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This was the sort of game where it showed how there isn't the quality for 24 teams IMO.

Had it been a 16 team tournament Scotland would've faced a playoff against one of Croatia, Netherlands, Italy, Switzerland, Serbia, Slovenia, Austria, Czech or Slovakia just to qualify. You'd have to think that makes it less than 50/50 they'd be there.

 

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1 hour ago, Maximus Decimus said:

Say what you like about Southgate, but he's changed the culture amongst the players and the country. The last QF defeat was a much more positive overall experience than the QF defeats in 2002, 2006 and 2016. Those 6-1 and 6-2 wins used to be godawful 0-0s like Algeria, or 2-0 late wins against Trinidad and Tobago.

My opinion is that it didn't have to change. We could've easily got another manager and carried on like we did in 2016. 

6-1 and 6-2 wins against Panama and Iran? Is that more impressive than when we beat Netherlands 4-1 in 1996? Or Croatia 4-2 in Euro 2004. Or Switzerland 3-0 in Euro 2004? Or when we beat Poland 3-0 in 1986 and then Paraguay 3-0 in the last 16? Or you could throw in group stage wins against Germany in 2000, Argentina in 2002.

I'm not arguing that Southgate has done badly. I'm saying that in my opinion he isn't deserving of being held in significantly higher esteem than so many previous England managers.

I think like Gingerjon you've maybe been seduced by the Southgate spin regarding the culture and togetherness. For me that's just waffle. Every England team (in fact you can include every team too) always says at the time how together they are, how much they love playing for England, etc. It's only years later when they write their books that they're able to give more private thoughts about things such as team selections and tactics. The same is true in every sport.

Anyway, I hope England perform at this Euros to a level that enables me to say that I think Southgate has done an amazing job this tournament.

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4 hours ago, Sidi Fidi Gold said:

First Euro's memories anyone ?

Mine was England v Belgium 1980, a 1-1 draw, I remember Ray Wilkins scoring a great goal, I remember England having a goal disallowed, I remember England fans rioting on the terraces and Italian police using tear gas which drifted onto the pitch forcing the players off, then we lost to hosts Italy, before beating Spain in the final game. I don't remember anything about any other game in the tournament.

1984 and Platini at his prime really.

I don’t have great memories of it and don’t remember it being a particularly big deal like it is now.

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4 hours ago, Maximus Decimus said:

Mine is 1992. I had scouts during the last game of the groups, and I remember my dad passing the news we were 1-0 up. When he picked me up and said we'd lost, I didn't believe him - (he was a windup merchant).

I still lament the end of 16 team version. The 24 might give us more teams, but there is far less jeopardy involved in the groups for the big teams. IMO it was better than the World Cup for quality of games.

I watched the final matches of that Euros (1992) in Hamburg staying with a German family, surrounded by German fans waiting for the party to start.

Denmark pooped on it massively and they were gutted and really castigated their world class players of that time.  I raised a wry smile thinking we would never do this (of course we did and we do).

It was explained to me that when it comes to West Germany (as it was then), that they’re expected to win and anything else was failure.  No pizza ads or hard luck stories for national team players - just win or be forgotten.

 

Edited by Gerrumonside ref
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Hungary v Switzerland, Spain v Croatia, Italy v Albania.

Should be an interesting day.

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Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life. (Terry Pratchett)

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11 hours ago, 17 stone giant said:

That's a penalty and red card for me.

I saw that and I must be honest I didn't think it was even a penalty, let alone a red card. He clearly went for the ball and maybe stumbled slightly but there was nothing malicious in that. 
I'm happy to concede that I'm not in the majority and will go with what actual football experts say but to me, nah. 
 

Had to laugh at Souness talking about it as if he was some sort of saint, he wouldn't last 5 minutes in the modern game. Better looking by far indeed. 

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11 hours ago, unapologetic pedant said:

I'm stuck in the era when almost all the Scottish national team played in the English first division. We just assumed any from the SPL were rubbish.

Pity the infamous Hansen collision v Soviet Union was with the unknown Willie Miller. Would have been a lot funnier had it been Souness.

Yes it seems weird to think many of Scotlands players were not only playing for the top English clubs but they were pretty much household names too. Not to mention the Scottish managers. 
 

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1 hour ago, gingerjon said:

Hungary v Switzerland, Spain v Croatia, Italy v Albania.

Should be an interesting day.

It'll be interesting to see how to slot in the Catalans game and the Leeds game, too.  Last night I watched Wigan on the laptop and Germany on the proper TV.  My dual screen desktop PC is currently in self-storage as we've just moved house, otherwise my challenge would be to watch four concurrent games.

 

Edited by JohnM
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12 hours ago, 17 stone giant said:

That's a penalty and red card for me.

Agree entirely. He knew immediately what he'd done as he threw himself to the ground pretending he'd been injured himself. Disgraceful.

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1 hour ago, The Masked Poster said:

I saw that and I must be honest I didn't think it was even a penalty, let alone a red card. He clearly went for the ball and maybe stumbled slightly but there was nothing malicious in that. 
I'm happy to concede that I'm not in the majority and will go with what actual football experts say but to me, nah. 
 

Had to laugh at Souness talking about it as if he was some sort of saint, he wouldn't last 5 minutes in the modern game. Better looking by far indeed. 

"Going for the ball", even getting the ball, is basically irrelevant.

Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life. (Terry Pratchett)

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1 hour ago, The Masked Poster said:

I saw that and I must be honest I didn't think it was even a penalty, let alone a red card. He clearly went for the ball and maybe stumbled slightly but there was nothing malicious in that. 
I'm happy to concede that I'm not in the majority and will go with what actual football experts say but to me, nah. 
 

Had to laugh at Souness talking about it as if he was some sort of saint, he wouldn't last 5 minutes in the modern game. Better looking by far indeed. 

I can't see how this was even in dispute, it was a studs up tackle where he connected above the ankle. It could've ended Gundogan's tournament.

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There's a lot of debate this morning about a comment Souness made last night. After talking about the 5-1, he then tried to qualify it by saying that Scotland is only a country of 5m people. This is a line I often hear from my brother-in-law when he's feeling humble.

He's been slated for it, and rightly so IMO as it is being used as an excuse. England have faced many low-populated nations over the years that have frustrated us while offering a threatening counter attack.

I think we were expecting Scotland to be hard to break down, but it was clear within the first 5 minutes that Germany were finding space. They then offered absolutely zero attacking threat and gave the ball away extremely easily.

Scotland's population explains why they'll never consistently compete at the highest levels, but not why any one performance was that bad and why they're never any good. Many of the smaller nations have good and bad periods (look at ROI), Scotland just seem to have bad.

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6 minutes ago, Maximus Decimus said:

There's a lot of debate this morning about a comment Souness made last night. After talking about the 5-1, he then tried to qualify it by saying that Scotland is only a country of 5m people. This is a line I often hear from my brother-in-law when he's feeling humble.

He's been slated for it, and rightly so IMO as it is being used as an excuse. England have faced many low-populated nations over the years that have frustrated us while offering a threatening counter attack.

I think we were expecting Scotland to be hard to break down, but it was clear within the first 5 minutes that Germany were finding space. They then offered absolutely zero attacking threat and gave the ball away extremely easily.

Scotland's population explains why they'll never consistently compete at the highest levels, but not why any one performance was that bad and why they're never any good. Many of the smaller nations have good and bad periods (look at ROI), Scotland just seem to have bad.

Croatia and Uruguay both have smaller populations than Scotland.

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1 hour ago, Maximus Decimus said:

I can't see how this was even in dispute, it was a studs up tackle where he connected above the ankle. It could've ended Gundogan's tournament.

I must emphasise that I aren't Scottish and the nationalist anti England element annoy me like they do you, I've no concerns about them losing 5-1 or 15-1. But I think he stumbled if anything and that made it look worse than it was. He wasn't lunging in studs first, he was just trying to defend a goal, albeit not very well. I've rewatched it a few times and still don't agree but am happy to acknowledge why it was given and I'm in the minority. 

Edited by The Masked Poster
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It's a shocking tackle. Reckless and dangerous. I don't think he deliberately tried to hurt the player, but he made a tackle in a manner that made that very likely. It could easily have been an ankle or leg breaker. You can't lunge in like that and use the defence that you're going for the ball. If you make contact with the player like that, you're gone. And rightly so!

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2 hours ago, Maximus Decimus said:

There's a lot of debate this morning about a comment Souness made last night. After talking about the 5-1, he then tried to qualify it by saying that Scotland is only a country of 5m people. This is a line I often hear from my brother-in-law when he's feeling humble.

He's been slated for it, and rightly so IMO as it is being used as an excuse. England have faced many low-populated nations over the years that have frustrated us while offering a threatening counter attack.

I think we were expecting Scotland to be hard to break down, but it was clear within the first 5 minutes that Germany were finding space. They then offered absolutely zero attacking threat and gave the ball away extremely easily.

Scotland's population explains why they'll never consistently compete at the highest levels, but not why any one performance was that bad and why they're never any good. Many of the smaller nations have good and bad periods (look at ROI), Scotland just seem to have bad.

This is a good assessment based entirely on the first 55 seconds ...

 

Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life. (Terry Pratchett)

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1 minute ago, The Hallucinating Goose said:

I thought Hungary-Switzerland would have been a bit more competitive than this. The Swiss have looked good but there has been some bad mistakes from Hungary.

Spoke too soon, Hungary have just scored and are back in it with 25 minutes left.

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Nice finish from Breel Embolo who has not really fulfilled his potential due to injury.

Don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone score a goal like that while their thigh strapping is falling down their leg and off.

It was too little too late from the Magyars in the second half.

Edited by Gerrumonside ref
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1 hour ago, Sidi Fidi Gold said:

There was a peak audience of 10.4 million for last nights match on ITV, with an average of 9.1 million for the match itself and an average of 6 million for the entire coverage.

Football's numbers in this country are just incredible.

Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life. (Terry Pratchett)

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On the subject of first memories of Euros, I have vague recollections from pre-1980 when the finals were 4-nations affairs. 

First, some highlights shown on Football Focus (or maybe On the Ball) of Yugoslavia 1976.

And West Germany beating England 3-1 at Wembley in a 1972 quarter-final first leg. Wouldn't have known the status of the fixture at the time. The Germans were in green. Watched it at the house of a relative who had just got a colour TV.

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7 hours ago, gingerjon said:

"Going for the ball", even getting the ball, is basically irrelevant.

RL has adopted a Soccer interpretation of late challenges. Used to be that if a defender were deemed "committed to the tackle" he could make contact, even heavy contact, after the ball had gone. Nowadays, penalty and sin-bin.

 

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