Didn't even aspect us to get out of the group stages let alone top it when I first saw that squad. So all things considered England exceeded my expectations overall and gave it a good go against Italy even though we were out classed for 120 mins.
I'm not club before country or country before club. When the league season is on I'm thinking about charlton, when England are playing in a finals tournament I'm thinking about England. They don't play each other so there is no need to have a priority.
So you're "thinking about England" for a month every two years ? That's probably why they'll only ever make the quarters
unless he works for the FA then its not his fault!
I don't think you can really comment on who we will have in 2/4 years time, players such as 'the ox' and even Welbeck have only just developed recently....whose to say that a new star might appear this year? You just don't know. Roy and the team has actually given me some faith in England again.
Bit harsh to be so critical of Cole who didn't have that bad a tournament. If you want to be critical of anyone what about Ashley Young, completely useless thoughout the tournament and then missed the key penalty that would have given us a chance. He shouldn't have started in my view and definitely should have been taken off when we brought Walcott on.
He did have a bad tournament but he earned his place in the team with the great build-up he had. Can't blame Hodgson for putting him in the team.
As for the penalty - again I think it's harsh to criticize. He beat the keeper and a few inches lower would have been all the difference. Something like that could happen to anyone.
I don't think its harsh to blame him for his penalty, if you are going down the middle you don't have to put as much power in as he did, just enough to send it into the net as if the keeper dives you have scored
You are right but I think it's unfair to just use that as a reflection of his performance/ability as some seem to be. Wayne Rooney could have scored a hat-trick in a 3-3 draw last night and then hit the bar from the spot. It is one of those things.
Had somebody like Walcott taken it instead or Carroll - there's no saying it would have been a different outcome.
Bit harsh to be so critical of Cole who didn't have that bad a tournament. If you want to be critical of anyone what about Ashley Young, completely useless thoughout the tournament and then missed the key penalty that would have given us a chance. He shouldn't have started in my view and definitely should have been taken off when we brought Walcott on.
He did have a bad tournament but he earned his place in the team with the great build-up he had. Can't blame Hodgson for putting him in the team.
As for the penalty - again I think it's harsh to criticize. He beat the keeper and a few inches lower would have been all the difference. Something like that could happen to anyone.
I don't think its harsh to blame him for his penalty, if you are going down the middle you don't have to put as much power in as he did, just enough to send it into the net as if the keeper dives you have scored
You are right but I think it's unfair to just use that as a reflection of his performance/ability as some seem to be. Wayne Rooney could have scored a hat-trick in a 3-3 draw last night and then hit the bar from the spot. It is one of those things.
Had somebody like Walcott taken it instead or Carroll - there's no saying it would have been a different outcome.
I agree its harsh to blame those who missed penalties for the defeat as it would have been a total injustice to football had we gone through, fantastic for us as England fans but could you imagine the other way round and we had all the play and chances Italy had and then not gone through?
Can't understand why we didn't tackle them when they had the ball. It was obviously tactical, as they ALL stood off the Italian players at least a yard whenever they had the ball. The Italians had all the room in the world to pass, until they were in our penalty box, can't blame ANY of our players for this, it was obviously Hodgson's tactics, and it was exasperating to watch.
The problem feels deeper than grass roots to me. Just about every foreign player in this tournament seems to have more intelligence, wit, patience and inventiveness than our (mostly admirable) work horses.
HOWEVER, I personally find the eternal possession game impressive but a bit boring. Give me the cut and thrust of English football any day with all its imperfections... it means we just won't win any international tournaments.
I thought that tackling the grass root problems of English football had started years ago in order to address the issues surrounding technique and to rid our coaching system and coaches of their obsession with high tempo box to box players with good engines but little else to offer. I see little progress to be honest and none on display in an England shirt. Those of you who admirably follow youth football will have a better idea of what is happening but please tell me that within ten years we will be producing English Iniestas and Pirlos.
Can't quite understand why Hodgson is beyond much criticism. I think he had a "mare". He didn't have the balls to leave Rooney out after a poor performance against Ukraine (shouldn't have started that one anyway imo). Set up too defensively against Italy using Milner and Young, both of whom were useless (again!). Failed to get the back four up much further forward than their own 18 yard box, leaving Pirlo acres of room. In seeing Pirlo in acres of room, failed to do anything tactically to TRY to address it. Took Welbeck off, the only one who looked remotely likely to score. I could go on and on. What is most galling is that this Italy side are one of their poorest for many years, made worse by the fact that they should have beaten us 3 or 4 nil. If he thought the players at his disposal were not good enough, he had nothing to lose by playing Oxlade Chamberlain and Walcott and going for broke. For those of you who are saying he got the best out of what he had, well I say no he didn't.
Can't quite understand why Hodgson is beyond much criticism. I think he had a "mare". He didn't have the balls to leave Rooney out after a poor performance against Ukraine (shouldn't have started that one anyway imo). Set up too defensively against Italy using Milner and Young, both of whom were useless (again!). Failed to get the back four up much further forward than their own 18 yard box, leaving Pirlo acres of room. In seeing Pirlo in acres of room, failed to do anything tactically to TRY to address it. Took Welbeck off, the only one who looked remotely likely to score. I could go on and on. What is most galling is that this Italy side are one of their poorest for many years, made worse by the fact that they should have beaten us 3 or 4 nil. If he thought the players at his disposal were not good enough, he had nothing to lose by playing Oxlade Chamberlain and Walcott and going for broke. For those of you who are saying he got the best out of what he had, well I say no he didn't.
Bit harsh to be so critical of Cole who didn't have that bad a tournament. If you want to be critical of anyone what about Ashley Young, completely useless thoughout the tournament and then missed the key penalty that would have given us a chance. He shouldn't have started in my view and definitely should have been taken off when we brought Walcott on.
He did have a bad tournament but he earned his place in the team with the great build-up he had. Can't blame Hodgson for putting him in the team.
As for the penalty - again I think it's harsh to criticize. He beat the keeper and a few inches lower would have been all the difference. Something like that could happen to anyone.
I don't think its harsh to blame him for his penalty, if you are going down the middle you don't have to put as much power in as he did, just enough to send it into the net as if the keeper dives you have scored
You are right but I think it's unfair to just use that as a reflection of his performance/ability as some seem to be. Wayne Rooney could have scored a hat-trick in a 3-3 draw last night and then hit the bar from the spot. It is one of those things.
Had somebody like Walcott taken it instead or Carroll - there's no saying it would have been a different outcome.
nobody needs to use Youngs penalty to judge his performance...we simply look at his 4 games during the tournament and he was absolutely dire in all of them!
Can't quite understand why Hodgson is beyond much criticism. I think he had a "mare". He didn't have the balls to leave Rooney out after a poor performance against Ukraine (shouldn't have started that one anyway imo). Set up too defensively against Italy using Milner and Young, both of whom were useless (again!). Failed to get the back four up much further forward than their own 18 yard box, leaving Pirlo acres of room. In seeing Pirlo in acres of room, failed to do anything tactically to TRY to address it. Took Welbeck off, the only one who looked remotely likely to score. I could go on and on. What is most galling is that this Italy side are one of their poorest for many years, made worse by the fact that they should have beaten us 3 or 4 nil. If he thought the players at his disposal were not good enough, he had nothing to lose by playing Oxlade Chamberlain and Walcott and going for broke. For those of you who are saying he got the best out of what he had, well I say no he didn't.
Can't quite understand why Hodgson is beyond much criticism. I think he had a "mare". He didn't have the balls to leave Rooney out after a poor performance against Ukraine (shouldn't have started that one anyway imo). Set up too defensively against Italy using Milner and Young, both of whom were useless (again!). Failed to get the back four up much further forward than their own 18 yard box, leaving Pirlo acres of room. In seeing Pirlo in acres of room, failed to do anything tactically to TRY to address it. Took Welbeck off, the only one who looked remotely likely to score. I could go on and on. What is most galling is that this Italy side are one of their poorest for many years, made worse by the fact that they should have beaten us 3 or 4 nil. If he thought the players at his disposal were not good enough, he had nothing to lose by playing Oxlade Chamberlain and Walcott and going for broke. For those of you who are saying he got the best out of what he had, well I say no he didn't.
I don't think he should escape all criticism but think you are being a bit harsh on him and also on Italy, this is a decent Italian side and at the moment probably only behind Germany and Spain in Europe as an all rounded team. I fully believe Milner was there in order to protect Johnson more than anything and to be fair I don't think much got down our right hand side. I thought we contained Pirlo quite well for the first half but he had the intelligence to just keep dropping deeper and receiving the ball to then dictate the play.
As it was it nearly worked, I mean we were only 3 successful kicks away from the semi, but that was more luck than anything.
Can't quite understand why Hodgson is beyond much criticism. I think he had a "mare". He didn't have the balls to leave Rooney out after a poor performance against Ukraine (shouldn't have started that one anyway imo). Set up too defensively against Italy using Milner and Young, both of whom were useless (again!). Failed to get the back four up much further forward than their own 18 yard box, leaving Pirlo acres of room. In seeing Pirlo in acres of room, failed to do anything tactically to TRY to address it. Took Welbeck off, the only one who looked remotely likely to score. I could go on and on. What is most galling is that this Italy side are one of their poorest for many years, made worse by the fact that they should have beaten us 3 or 4 nil. If he thought the players at his disposal were not good enough, he had nothing to lose by playing Oxlade Chamberlain and Walcott and going for broke. For those of you who are saying he got the best out of what he had, well I say no he didn't.
I don't think he should escape all criticism but think you are being a bit harsh on him and also on Italy, this is a decent Italian side and at the moment probably only behind Germany and Spain in Europe as an all rounded team. I fully believe Milner was there in order to protect Johnson more than anything and to be fair I don't think much got down our right hand side. I thought we contained Pirlo quite well for the first half but he had the intelligence to just keep dropping deeper and receiving the ball to then dictate the play.
As it was it nearly worked, I mean we were only 3 successful kicks away from the semi, but that was more luck than anything.
Fair play Col. Some interesting points made. It's a game all about opinions. The fact that we were only 3 kicks away from the semi was more down to atrocious Italian finishing than anything we did. As you can probably guess, I'm not a great Hodgson fan.
Don't get me wrong I don't think he is brilliant myself, but I do think he was the best man for the job that we could realistically get. Can you imagine what sort of a shambles the tournament would have been had 'Arry and his "tactics" taken over?
For me England were rigid with fear. Afraid to win for fear of losing. Poor in possession and dreadful without possession. They looked haunted on the long walk to the shootout. How tense was Rooneys penalty? In fact all of them, whether they went in or not. Gerrard cramping up on 70 minutes showed he was mentally out of the game. Way too tense. Hodgson looked like a highly strung violin! A lot less media hype of these players would do a lot of good. They are decent at best,good solid players but thats it. Lack of technical ability lessens the faith they have in each other. The "World class"media hysteria has to end .
Everyone was quite keen to defend Powell when he inherited someone else's team and team mentality and then produced naff all initially. Isn't it the same here ?
Everyone was quite keen to defend Powell when he inherited someone else's team and team mentality and then produced naff all initially. Isn't it the same here ?
Exactly.
And when it took BWP three months to score a goal half way through this season - were we all calling him overrated? No.
Everyone was quite keen to defend Powell when he inherited someone else's team and team mentality and then produced naff all initially. Isn't it the same here ?
Sort of. I don't think Hodgson has produced "naff all", however. Last time we reached a major tournament semi-final was in 1996. Hodgson, in a short space of time, led England to where we should be with the current crop.
Comments
Had somebody like Walcott taken it instead or Carroll - there's no saying it would have been a different outcome.
HOWEVER, I personally find the eternal possession game impressive but a bit boring. Give me the cut and thrust of English football any day with all its imperfections... it means we just won't win any international tournaments.
As it was it nearly worked, I mean we were only 3 successful kicks away from the semi, but that was more luck than anything.
And when it took BWP three months to score a goal half way through this season - were we all calling him overrated? No.
We're not a good team...We tried to play to our strengths. Wouldve been hammered by tbe krauts again anyway!!
Great support.