England in major championships

[Tarkovsky_Mikluzhkin]

Some good stats and theories relating to England in major tournaments here, not sure why it stops at 1990 though. Its not as if England were great before then. So lets have at look at the all time record.

Of the 35 Major Tournaments, England have entered 32, Of those England have got to the Semi-Final or further on just 4 occasions. On the face of it that is 12.5% of the time but if we isolate those tournaments England's issues become even clearer.

1966: Winners - England played all their games at Wembley Stadium. I'm sure I don't need to explain home advantage to anyone but I expect it was even stronger when playing against players who had probably never been outside of their own country for longer than a fortnight nevermind a different continent for a month and a half. Modern football's globalization has made this less of an issue for many countries I would expect

1996: SF - Again England play all their games at Wembley, The most recent Tournament to be played here and the most recent final four appearance. We always think other host countries will go further than usual, The next two World Cups saw France Win and S.Korea as Semi-Finalists.

1968 - SF - Of the 8 matches before England's Semi-Final loss to Yugoslavia there was only 1 that required the players brought their passports (A 1-0 victory at the Bernabeu no less). Another final four built on home comforts perhaps.

1990 - SF - By far the best performance at an away World Cup. Finishing W1 D5 - going on to win two of those draws in extra-time and lose the other on pens (The win came against Egypt by the way).

Almost Every Other Competition - Qualified easily - Knocked out before Semis - 50% of Qualifying is at Wembley/Old Trafford and the Tournaments aren't necessarily always in the UK.

 This isn't meant to belittle or undermine the performances of those final four squads, But I think there's often a collective (The Fans, The Media, Pundits in General, The FA, Former Players, The Manager, The Coaches and even the Players themselves) idea that these players were god like genius superstars genuinely amongst the best in the world which isn't always helpful or indeed true. If we think we could have won a World cup with Steve McMahon and Neil Webb. Why is it laughable to think James Milner, Emile Heskey, Matt Upson and Jake Livermore couldn't form part of a successful squad?
The successful England teams took advantage of the cards dealt to them and did what was necessary to find a way to win (particularly in Italia 90) and that is what The Media, Pundits in General, The FA, Former Players, The Managers, The Coaches, The Players themselves and of course us should have at the forefront of our minds when trying to think of an interesting way to evaluate a couple of 0-0 draws.

[RoversAlias]

Some of the young players on show in the last two games have been quite impressive.
Pickford, Gomez, Rashford,Loftus Cheek and McGuire have shown they are ready for regular games while for me, Stones has been a stand out player, his performance against Brazil was nothing short of brilliant.

Spot on Hound, Stones is developing into a top, top defender. I think playing under Pep is helping him no end.

[Monkcaster_Rover]

John Stones is ace. Always been a fan even when he was making the odd mistake. Few years he'll be up there with the best.

Not bad for a lad from Barnsley.

[BillyStubbsTears]

There is a case to be made that in all four of those examples, we did have a core of players who were genuinely at the top table of global standards at that time.

66/68 Banks, Moore, Peters, Ball, Charlton, Hurst

90 Walker, Pearce, Gascoigne, Waddle, Lineker

96 Neville, (momentarily revived) Gascoigne, McManaman, Shearer, Sheringham.

Not all geniuses, but many of them really good, souls producers when it mattered.

We've never had that since. We've had the odd one who occasionally stepped up. Owen in 98. Rooney in 04. Ashley Cole was steady.  But we've never had performances from a core of players at any one time. Beckham, Gerrard, Lampard, Terry, Ferdinand were all found wanting when it mattered. So when we came up against contenders, we've been embarrassed. Brazil in 02. Germany in 10. Italy in 12 (which must rank as the most one-sided 0-0 in football history).

And as we've spiralled down over the past half-decade, we've struggled even to do a job in smaller nations. I think the current squad will probably not be embarrassed against an Iceland or a Costa Rica.  But we will if we play Spain or France or Germany or Brazil.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Aye. Stones is a grand player. But is he really amongst the 9 most valuable players of all time? Which is how he was valued when Man City bought him.

[Tarkovsky_Mikluzhkin]

I'd also be wary of any analysis that comes from the perspective of looking for something thats is different now to how it was a few decades ago. England's Tournament record through the ages has been surprisingly consistent. Example:

> L16-QF-L16-QF <
> L32-L16-QF-QF <

One of these is England's first 4 World Cups the other is the last 4. Now I'm sure most of you know which is which but it probably took you a few seconds to be certain as it's not exactly a seismic difference.

Therefore any theory that involves Wages, Overseas players, Fans attitudes or Young un's on their playstations being different to the "golden age" is clearly wrong and likely just someone sounding off about one of their own grievances.

If you kept getting the same results in... well anything really, you would NOT look at what you're doing differently. You would do the exact opposite and try to do something different with one of the constants. So maybe we should analyse some of the similarities from 1950-2016 (losing in the Last 16 to a minnow happened at either end of that stretch. So that could be a start)

[DonnyBazR0ver]

We have some exciting young players emerging who seem to cope with the transition to the senior squad. For the life of me though, I can't understand what Dier brings to the party.

As a team, in midfield particularly, our movement is piss poor compared to many other nations and Dier reflects the worst example of this. We need to find an alternative and Wilshire should be given another chance. Not sure he's the answer but he has more strings to his bow than Dier.

Stark comparison last night between Naymar and Vardy. Naymar got involved whilst Vardy was up front on his own and touched the ball about three times in the first half. At international level you have to have players who can be flexible and join in general play. Kane drops deeper now and again.

With the crop on youngsters coming through, leave Dier and Vardy at home.

[Tarkovsky_Mikluzhkin]

It is a compelling list of players you've come up with there Billy. However, It's very difficult to workout in hindsight whether they are highly regarded because of their relative success in those Tournaments or whether they would be thought of similarly without that international success.

But the players own testimony might help. Alan Ball said in many interviews he was surprised to be picked for the final ahead of Terry Connelly (I literally have no idea who this is either). Hurst didn't start the tournament in '66 as he was kept out by the prolific Jimmy Greaves. Both of those did pretty well in the Final.

Shearer hadn't scored for England for something like 2 years before Euro 96. Lineker also had his struggles and has said he was never thought of as one of the top strikers in the world until Mexico '86 (Maradona said something very similar too).

Owen, Beckham, Gerrard, Lampard all finished in the top 3 in Ballon D'or votes without ever getting to a final four. Kevin Keegan won it twice and so did Stanley Matthews neither of them got to the business end of a Tournament. Kane and Alli are certainly on course to break the top 3 too I would think.
Moore,B.Charlton, Lineker and Gazza (4th) of those squads got that recognition so I think it might be another consistency.

[Tarkovsky_Mikluzhkin]

It was Terry Paine not Connelly just looked it up. Interestingly Peters, Ball and Hurst had 17 Caps between them at the start of '66, doubled their collective experience by the end of the competition.

[The Red Baron]

In nine tournaments at World and European level we have only beat three teams of vaguely top calibre?

Argentina, Germany and Netherlands.

First two were hardly top draw generations for their countries and the latter albeit an absolute hiding, was on home turf.

And if I remember correctly, only the Dutch was a knock out game? Indeed I cannot remember last time we bested a top team in knockout rounds of a tournament. 86 was Paraguay. 82 was? This is piss poor.

In 82 we never lost a game, the 82 world cup had two stages of group games, the knockout stage did n't start until the semi finals

82 was an interesting one. We struggled to qualify (remember the embarrassing defeat in Norway) and then named Keegan and Brooking in the squad although neither were fit to start the tournament.

We played brilliantly in the first game against France and got through the group comfortably. The format was then another group of three. Keegan and Brooking came back in yet were off the pace and we drew against both Spain and West Germany, so we were out. After that game against France I genuinely thought we could win the World Cup. Ah, well...

[BillyStubbsTears]

TRB

I actually think 82 is the best performance England has had in any major tournament since 1966. Keegan & Brooking's injuries were the key. They actually only came on for the last 20 minutes of the Spain match and very nearly turned it.

We did have that core of world-class players that year (or would have done without the injuries) Shilton & Clemence at their peak, Keegan, Brooking, Francis, Hoddle, Wilkins, Robson. Supported by some very able players in Woodcock, Neal, Mills, Sansom, Butcher, Thompson, Rix, Mariner, McDermott, Coppell, Anderson. 

There weren't many weak links in that group. There was a really big, strong core of players, a lot of whom had been dominating European football over the previous few years. I reckon that squad was a match for any one in the tournament and with the smallest bit of luck with injuries, could and maybe should have won the thing.

[drfchound]

Aye. Stones is a grand player. But is he really amongst the 9 most valuable players of all time? Which is how he was valued when Man City bought him.

Man City very obviously saw the potential for Stones to become one of the top defenders in the World and May well yet get a fantastic return on their investment.
He is still a young man and his reputation and standing in the game is growing fast.

There was a situation against Brazil, late in the game, when Stones had a ball played to him on the edge of our own 18 yard line.
He was quickly closed down by two Brazil players ( I think one was the much feted Neymar) but he turned towards his own goal and played a brilliant reverse pass to an England player out wide on the left wing.
A truly special piece of play.

[andysly]

Not be long till World Cup Fever strikes again. And I've just seen an article by Phil Neville saying that England has a terrifically talented bunch of players and could go a long way.

Which would be nice because we all know how far off the pace we've been over recent times.

Or at least I thought I knew. Until I actually went and had a look at the record.

Since England beat Cameroon in Naples in 1990 and we all thought we might actually win the bleeding thing, there have been 14 Euro and World Cup competitions. England have won a grand total of 16 games in the finals of those competitions (not including penalty shootouts)

World Cup
94 DNQ
98  Tunisia, Colombia
02 Argentina, Denmark
06 Paraguay, Trinidad & Tobago, Ecuador
10 Slovenia
14 None

Euro
92 None
96 Scotland, Netherlands
00 Germany
04 Switzerland, Croatia
08 DNQ
12 Sweden, Ukraine
16 Wales

Just as a comparison, in that time, Germany have won 26 WC final stages matches and 17 EC ones.

Not including penalty shoot-outs how many games have England actually lost then ?

[BillyStubbsTears]

In that period?
Five at the Euros
92 Sweden
00 Portugal, Romania
04 France
16 Iceland
Plus 08 when we didn't qualify and so didn't get the chance to lose any.

World Cup. 5.
98 Romania
02 Brazil
10 Germany
14 Italy, Uruguay
Plus 94 when we didn't qualify sodidnt have the opportunity to lose any.

The complete record is:

Euros
P 23 W8 D10 L5

WC
P21 W8 D8 L5

It's not stellar, really, is it, for a country that considers itself to be one of the big global forces? The sort of form that would equate to about 9-10th place in a league over a season.

[RoversAlias]

All irrelevant without comparable stats from other nations which I'd be interested to see. Knock out tournaments aren't quite the same as the league really because you lose, you're out. Or in group stages, you don't win enough and you don't get the chance to play more matches.

[BillyStubbsTears]

RA

Well, the figures for Germany since 1990 are:

Euros
P34 W17 D8 L9
World Cup
P39 W28 D5 L6

France
Euros
P32 W15 D9 L8
WC
P28 W16 D7 L5

Italy
Euros
P27 W12 D10 L5
WC
P26 W14 D6 L6


Netherlands
Euros
P25 W11 D7 L7
WC
P30 W19 D6 L5

Spain
Euros
P27 W15 D7 L5
WC
P27 W16 D5 L6

Portugal
Euros
P31 W17 D7 L7
WC
P17 W7 D4 L6

Croatia. Didn't enter a competition until 1996. Their record is still comparable to ours.

Euros
P18 W8 D5 L5
WC
P16 W7 D2 L7

Sort of puts it in perspective. We're not remotely in the class of the best countries. We're some way behind Portugal. We're about on a par with Croatia.

[idler]

Some good stats and theories relating to England in major tournaments here, not sure why it stops at 1990 though. Its not as if England were great before then. So lets have at look at the all time record.

Of the 35 Major Tournaments, England have entered 32, Of those England have got to the Semi-Final or further on just 4 occasions. On the face of it that is 12.5% of the time but if we isolate those tournaments England's issues become even clearer.

1966: Winners - England played all their games at Wembley Stadium. I'm sure I don't need to explain home advantage to anyone but I expect it was even stronger when playing against players who had probably never been outside of their own country for longer than a fortnight nevermind a different continent for a month and a half. Modern football's globalization has made this less of an issue for many countries I would expect

1996: SF - Again England play all their games at Wembley, The most recent Tournament to be played here and the most recent final four appearance. We always think other host countries will go further than usual, The next two World Cups saw France Win and S.Korea as Semi-Finalists.

1968 - SF - Of the 8 matches before England's Semi-Final loss to Yugoslavia there was only 1 that required the players brought their passports (A 1-0 victory at the Bernabeu no less). Another final four built on home comforts perhaps.

1990 - SF - By far the best performance at an away World Cup. Finishing W1 D5 - going on to win two of those draws in extra-time and lose the other on pens (The win came against Egypt by the way).

Almost Every Other Competition - Qualified easily - Knocked out before Semis - 50% of Qualifying is at Wembley/Old Trafford and the Tournaments aren't necessarily always in the UK.

 This isn't meant to belittle or undermine the performances of those final four squads, But I think there's often a collective (The Fans, The Media, Pundits in General, The FA, Former Players, The Manager, The Coaches and even the Players themselves) idea that these players were god like genius superstars genuinely amongst the best in the world which isn't always helpful or indeed true. If we think we could have won a World cup with Steve McMahon and Neil Webb. Why is it laughable to think James Milner, Emile Heskey, Matt Upson and Jake Livermore couldn't form part of a successful squad?
The successful England teams took advantage of the cards dealt to them and did what was necessary to find a way to win (particularly in Italia 90) and that is what The Media, Pundits in General, The FA, Former Players, The Managers, The Coaches, The Players themselves and of course us should have at the forefront of our minds when trying to think of an interesting way to evaluate a couple of 0-0 draws.

I'm sure that we beat France 2-0 at The White City stadium Tarkovski.😉

[drfchound]

All irrelevant without comparable stats from other nations which I'd be interested to see. Knock out tournaments aren't quite the same as the league really because you lose, you're out. Or in group stages, you don't win enough and you don't get the chance to play more matches.

TBF , Portugal didnt win a group game but still won the last Euro Championship.

[silent majority]

Doesn't Le Tournoi count?   

[drfchound]

Doesn't Le Tournoi count?   

How could we forget that one SM ?

I suppose in World football terms it is probably the equivalent of the Checkatrade trophy for the Rovers.

[RoversAlias]

Excellent BST, thanks for putting them on there. Much better to compare to.

Let's see how the draw shakes out before judging fully our expectations for next summer.

[BillyStubbsTears]

RA
You reckon we might get an easier group that Russia, Slovakia and Wales, with a team from a country with a population a tad higher than DMBC in Round 2?

[RoversAlias]

Not sure I understand your question BST, sorry.

If we draw Brazil, Denmark and Nigeria it will be tougher to get through you would imagine than being drawn against, say Poland, Senegal and Saudi Arabia.

[BillyStubbsTears]

RA
Aplologies. I thought it was obvious (although it might have been clearer if I'd not confused Slovakia and Slovenia).

 Last year we were in what was probably the weakest group that I've ever seen at a major tournament. We limped out of that and straight into the most embarrassing performance in the nation's history.

Past performance doesn't guarantee future performance and all that. But this is predominantly the same set of players that looked utterly clueless last year. I'm struggling to see why we should expect anything else next year. In which case, the group draw is not really significant.

I truly hope I'm wrong. I'd love to see England put on performances to make us proud. I've just stopped expecting it or even giving much time to hoping for it after seeing it so rarely in the past quarter century.

[RoversAlias]

The wording wasn't clear to me is all. Our group last time out was pretty ordinary, yes, but I think our 2010 World Cup group was easier. We have a new manager now, we have a new set-up and a lot of new / more mature players. I'm not saying I expect us to rip everyone apart but I think we can do better than the last two tournaments we've been to. And I don't think anyone should expect miracles out of a young squad in a developing phase.

[BillyStubbsTears]

RA
Yep. Fair point. I was forgetting how weak some of the World Cup groups can be when the non-European/South American teams don't come up to snuff.

Let's say that last summer we limped out of a group that was as weak as you could realistically expect to be drawn in at the  Euros. Doesn't change the basic thrust of the argument.