Italy vs England Euro2020 Final

[Padge_DRFC]

Southgate is a nice guy though....

Italy's right back was awful and there for the taking however we put Mason Mount up against him who did next to nothing in this game.

Really poor from Southgate again. Has a plan beforehand. When things change mid game he hasn't got a clue. England had the better players bar the 2 midfielders. Italy had the much better manager.

[Filo]

I feel for Saka, bullied against Denmark, and like a rabbit in the headlights against Italy, then asked to take the last penalty. Sterling went missing in action, Rashford came on for the penalties and did what he does best a too casual attitude, he’s a 1 game in 10 performer. Phillips ( the Yorkshire Pirlo) not good enough for this level, had a very good opening game then looked average throughout. Maguire surprised me, rock solid in defence, and showed the posers how a penalty should be taken. Grealish should retire from international football until Southgate leaves, criminal to leave him out all the time

[Herbert Anchovy]

To read some of the comments on here anyone would think we were knocked out in the first round of the tournament.

[mushRTID]

Last night I was in the “oh well, we’ve done well. Weve given it everything”

This morning I’m pretty pissed off at the missed opportunity.

Their equaliser was coming and we brought it on ourselves. Yes they are a top side and we’re always going to have spells, but we had to be braver and get into them. That spell lasted ages.

And second half of extra time, Italy dipped somewhat. Why didn’t he bring rashford and sancho on then, at HT? One to give them time to get into the game and two, they might even have got us a goal.

I agree with comments Iv read that putting them on just for the penalties added unnecessary pressure.

Finally Saka taking one, I just couldn’t believe it. Where were Sterling, Shaw etc?

We’ve thrown away the only realistic chance iv seen us have and I’m absolutely gutted about it.

[normal rules]

That’s it. The pineapple is going on the pizza tonight. Lots of it.

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

We will keep improving though and we were a few penalties away in a shootout.

I've seen criticsm of the defence mentioned. We conceded 2 goals in 7 games.  Overall we were the better side in every game bar the final.

Also criticsm of England last night. Yes the second half and e.t was disappointing, but there's two teams on that pitch and the other team changed and played very well.

It's easy in the narrowest of defeats to criticise in a game where there was next to nothing between the teams.

[SydneyRover]

Yep, I tend to agree with you there pud, if we had won on penalties some would be still complaining, I really enjoyed the games and the squad did well and yes we will get better. I said before that Southgate should have brought the penalty takers on earlier. Italy were a strong well credentialed team and we shouldn't take anything away from them.

[normal rules]

Let’s be straight. The way the groups fell and games landed, England had a relatively straight forward passage to the final, with the exception of the Germany game.
No France, no Belgium, no Portugal.
This will not happen again anytime soon.
And as far as Qatar goes, This England against a half decent Argentina or Brazil will get mullered.
Last night was the opportunity of a lifetime.

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

Disagree normal rules.  The team will be much stronger after this and will continue to kick on to the world cup.  The best teams often get easier draws because of seeding and winning so it may well continue.  The teams we played were there because they knocked out other strong teams.

And if we lose to a better side that's fine, we don't have a right to be the best.

[sedwardsdrfc]

Last Euros France lost on home soil and went on the win the next World Cup. We have to believe for next year

[Chris Black come back]

It’s natural to add Brazil and Argentina into the mix for any World Cup but their records over recent tournaments has been average. 2018 all the semi finalists were European. 2014 was in South America and both sides did reasonably ok, despite Brazil getting humiliated by Germany in the semi final. 2010 both sides got knocked out in the quarter finals. Same also in 2006, both out in quarter finals.

They are good sides, but an average recent record especially outside of South America.

We competed against the strongest teams in world football as part of the Euros. It doesn’t get much more difficult than the group of nations in Euro 2020.

[DonnyOsmond]

We beat Germany and drew against Italy, who had Spain, France and Belgium in their side of the draw. We also had Netherlands in our side. We might not have had to face a big nation the whole way through it but we definitely deserved to be there.

[drfchound]

“We should have brought Rashford and Sakka on earlier”…….
We took off Walker and put Rashford to RB.
Would we have even got to the pens if we had done that ten minutes earlier?
I doubt it very much.

[Filo]

“We should have brought Rashford and Sakka on earlier”…….
We took off Walker and put Rashford to RB.
Would we have even got to the pens if we had done that ten minutes earlier?
I doubt it very much.

Rashford was brought on for the pens, if Southgate had a plan B he might have brought him on in a more natural position, it appears Southgates plan B was penalties. For me Rashford needs a kick up the arse at club level and national level, I’d leave him out of the next squad, far too laid back for me

[mushRTID]

“We should have brought Rashford and Sakka on earlier”…….
We took off Walker and put Rashford to RB.
Would we have even got to the pens if we had done that ten minutes earlier?
I doubt it very much.

He only took Walker off as he wouldn’t take a pen.
Could have got rashford on sooner, for someone else and changed things up to be more proactive

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

Who would you have taken off, Kane, Sterling?  The clamour was for grealish and many said Saka should have kept his place. He made those subs.

If anything you could argue the midfield was light, we don't have the quality in the centre that others do.

[sha66y]

I feel for Saka, bullied against Denmark, and like a rabbit in the headlights against Italy, then asked to take the last penalty. Sterling went missing in action, Rashford came on for the penalties and did what he does best a too casual attitude, he’s a 1 game in 10 performer. Phillips ( the Yorkshire Pirlo) not good enough for this level, had a very good opening game then looked average throughout. Maguire surprised me, rock solid in defence, and showed the posers how a penalty should be taken. Grealish should retire from international football until Southgate leaves, criminal to leave him out all the time

Struggling like hell to disagree with any of this…though you could have been a tad more scathing of the Managers inability to see what Mancini was doing…lol

[Filo]

I feel for Saka, bullied against Denmark, and like a rabbit in the headlights against Italy, then asked to take the last penalty. Sterling went missing in action, Rashford came on for the penalties and did what he does best a too casual attitude, he’s a 1 game in 10 performer. Phillips ( the Yorkshire Pirlo) not good enough for this level, had a very good opening game then looked average throughout. Maguire surprised me, rock solid in defence, and showed the posers how a penalty should be taken. Grealish should retire from international football until Southgate leaves, criminal to leave him out all the time

Struggling like hell to disagree with any of this…though you could have been a tad more scathing of the Managers inability to see what Mancini was doing…lol

See my postings on the other thread regarding the Manager

[normal rules]

Disagree normal rules.  The team will be much stronger after this and will continue to kick on to the world cup.  The best teams often get easier draws because of seeding and winning so it may well continue.  The teams we played were there because they knocked out other strong teams.

And if we lose to a better side that's fine, we don't have a right to be the best.

A valid point pudding. I so hope your right.
Southgates approach to games has been described as conservative. Winning games by not conceding. And he has done well. Very well in fact.
I’d love to know what he said at half time though, because something dramatically changed last night after going in a goal up. Yes, it was always going to be the case that Italy would come back into the game. But they just seemed to lose ideas and momentum. At one point it was hoof ball at best.
A distinct lack of creativity and ideas in the second half.
This England squad will not need to be be judged by any of us on here. Time will do that.
And after 55 years, time is not their friend. The time to win a major comp was last night.

[NickDRFC]

“We should have brought Rashford and Sakka on earlier”…….
We took off Walker and put Rashford to RB.
Would we have even got to the pens if we had done that ten minutes earlier?
I doubt it very much.

Rashford was brought on for the pens, if Southgate had a plan B he might have brought him on in a more natural position, it appears Southgates plan B was penalties. For me Rashford needs a kick up the arse at club level and national level, I’d leave him out of the next squad, far too laid back for me

Last season Rashford scored 21 and got 15 assists for Man Utd in 57 appearances/4,146 minutes. A goal involvement every 115 minutes. Better than Foden & Sterling despite being in a worse team (I’ve deliberately excluded Saka who has the worst record by far as he played a lot of games at wing back and is at a terrible team)

Foden - 16 goals/10 assists/50 appearances/goal involvement every 130 minutes
Sterling - 14 goals/12 assists/49 apps/GI every 142 mins
Sancho - 16 goals/20 assists/38 apps/GI every 83 mins

Why do you think he needs a kick up the arse at club level, where he’s outperforming his contemporaries? Or at international level, where he’s played 73 minutes across 7 games? What sort of impact could or should he have made with that level of game time? He took a bad penalty (and it was still a better penalty than the other two missed), doesn’t make him a bad player.

[Filo]

“We should have brought Rashford and Sakka on earlier”…….
We took off Walker and put Rashford to RB.
Would we have even got to the pens if we had done that ten minutes earlier?
I doubt it very much.

Rashford was brought on for the pens, if Southgate had a plan B he might have brought him on in a more natural position, it appears Southgates plan B was penalties. For me Rashford needs a kick up the arse at club level and national level, I’d leave him out of the next squad, far too laid back for me

Last season Rashford scored 21 and got 15 assists for Man Utd in 57 appearances/4,146 minutes. A goal involvement every 115 minutes. Better than Foden & Sterling despite being in a worse team (I’ve deliberately excluded Saka who has the worst record by far as he played a lot of games at wing back and is at a terrible team)

Foden - 16 goals/10 assists/50 appearances/goal involvement every 130 minutes
Sterling - 14 goals/12 assists/49 apps/GI every 142 mins
Sancho - 16 goals/20 assists/38 apps/GI every 83 mins

Why do you think he needs a kick up the arse at club level, where he’s outperforming his contemporaries? Or at international level, where he’s played 73 minutes across 7 games? What sort of impact could or should he have made with that level of game time? He took a bad penalty (and it was still a better penalty than the other two missed), doesn’t make him a bad player.

You can manipulate stats for support your view, assists are just the final pass, Foden for example might not have as many assists, but he was probably integeral in the build up to many goals. Rashford gets a lot of chances at Man Utd, he’s bound to put a few away, but look how many he misses and his selfish runs into blind alleys, no doubt he has talent, but he needs to step up from being a 1 good game in 10 player. Going on your stats, Sancho should be in every game, but hardly had a kick in the Tournament

[Campsall rover]

Totally gutted.
I really did think it was coming home.

Very proud of the team and squad. They have done us proud.
I really feel for the players. We are all gutted but how gutted must those players feel right now.

Don’t understand the choice of penalty takers and bringing on 2 subs to take them when they never even had a kick in the game.
It must have been decided before obviously but very strange imo.
As for poor Saka giving him the 5th and crucial penalty seems bizarre to me.
Why were Henderson or Sterling not taking it.
Yes hHenderson was subbed I know but thought he would hold his hand up for one.

Hate being critical because we have just witnessed a group of England players who have re kindled our belief that we can actually achieve success in the major International tournaments.
The last time was 25 years ago at Euro 96 under Venables when we had a team which should really have won that competition. Again if we had won that penalty shoot out in the semi final we would surely have gone on to beat Chech Republic in the final.

[dickos1]

If you are prepared to accept abject failure and be happy with not winning then you are seriously conditioned to loss acceptance!
We scored early from a great move, we attacked with a great determination for about 25-30 more mins…….and then we stopped!

We conceded ground happy to break up and nullify the Italians, and clinging onto that word “ hope” ….we hoped they would run out of steam, they didn’t….we hoped our attacks would frighten them, they didn’t, we hoped to be able to hang on for a well earned yet uninspiring victory, we didn’t…

The Manager had enough diamonds to make a necklace, yet offered up a pair of earrings, I don’t care about all the “ look at the Positives” …they truly pale into insignificance when you accept loss so easily….

We had the best opportunity to attack with some of the finest young talents going hell for leather…and I wouldn’t of minded if we’d lost, because we would have played to our strength…..instead we lost by being the second best team who didn’t defend good enough…….. the manager must shoulder all of the blame for not reacting to Mancini’s game changing tactics…

Forgettable, utterly forgettable!! 

Again a lot of nonsense in here,
Our strength throughout the tournament has been the defence, the best in the tournament in fact so we did play to our strengths.
Even last night we defended outstanding Pickford had one save to make and he made it but it came off the post for them to tap in.
All this rubbish about all the good attacking players we have, people are forgetting that for years we’ve played all our best attacking players and shoe horned them into a side and all we got was abject failure.
Southgate has transformed the national side that is obvious, the last major tournament before him we got knocked out by Iceland.
Look How far we’ve come, enjoy the ride instead of looking for things to moan about all the time that aren’t there

[Filo]

If you are prepared to accept abject failure and be happy with not winning then you are seriously conditioned to loss acceptance!
We scored early from a great move, we attacked with a great determination for about 25-30 more mins…….and then we stopped!

We conceded ground happy to break up and nullify the Italians, and clinging onto that word “ hope” ….we hoped they would run out of steam, they didn’t….we hoped our attacks would frighten them, they didn’t, we hoped to be able to hang on for a well earned yet uninspiring victory, we didn’t…

The Manager had enough diamonds to make a necklace, yet offered up a pair of earrings, I don’t care about all the “ look at the Positives” …they truly pale into insignificance when you accept loss so easily….

We had the best opportunity to attack with some of the finest young talents going hell for leather…and I wouldn’t of minded if we’d lost, because we would have played to our strength…..instead we lost by being the second best team who didn’t defend good enough…….. the manager must shoulder all of the blame for not reacting to Mancini’s game changing tactics…

Forgettable, utterly forgettable!! 

Again a lot of nonsense in here,
Our strength throughout the tournament has been the defence, the best in the tournament in fact so we did play to our strengths.
Even last night we defended outstanding Pickford had one save to make and he made it but it came off the post for them to tap in.
All this rubbish about all the good attacking players we have, people are forgetting that for years we’ve played all our best attacking players and shoe horned them into a side and all we got was abject failure.
Southgate has transformed the national side that is obvious, the last major tournament before him we got knocked out by Iceland.
Look How far we’ve come, enjoy the ride instead of looking for things to moan about all the time that aren’t there

You missed Chiesa’s shot that Pickford saved then

[NickDRFC]

“We should have brought Rashford and Sakka on earlier”…….
We took off Walker and put Rashford to RB.
Would we have even got to the pens if we had done that ten minutes earlier?
I doubt it very much.

Rashford was brought on for the pens, if Southgate had a plan B he might have brought him on in a more natural position, it appears Southgates plan B was penalties. For me Rashford needs a kick up the arse at club level and national level, I’d leave him out of the next squad, far too laid back for me

Last season Rashford scored 21 and got 15 assists for Man Utd in 57 appearances/4,146 minutes. A goal involvement every 115 minutes. Better than Foden & Sterling despite being in a worse team (I’ve deliberately excluded Saka who has the worst record by far as he played a lot of games at wing back and is at a terrible team)

Foden - 16 goals/10 assists/50 appearances/goal involvement every 130 minutes
Sterling - 14 goals/12 assists/49 apps/GI every 142 mins
Sancho - 16 goals/20 assists/38 apps/GI every 83 mins

Why do you think he needs a kick up the arse at club level, where he’s outperforming his contemporaries? Or at international level, where he’s played 73 minutes across 7 games? What sort of impact could or should he have made with that level of game time? He took a bad penalty (and it was still a better penalty than the other two missed), doesn’t make him a bad player.

You can manipulate stats for support your view, assists are just the final pass, Foden for example might not have as many assists, but he was probably integeral in the build up to many goals. Rashford gets a lot of chances at Man Utd, he’s bound to put a few away, but look how many he misses and his selfish runs into blind alleys, no doubt he has talent, but he needs to step up from being a 1 good game in 10 player. Going on your stats, Sancho should be in every game, but hardly had a kick in the Tournament

A player who scored better than 1 in 3 is not a “1 good game in 10 player”. That’s rubbish. Rashford is currently England’s 5th choice wide player which I think is right, there’s no need to jettison him from the squad like you’re suggesting. He’s in there on merit, and that’s supported by the numbers.

[dickos1]

If you are prepared to accept abject failure and be happy with not winning then you are seriously conditioned to loss acceptance!
We scored early from a great move, we attacked with a great determination for about 25-30 more mins…….and then we stopped!

We conceded ground happy to break up and nullify the Italians, and clinging onto that word “ hope” ….we hoped they would run out of steam, they didn’t….we hoped our attacks would frighten them, they didn’t, we hoped to be able to hang on for a well earned yet uninspiring victory, we didn’t…

The Manager had enough diamonds to make a necklace, yet offered up a pair of earrings, I don’t care about all the “ look at the Positives” …they truly pale into insignificance when you accept loss so easily….

We had the best opportunity to attack with some of the finest young talents going hell for leather…and I wouldn’t of minded if we’d lost, because we would have played to our strength…..instead we lost by being the second best team who didn’t defend good enough…….. the manager must shoulder all of the blame for not reacting to Mancini’s game changing tactics…

Forgettable, utterly forgettable!! 

Again a lot of nonsense in here,
Our strength throughout the tournament has been the defence, the best in the tournament in fact so we did play to our strengths.
Even last night we defended outstanding Pickford had one save to make and he made it but it came off the post for them to tap in.
All this rubbish about all the good attacking players we have, people are forgetting that for years we’ve played all our best attacking players and shoe horned them into a side and all we got was abject failure.
Southgate has transformed the national side that is obvious, the last major tournament before him we got knocked out by Iceland.
Look How far we’ve come, enjoy the ride instead of looking for things to moan about all the time that aren’t there

You missed Chiesa’s shot that Pickford saved then

I’ll give you that but their goalie also made a similar standard save from stones, and stones was also inches away from scoring in extra time.

[Axholme Lion]

Do we get our money back for the school dinners?

[Campsall rover]

If you are prepared to accept abject failure and be happy with not winning then you are seriously conditioned to loss acceptance!
We scored early from a great move, we attacked with a great determination for about 25-30 more mins…….and then we stopped!

We conceded ground happy to break up and nullify the Italians, and clinging onto that word “ hope” ….we hoped they would run out of steam, they didn’t….we hoped our attacks would frighten them, they didn’t, we hoped to be able to hang on for a well earned yet uninspiring victory, we didn’t…

The Manager had enough diamonds to make a necklace, yet offered up a pair of earrings, I don’t care about all the “ look at the Positives” …they truly pale into insignificance when you accept loss so easily….

We had the best opportunity to attack with some of the finest young talents going hell for leather…and I wouldn’t of minded if we’d lost, because we would have played to our strength…..instead we lost by being the second best team who didn’t defend good enough…….. the manager must shoulder all of the blame for not reacting to Mancini’s game changing tactics…

Forgettable, utterly forgettable!! 

Again a lot of nonsense in here,
Our strength throughout the tournament has been the defence, the best in the tournament in fact so we did play to our strengths.
Even last night we defended outstanding Pickford had one save to make and he made it but it came off the post for them to tap in.
All this rubbish about all the good attacking players we have, people are forgetting that for years we’ve played all our best attacking players and shoe horned them into a side and all we got was abject failure.
Southgate has transformed the national side that is obvious, the last major tournament before him we got knocked out by Iceland.
Look How far we’ve come, enjoy the ride instead of looking for things to moan about all the time that aren’t there

Great post dickos.

One moan from me.
I do think playing Mount on the left was a mistake. He had almost no influence on the game from that position and in the 2nd half I almost did not know he was on the pitch.
Massive tactical error imo. The only one Southgate made in the 7 games imo.

Penalties takers, bizarre but surely they were decided before the kick off.  So it’s just having enough bottle and a little bit of luck on the night.

[dickos1]

Penalty takers were picked beforehand so it must have been decided in training with the best penalty takers.
It’s a euros final the pressure was unbelievable just standing in the stadium so imagine what the players must have felt.

[Filo]

Maguire showed how to take a Penalty, hard and high, no poncing about