Semi-finals

[Marsbar100]

Unfortunately southgate let things run for to long, the mdifield 3 were clearly struggling to shift from side to side to stop crosses, really needed to bring delph or loftus on to try stop that.

[jayramfootball]

I wonder when people are going to take the rose coloured glasses off.
England were useless in this tournament from start to finish with the exception of the game against Sweden where they were ok.

Not a single one of Englands players is world class or offers anything for an opponent to fear.
Passing (i don't mean meaningless passing) is dreadful.
Movement - unintelligent
Pressing the ball - nope
Control when receiving a pass is dreadful.
Finishing is dreadful
Fitness is dreadful

England were like a lower league team that had an amazing run in the FA Cup aided by playing not a single good team on the way until they met an average team - and got knocked out.

If you accept that England a 3rd rate footballing nation (not even in the second tier of teams) then the players are indeed the heroes they are being made out to be.
If you think England should be a top, tier 1, footballing nation, then the World Cup was an embarrassment and the players let the country down.
Take your pick.

[Santi]

Unfortunately southgate let things run for to long, the mdifield 3 were clearly struggling to shift from side to side to stop crosses, really needed to bring delph or loftus on to try stop that.

Yep, really don't know how he didn't see this.

[Angelito]

Couldn't find a better quality.

This is just banter, but Keane is right. I do agree with Wrighty that you have to be excited when your country is in the semis. There's no point to football if you can't celebrate.

Yet, Keane has a point with the whole, "It's coming home," mantra - and how most pundits already thought that England were in the Final.

"English journalists, pundits from television, they underestimated Croatia and that was a huge mistake," Real Madrid's Modric told ITV. "They should be more humble and respect more opponents.

"All these words from them we take, we were reading and we were saying, 'OK, today we will see who will be tired'."

The arrogance was there. Most pundits were underestimating Croatia.

Modric for Balloon Door.

[Santi]

I wonder when people are going to take the rose coloured glasses off.
England were useless in this tournament from start to finish with the exception of the game against Sweden where they were ok.

Not a single one of Englands players is world class or offers anything for an opponent to fear.
Passing (i don't mean meaningless passing) is dreadful.
Movement - unintelligent
Pressing the ball - nope
Control when receiving a pass is dreadful.
Finishing is dreadful
Fitness is dreadful

England were like a lower league team that had an amazing run in the FA Cup aided by playing not a single good team on the way until they met an average team - and got knocked out.

If you accept that England a 3rd rate footballing nation (not even in the second tier of teams) then the players are indeed the heroes they are being made out to be.
If you think England should be a top, tier 1, footballing nation, then the World Cup was an embarrassment and the players let the country down.
Take your pick.

Somewhere in between, do agree with the sentiment a little bit though. Knockout football is tough and we did what we had to but the only good game was really the Sweden one, Colombia one wasn't bad either as they're a decent team.

However, we would have had NO chance against the likes of Brazil and France, unlike Belgium who actually can take great heart away from this tournament. They won all their group games and ended up on the harder route, came back from a poor game against Japan, beat the favourites in fairly comfortable fashion and gave the 2nd faves a good run in the semi. England did well in terms of the round we got to, but it was mostly down to the easy run we got.

[Marsbar100]

First half we did play some really good stuff, we obviously gassed though.

Admittedly alli, lingard and henderson wasn't good enough to relive pressure in the 2nd half last night, i like all of them as players but we needed more last night in the 2nd half, not taking wilshere was proved to be a really insane decision, we got away with it against columbia and didn't last night, what ever you want to say about him is the technically most gifted English midfielder by a distance, he should have been on the pitch the last hour

[Losmeister]

england out cos they didnt have jack wilshere... riiggggggggggggght

[DiamondGooner]

We did the same against Columbia went 1-0 up then just sat back and let them back into the game.

We needed to capitalise in the first half and we didn't, practically gave the game away by letting their midfield into the game.

Such a mistake and such a shame, we dominant for the first 40mins then they got lazy and ceded momentum, maybe scoring early wasn't a good thing, we got too comfortable.

[Marsbar100]

:dizzy: england out cos they didnt have jack wilshere... riiggggggggggggght

He is our most gifted midfielder of course it could have helped, not saying he would have saved the day but you take most gifted midfielder.

International football suits him, think he had 5 motm in a row for England once

[Ach]

:dizzy: england out cos they didnt have jack wilshere... riiggggggggggggght

He is our most gifted midfielder of course it could have helped, not saying he would have saved the day but you take most gifted midfielder.

International football suits him, think he had 5 motm in a row for England once

hes shit at club level and we all saw how knackered these players were at semi final time. Jack would be dead by then.

[Marsbar100]

:dizzy: england out cos they didnt have jack wilshere... riiggggggggggggght

He is our most gifted midfielder of course it could have helped, not saying he would have saved the day but you take most gifted midfielder.

International football suits him, think he had 5 motm in a row for England once

hes shit at club level and we all saw how knackered these players were at semi final time. Jack would be dead by then.

shit? emery wanted him to stay lol

[Ach]

If he wanted him to stay then he'd have stayed. We just bought 2 CMs. Doubt he tried very hard to keep him. Failure at Bournemouth and literally did nothing for us last season.

We missed someone like shelvey who is better.

[Jedi]

Couldn't find a better quality.

This is just banter, but Keane is right. I do agree with Wrighty that you have to be excited when your country is in the semis. There's no point to football if you can't celebrate.

Yet, Keane has a point with the whole, "It's coming home," mantra - and how most pundits already thought that England were in the Final.

"English journalists, pundits from television, they underestimated Croatia and that was a huge mistake," Real Madrid's Modric told ITV. "They should be more humble and respect more opponents.

"All these words from them we take, we were reading and we were saying, 'OK, today we will see who will be tired'."

The arrogance was there. Most pundits were underestimating Croatia.

Modric for Balloon Door.

Pretty much this.


What i said before the game:

Many England fans seem to think they're already in the final. Dangerous mentality to have and if the players share it they could be in for a rude awakening. I still see Croatia winning this.

[Losmeister]

If he wanted him to stay then he'd have stayed. We just bought 2 CMs. Doubt he tried very hard to keep him. Failure at Bournemouth and literally did nothing for us last season.

We missed someone like shelvey who is better.

this

[Marsbar100]

If he wanted him to stay then he'd have stayed. We just bought 2 CMs. Doubt he tried very hard to keep him. Failure at Bournemouth and literally did nothing for us last season.

We missed someone like shelvey who is better.

this

He had a contract on the table, emery was rightly honest with him that he couldn't guarantee him first team football, which is no shame as thankfully there is fantastic options in the positions he plays, doesn't mean he didn't want him, he just didn't lie to him which is the correct way to go about things.