Gareth Southgate

[ravenrover]

Is that the best you can come up with a personal insult, you need to get out more

[drfchound]

No. The world class foreign players make it easier for  our worldies to look what they are. Cruyff and Eusebio would look pedestrian with some of those guys around them.

BobG

Poor players will still look like poor players in a good team.
To suggest that Bellingham and Kane aren’t world class players is daft.

[Little Wolf]

Southgate would put eusobio at right back and cruyff at left back

[dickos1]

If we win it, so many people on here will be shouting it was only because of our easy route.
Just enjoy the tournament and analyse it afterwards.

[GazLaz]

Said it the other day, international football is a poor standard generally. People expect Premier League standard performances and you just don’t get them. Cobbled together teams that don’t really gel.

[dickos1]

The austrias and georgias have nothing to lose, their knock out football starts straight away which is why they play no risk football.
The bigger teams often start off cagey and grow into the tournament, the last euros for instance we drew 0-0 with Scotland and won 2 games 1-0. Then once we qualified we beat Germany 2-0 and then Ukraine in the quarters 4-0.

[Draytonian III]

Watkins in for Kane, Kane was never the quickest and that year in Germany has made him slower, mainly because it’s a slower league than the English league

[DearneValleyRover]

Said it the other day, international football is a poor standard generally. People expect Premier League standard performances and you just don’t get them. Cobbled together teams that don’t really gel.

Utter rubbish, the England team in general has played together sufficient enough times to not have been cobbled together. Top players are able to adapt and only need a well drilled system to play to which is what training is about. England’s problem is they don’t have a plan and certainly aren’t training to it.

[Little Wolf]

Negatives , we do not score goals
Positives , we do not concede goals and once again have the perfect draw
Get ready for penalty shoot outs

[grayx]

If we win it, so many people on here will be shouting it was only because of our easy route.
Just enjoy the tournament and analyse it afterwards.

If we win it, which i doubt very much, it will be inspite of having southgate as manager and not because of him. The downside would be the FA may wanna keep him on.

[grayx]

Watkins in for Kane, Kane was never the quickest and that year in Germany has made him slower, mainly because it’s a slower league than the English league

I’d go with that but no way will sir gareth.

[steve@dcfd]

Said it the other day, international football is a poor standard generally. People expect Premier League standard performances and you just don’t get them. Cobbled together teams that don’t really gel.

Premier league is that good that no teams got to an European semi final this season. Players overrated and supporters tribal wanting their players in an England team. We have been poor but the expectations have been over the top

[steve@dcfd]

Watkins in for Kane, Kane was never the quickest and that year in Germany has made him slower, mainly because it’s a slower league than the English league

Watkins is an average premier league striker but is way off being a good international striker.

[BradwellRover]

The football England are playing isn’t great (and much of it has been frankly crap) but some of the abuse Southgate has had is completely out of order. I’m in Germany at the moment and it’s interesting that a number of nations with decent teams, who qualified without playing great football (Italy, Netherlands, France etc) just don’t care. For them it’s about the qualification, not the results, and they also know what it needs to win tournaments like this - endurance not sprinting.

We really do want the moon on a stick.

[Campsall rover]

Watkins in for Kane, Kane was never the quickest and that year in Germany has made him slower, mainly because it’s a slower league than the English league

Got to disagree with that Draytonian.
The German League is not slow build up football like it is in Italy and Spain.
It is quick very much like our league football. Maybe the quality of all the teams in their league are not as high a standard as our Premier League but in no way has that league made Kane slower.

The fact is he has never been a player who runs in behind and has never been really quick.
He is obviously not 100% up to speed yet after his injury late in the season.
Get him fit and he is a must starter in the team imo. He is a world class finisher but he is getting zero service at present. No striker in the world scores goals in the penalty box without service.

[Draytonian III]

It’s all about opinions, I totally agree he’s a world class finisher, but he’s never had the speed which defenders hate. I just think Watkins could stretch their defence and close them down quicker than Kane

[dickos1]

If we win it, so many people on here will be shouting it was only because of our easy route.
Just enjoy the tournament and analyse it afterwards.

If we win it, which i doubt very much, it will be inspite of having southgate as manager and not because of him. The downside would be the FA may wanna keep him on.

Yep this is the kind of thing that will be peddled out everywhere.
When we do well it’s in-spite of Southgate when we do shit it’s all down to Southgate.
We English have a very strange mindset when it comes to national team managers

[Goole Rover]

Spot on dickos.
The problem is that a large number who contribute on here have never managed people. In my experience its very difficult to get the best out of everyone at the same time.

[Campsall rover]

Spot on dickos.
The problem is that a large number who contribute on here have never managed people. In my experience its very difficult to get the best out of everyone at the same time.

No one said it isn’t difficult.
The fact is the best Managers do get the best out of the players and win euro’s and World Cups.

The fact that some people may not have managed others in their jobs is completely irrelevant.
Southgate has been given the riches of some extremely talented players who would be the envy of the vast majority of other countries and he seems to be incapable of getting them to play to their abilities.
He doesn’t even know what his best team is. That to me at this stage is farcical.

[drfchound]

The football England are playing isn’t great (and much of it has been frankly crap) but some of the abuse Southgate has had is completely out of order. I’m in Germany at the moment and it’s interesting that a number of nations with decent teams, who qualified without playing great football (Italy, Netherlands, France etc) just don’t care. For them it’s about the qualification, not the results, and they also know what it needs to win tournaments like this - endurance not sprinting.

We really do want the moon on a stick.

Well said Bradwell.

[dickos1]

Spot on dickos.
The problem is that a large number who contribute on here have never managed people. In my experience its very difficult to get the best out of everyone at the same time.

No one said it isn’t difficult.
The fact is the best Managers do get the best out of the players and win euro’s and World Cups.

The fact that some people may not have managed others in their jobs is completely irrelevant.
Southgate has been given the riches of some extremely talented players who would be the envy of the vast majority of other countries and he seems to be incapable of getting them to play to their abilities.
He doesn’t even know what his best team is. That to me at this stage is farcical.

Well of course he thought he knew his best team because that’s the one he played for the first two games. Now he’s looking for improvement by changing things.
That’s nothing different to any football club and any manager in the world

[drfcsteve]

Why didn’t he pick what he thought was his best team before the tournament to check it was his best team, instead of “experimenting” when we’re actually in the tournament. Seems amateur to me to be faffing around with the team because you don’t know who to play where, when we seem to have an international friendly about once a month.

[BobG]

No. The world class foreign players make it easier for  our worldies to look what they are. Cruyff and Eusebio would look pedestrian with some of those guys around them.

BobG

Poor players will still look like poor players in a good team.
To suggest that Bellingham and Kane aren’t world class players is daft.

Fair enough Hound.  Can't argue with that. I still suspect though that with better players around him, a nediocre player should perform better. Dunno...

Bob

[drfchound]

No. The world class foreign players make it easier for  our worldies to look what they are. Cruyff and Eusebio would look pedestrian with some of those guys around them.

BobG

Poor players will still look like poor players in a good team.
To suggest that Bellingham and Kane aren’t world class players is daft.

Fair enough Hound.  Can't argue with that. I still suspect though that with better players around him, a nediocre player should perform better. Dunno...

Agreed, better players can improve mediocre players but in the case of Kane and Bellingham, they are far better than mediocrity.
Anyway, how are you?
Did you manage to get those  fish and chips?

[ncRover]

It’s all about opinions, I totally agree he’s a world class finisher, but he’s never had the speed which defenders hate. I just think Watkins could stretch their defence and close them down quicker than Kane

Play quick players with Kane and he finds them better than most midfielders. He’s not just all about the goals. And there’s other ways to make defenders hate you than being quick of course!

[dickos1]

Why didn’t he pick what he thought was his best team before the tournament to check it was his best team, instead of “experimenting” when we’re actually in the tournament. Seems amateur to me to be faffing around with the team because you don’t know who to play where, when we seem to have an international friendly about once a month.

This kind of comment just emphasises that whatever he does he will get criticised. I’ve been listening all week to people on the radio saying he should’ve experimented more before the tournament started and then here he’s being criticised for experimenting too much before the tournament started.

[BradwellRover]

The biggest issue, in my humble opinion is the lack of an organiser and orchestrator. We have almost all of the component parts of a great team, but we just don’t seem to produce the kind of player who can pull it all together (a Kroos, Modric, Rodri etc). Someone to take the ball under pressure from the defence or Rice and dictate whether we need to speed up or slowdown.

Perhaps it’s because we coach them all to play at maximum speed in the EPL (Gallagher is the best example of this)?

I’d be tempted to give Wharton or Mainoo a proper go.

On man-management, and some of the earlier comments, it is bloody hard and I think Southgate is good at this. I’m not convinced by his tactical nous or coaching though. He should have built a coaching team around him to cover this, but seemingly hasn’t. I really do wonder what Steve Holland does (apart from pissing off Ben White).

[Goole Rover]

Why didn’t he pick what he thought was his best team before the tournament to check it was his best team, instead of “experimenting” when we’re actually in the tournament. Seems amateur to me to be faffing around with the team because you don’t know who to play where, when we seem to have an international friendly about once a month.

This kind of comment just emphasises that whatever he does he will get criticised. I’ve been listening all week to people on the radio saying he should’ve experimented more before the tournament started and then here he’s being criticised for experimenting too much before the tournament started.

Again dickos I’m with you. We have a lot of should haves on this forum.

[drfcsteve]

Oh come on guys, even pundits like Lineker who usually stays neutral are coming out and saying we’re playing shit. Whose fault do you think it is if not the manager?

[Campsall rover]

There are a few people living on another planet if they can’t see that GS’s tactics are flawed.

Yes we qualified but not because we played well enough to get them but because we got very lucky.

The fact is we could very easily have only drawn the first game against Serbia after we went to sleep in the second half. We should have gone on and won at least 3-0 but no we hang on for dear life at 1-0

2nd game we were shocking from start to finish and with better finishing from Denmark we would have lost that match.

3rd game we only drew because we had no idea how to break down a team he’ll bent on not losing.
Brings subs on 35/40 mins too late and starts again with a non existent left side.
We could very easily have ended up with only 2 points.
Yes i know we got 5 but seriously we got lucky.

Sorry if anyone can can pretend Southgate knows what he is doing then I really admire your loyalty to him but seriously don’t understand how you can think he is tactically astute.

I have been loyal to him right up to this tournament and kept backing him. We got to a World Cup semi and a Euro Final so fairs fair. Credit where it’s due.
But this tournament our football has been dire against 3 very mediocre teams. 3 of the worst 5 in the whole competition probably.

Slovakia are going to shut up shop so what is GS going to do.
Will he play Palmer and Gordon.
Gordon is a must for me even if Shaw plays so to give us genuine width on the left so we can stretch them both left and right side of the pitch.
We have an unbelievable opportunity to get to the final with the draw we have.
We must grasp it with both hands. GS has to be bold.
Sit on a lead again and we go out in the Qtr finals if not tomorrow.
Has Gareth learnt anything or are we going to get the same shocking boring negative England again?