It was a tight game, and we didn’t want to open things up just in case we conceded”.
Now, pretty much backed himself into a situation where Foden can only play on the wings, or if a 3-5-2, not at all.
Even though Sterling played great first game, Foden/Saka on the wings are the form players this season. Give them one game together
Don’t make it into a generation of Foden or Saka.
Don't think Gareth's ever worried about actually being consistent with his media pronouncements
And yeah, obvious what he actually meant is "the game was tight and we weren't getting the ball anywhere near where Foden is most effective anyway"
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I'm just here for @GunmaN1905 to say "bottled"
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I'm not sure solidarity from the US is all that helpful to Iranian protestors, mind you...
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Just now, Bootador said: I can't, I really can't.
imagine all the people.... in our back line against France
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3 minutes ago, Rob1981 said:
I think there was an element of this tonight. Possibly trying something out with the knockouts in mind, given that we have had limited preparation time and we knew we had three points already in the bag from Monday.
Cede possession a bit but set up to try and stifle the opposition. And he’s done it with four at the back instead of his usual five and limited USA to one shot on target all night.
Clearly need to sharpen up going forward, but imagine if tonight gives him the confidence to play a back four against France or Argentina, and push another body higher up the pitch.
I love your optimism.
Can't wait for you to be the only one in here celebrating when we win the bloody thing and everyone else is too busy being angry about team selection to care
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22 minutes ago, The_jagster said:
Glad I supported one of the teams else I'd have died of boredom.
People moaning about Foden are missing the point about the team a bit, every attacking player will look bad when we play like that, a set defence most of the time and Maguire looked good when able to just head everything away and step in knowing there was cover.
USA also held back in the second half a bit, I think @Astafjevs was right early in the thread saying Southgate was hoping to pick them off when they tired. But we were so slow that they didn't get tired because we weren't moving them about. May as well just have Grealish on from the start because for some unknown reason every opposition player loves fouling him, the free kick that Kane cleared wide was utterly braindead from the defender (as was the late free kick USA decided to pass down the line and won a throw from
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However, there weren't even any edgy moments from the US defence where you think if only the pass had been a bit better we're in there, for me the epitome of the match was Maguire stepping forward with the ball, having nothing on, and playing a stupid through ball for a slow Kane to chase. There is no point playing for the counter if you don't even have any decent countering options.
USA played well but even that Mckennie chance wasn't that good, neither team was prepared to go for it but if you're the US I think that's fair enough. But I don't want to be going to penalties against Ecuador or Senegal which is likely if we play this cautious game.
Found our pass map too.
Gareth obviously played a lot of FM22
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1 minute ago, av3ry said:
Also found out my father would have loved Sam Allardyce as manager. "GET IT FORWARD" "STOP PASSING AROUND THE BACK, LOB IT FORWARD FFS!
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Your dad is my dad
(Also love him being completely convinced that his school team did more pressing than a bunch of elite athletes that spend half their week doing pressing drills)
3 minutes ago, Chase Failey said:People calling for Southgate to be sacked
I mean, normally in group stages we absolutely thrash all our opponents, don't we? And we have such a good tournament record against the USA
(Also, everyone screaming for Foden is like Baptista stanning for Grealish in every conceivable situations in the last tournament
. Yes, Foden is great, no Foden is absolutely not the answer to the question "can you look less nervy at the back, transition a bit better and either hold the ball up or ruin them with pace". I'd have considered him at half time when it looked like what we were missing might just be final third quality, but in the middle of that second half when we couldn't even get the ball to the areas he's effective in?!?)
10 minutes ago, Astafjevs said:If England repeat tonight's performance they'll beat Wales 4-0. Wales are a poor team
Wales are not THAT bad. But yeah, Wales won't be as energetic as the USA, never mind beat us 4-0, which is the only way we don't go through
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1 minute ago, m_fenton said:
Love the melodrama here
Well on course to qualify from the group, a crap 0-0 in the groups (which certainly was crap) is hardly the end of the world.
One of the best things about coming home is how the average England fan is going to be really annoyed by it
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1 minute ago, georginho_juventusygr said:
This is like Italy 2006. Great opening, draw against USA in the following match, and the rest is history.
IT'S COMING HOME.
Did Italy's fans overreact this much
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1 minute ago, enigmatic said:
Going to score a winner and do a knee slide too
Or give away a needless free kick when the game was over if he left it....
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1 minute ago, Heartwork said:
Only thing I will say is Maguire has had a decent game which will help his confidence.
Going to score a winner and do a knee slide too
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1 minute ago, Andrew_ said:
Exactly. Who knows what England could have won without him in charge. He's holding them back if anything.
Everyone knows the answer to that is still "bugger all". We have watched England before.
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2 minutes ago, Pukey said:
He did make a save from Mount in the first half
Sh.... We're not allowed to mention that Mount's been our best attacking player
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3 minutes ago, Astafjevs said:
Grealish makes sense. Need someone to get on the ball and play those little 5 yard passes into space
just needs to win some free kicks so we can get the ball to their end of the pitch tbh
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And I know Hendo is not everyone's favourite substitution, but the mind boggles that people are surprised that Bellingham is coming off; he's been as bad this game as he was good last game. That applies to a few attacking players, but he's the one supposed to be linking them and helping out defensively...
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1 minute ago, Darius1998 said:
Has he watched Henderson this season?
yeah. tbf I'm thinking "yeah, everyone hates the idea of using a water carrier instead of our attacking talent but when you need to steady the ship..."
then I remember that I haven't watched him this season but I have seen Liverpool's results.
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1 minute ago, Smallen said:
Maguire’s been great
I was about to post, unironically, that he's probably been our best player.
That's not exactly a compliment to the rest of the team, but he does have a massive head
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3 minutes ago, Smallen said:
Thought it was odd that the ref was Venezuelan considering the sanctions the relations between the countries.
If he supports their government he hates both sides equally. Seems fair
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1 minute ago, Mr Adam said:
Scenes when Walker comes on for Saka and we go 3-5-2
Even bigger scenes if it works and we start looking like favourites again
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1 minute ago, martynlcfc said:
Trent for Trippier is another change it consider here. The threat is mostly down the right and his extra quality on the ball can make the difference in a game like this. Notwithstanding Trippier has been poor individually as well
I'd wait for the USA to stop attacking us first
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6 minutes ago, Mr Adam said:
I hate the idea that half time changes mean panic.
You can make changes at half time that are considered and reasoned rather than panic
Especially in a group stage game with five subs and a wealth of talent on the bench
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Poor old Mount did get us a token shot on target
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16 minutes ago, Astafjevs said:
Get the impression the scouting report for England was something like 'US will be blowing after 65 mins, wait it out, make sure they're not winning by then, then take the chances that come'.
Because that's kind of how they're playing. If they can go 1-0 up then great, but if not then just make sure US don't have a lead to defend in the last third of the game
Think that flatters us. We're not playing boring possession football or sitting deep and waiting for them to give us the ball back, we're getting caught in possession and with runs in behind. Think our scout report said "these guys couldn't even beat Wales" and Gareth didn't do the warn against complacency team talk. But at this stage, we look like we should be making substitutions to make sure we eke out the 1-0
To be fair to the US, they've actually been pretty good rather than relying on us to be horribly bad.
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Don’t make it into a generation of Foden or Saka.
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Iran v USA - Al Thumama Stadium, Cymru v England - Ahmad bin Ali Stadium, 7PM UK time.
in 2022 World Cup Forum
Posted
Think Rashford read this thread at half time