Euro 2020 thread Italia Afterparty Function

[Rocko]

A quick thought experiment for you, dear reader:

Please name the top three managers in football today.

Now name the top five.

Now the top 10.

At any point in your process (we’ll forgive you if you got to seven managers and skipped a beat), did you name a manager in charge of a national team?

As Euro 2020 speeds through its knockout rounds, delivering some of the most memorable football of the current era, there has been a noticeable difference in the ebbs, flows and tactics of the games compared to what is seen in club football.

Europe’s top five domestic leagues rarely create matches as entertaining as Spain vs Croatia, for example. The Champions League, even when the stars align and two heavyweights are pitted against one another, can go months without manifesting a game delivering half the excitement that France vs Switzerland gave us. International football has always been a distinct entity compared to the domestic version, and this European Championship has seen those differences become more and more pronounced.

So what exactly is going on?

The most obvious difference between Euro 2020’s knockout phase (and indeed, the final days of the group stage) and club football, of course, is the format. The Euros are single elimination; it is win or bust for (nearly) every single game, creating a unique sense of jeopardy. To the audience, that is part of the thrill; an unexpected goal (Portugal), a freakish red card (the Netherlands) or some other strange alchemy of events (France) can see tournament favourites eliminated at a moment’s notice. In a sport as low scoring as football, single-elimination games increase the level of importance of freak events – one slip up and you’re out.

To managers, who spend the better part of two years planning for each tournament, that constant risk of jeopardy is a nightmare, and so Euro 2020 is seeing a number of its teams employ a very pronounced style of football in an attempt to control the chaos.

Didier Deschamps, for example, has spent years refining his France team in a way that doesn’t unleash his assortment of attacking talents, but first works to limit the spaces available to the opposition teams. Deschamps won the last World Cup gambling that if he could make his team solid before being spectacular, he could reduce the chaos of single-elimination international matches into a game of fine margins. Blessed with more talented footballers than any other country in the world, Deschamps then waits for one of his superstars to do something to win the match. That worked at Russia 2018 and, after a seven-minute spell in that last-16 tie against Switzerland where Hugo Lloris saved a penalty and Karim Benzema scored twice, it looked to be working again this summer.

Deschamps’ France, along with Fernando Santos’ Portugal, have won international trophies by working not to be “good” in a sense that fits the conventions of modern club football, but instead by trying to be “good enough to provide a platform for a superstar to swing a game”. There is a reason why Gareth Southgate talked up both those teams as “savvy and experienced” and possible educational tools as to how his England lads might start winning big tournament games.

There’s also a reason why France and Portugal have now both been eliminated from these Euros in thrilling circumstances – eventually, the chaos of international football will manifest itself.

“What takes you 60 sessions in pre-season to set a team up, you need to do it in three sessions with international teams,” said Roberto Martinez in a recent interview with The Athletic . Martinez’s club management career has been an interesting one, with transformative spells at Swansea City and Wigan Athletic dampened by a subsequent erratic reign at Everton. Now in charge of one of the best squads at this European Championship, it can be hard to quantify his tactical approach in the same way we might do, say, a Mauricio Pochettino.

We know Martinez has a tactical outlook for his Belgium team, but because of the limited contact time he has with those players over the course of the year, he must make adaptations and trade-offs based in part on what he sees in each player’s club performances. Martinez is one of the most successful managers in Belgium’s history but has openly spoken about how his skills perhaps lie more in the softer intangibles of football management rather than in leading whiteboard sessions.

Martinez can’t coach Belgium the same way he would a club side (Photo: Alexander Hassenstein/Getty Images)

In addition to this, the whiteboard sessions afforded to national team managers create different scenarios compared to their club counterparts.

There is less pressing at Euro 2020, for example, compared to the Premier League. What pressing we have seen at this tournament occurs in short bursts, with one team often sitting off once the opposition has established conditions for possession.

There is added impetus on set pieces as a means for chance creation, a long-developing trend from the World Cup three years ago. There’s “home advantage” in some games for certain nations, and then there is not in others. There are water breaks allowed in some games because of the heat and time of kick-off, but also not. There are travel distances between host cities to consider, injury issues, COVID-19 protocols to adhere to, and more. Even if Martinez got the 60 sessions he spoke of, he’d still be unlikely to plan for every eventuality at this tournament. There’s always an unknown unknown.

Football is regarded as a “weak-link” sport, where less talented players have a more noticeable negative effect on a team than a superstar can have a positive one.

In club football, with an abundance of training time, a home-and-away league format that allows for swings in form, and squads assembled largely from capital (as in, teams with higher wage budgets tend to always finish above teams with lower wage budgets), managers have the time and freedoms to tackle their own “weak links” before attempting to exploit the oppositions.

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, for example, has a weakness in defensive midfield at Manchester United, so to alleviate this he tasks both Fred and Scott McTominay with carrying out the work of one man, before asking Bruno Fernandes to play an intense high-risk/high-reward style of passing to make up for their lack of creativity from deep. The “Pep Roulette” system at Manchester City is Guardiola constantly readjusting his XI as he seeks extra margins to win games, and so on.

In international football, where there is less training time, single-elimination matches and squads assembled solely by nationality, coaches have to interpret weak links differently.

Portugal lost 4-2 to Germany in the group stage of these Euros in part because Santos could not hide his side’s weaknesses at full-back when Nelson Semedo plays, and Germany punished him severely.

In a league format, Santos would be able to correct that issue within a month, or perhaps bring in a player in a transfer window to change his team’s style of play. At a European Championship, he had a few days to correct the issue. Where club football allows for systems of constant, gradual refinement and adjustments, there is a greater need for international managers to “mend and make do”.

That international tournaments traditionally arrive every two years creates further rhythms and cycles that a manager must be wise to. Every manager still involved at Euro 2020 (and a few of those recently eliminated) is working towards (at least one) obvious, distinct window of opportunity for his team. Belgium’s comparatively small population and gaggle of defenders aged over 30 give Martinez added impetus to win now before the overall quality of his squad dips. Deschamps, Gareth Southgate and others could spend some time at this tournament thinking about the World Cup finals that begin in Qatar in 18 months.

International football managers work to different systems to club managers, and within that framework there are further different systems they have to develop based on the country they represent.

International football used to be closer to a strong-link sport, with some historically successful footballing nations winning tournaments largely based on the work of two or three superstars. However, the tactical developments in the 21st century — drawing on improvements in sports science, the boom in statistical analysis, and further exchange in cultural ideas between nations — have seen a change of approach from winning teams at recent tournaments.

Developments in coaching across nations, coupled with the near-industrialisation of youth football have also seen the gap close between the historically successful footballing nations and the smaller ones: England expected to ease past Iceland in the last-16 at the Euros five years ago due to these strong links but lacked the tactical system to respond after going a goal behind.

It is rare for a team to reach an international tournament without having at least two players with Champions League experience in their squad. Winning teams have to be sensible in their tactics, which, coupled with the limited coaching time available, means many top national teams play a safety-first, tactics-light, defensive style. However, they can be undone by one player in the dying moments of a game making a last-ditch effort of a pass, such as Granit Xhaka’s assist for Mario Gavranovic to make it 3-3 against France on Monday.

International football is many different, wildly oscillating forces colliding with objects that have spent years trying to become immovable.

This is not to say there are no tactics on show at this summer’s competition — the weekend’s last-16 ties saw Denmark shut down Wales by moving defender Andreas Christensen into central midfield to close off the space to Aaron Ramsey, and the Czech Republic beat the Netherlands in part due to Tomas Holes tracking the runs of Georginio Wijnaldum — but it is rare to see an international team play with the tactical structure of a club side (especially when attacking).

As mentioned above, football is a low-scoring sport, which means you can have small moments of oddity that create moments of wild variance – a longer, league format will eventually see those balance out. Euro 2020 compacts all of that variance into one month, adds several extra elements and then asks the managers involved to figure it out as they go along.

And that’s before we factor in that this competition is being played on the back of a massively-compacted 2020-21 club season that saw a number of the most talented and technically proficient footballers in the sport’s history perform with high levels of mental and physical fatigue.

Few players at Euro 2000, say, would have been able to replicate Pedri’s 30 yard-plus back-pass to goalkeeper Unai Simon on Monday, but Simon wasn’t aware of the spin and pace on the ball and it created a freakish own goal that put Croatia 1-0 up.

That’s what makes the Euros fun.

That’s what several managers at the Euros try to stop at any cost, only for it to happen anyway.

[Fulvio_From_Aughnacloy]

Here is Cox’s take.

Cox: England’s attacking at 1-0 was desperately poor. They failed when they were winning, not in the shootout

By Michael Cox 5h ago 167

For England supporters, it is a familiar feeling.

The sinking sensation after a defeat on penalties, certainly, but also the acknowledgement that England had been outperformed for the vast majority of the 120 minutes, and were flattered by reaching the shootout in the first place. Just like in England’s previous shootout defeat, at Euro 2012, England were given the runaround by Italy and spent the best part of two hours camped inside their own half.

An obvious theme throughout England’s Euro 2020 campaign has been the concept of tactical flexibility. England, once considered one-dimensional and stubborn, have proved capable of playing 4-3-3, 4-2-3-1 and 3-4-3, offering good structure and organisation in each system, as you’d expect of footballers accustomed to playing for top-level club sides under top-level foreign managers.

But flexibility isn’t simply about formations and systems, it is also about wider strategy, particularly in relation to the game state — because a side’s objective changes dramatically based upon the situation in the match.

If you’re losing, you need to chase the game and seek a goal.

If you’re drawing, you need to balance preventing a goal and scoring one.

And if you’re winning, the primary intention is to protect your own goal. It shouldn’t, however, be the sole objective.

Because, of course, if you are 1-0 up, you maximise your chances of victory by scoring another goal. If you turn 1-0 into 2-0 and then 3-0, things become a lot more comfortable.

All this is entirely obvious, of course, but this was England’s problem at various stages throughout this tournament, which ultimately cost them in the final. When Gareth Southgate’s side went 1-0 ahead against Croatia and the Czech Republic, their attack shut down and they concentrated upon securing a single-goal victory.

Nothing wrong with that; it qualified them for the knockout stage. But seeing a game through against those opponents is very different to doing so against Italy, and ultimately England were unable to record a clean sheet against a technically gifted, well-structured side, who were repeatedly given the ball back cheaply, and barely needed to worry about protecting their defence.

England were never going to dominate the midfield zone against an Italy side featuring the wonderful duo of Jorginho and Marco Verratti, and Luke Shaw’s goal within two minutes was only ever going to exaggerate the pattern of the game. You could have predicted the fact that Italy would attempt roughly twice as many passes as England, 820 to 426.

That was, in itself, fine. England’s defence is not desperately weak. But the unacceptable aspect of the performance was that England didn’t capitalise offensively on the change in score. There was a 65-minute period here when Italy were pushing men forward to get back into things, theoretically leaving space for England to break into, and England did nothing of the sort.

England played those 65 minutes like they were the final five minutes, tackling and blocking and intercepting effectively, but without any sense of a quick shift to a fast break. We are constantly told how important transitions are in the modern game, but England were desperately poor in those situations. A lack of plan or individual failings? A bit of both, perhaps, and Italy short-circuited any concept of an England attacking transition by counter-pressing quickly and winning back the ball.

Here’s an early example — Verratti plays the ball into Lorenzo Insigne, who takes a heavy touch.

Declan Rice steams in to win possession, treats this like a 50-50, and thumps the ball downfield aimlessly. A calmer player might have read this situation better and realised this was an opportunity to put England on the attack.

That might have been an isolated incident, but other similar situations followed. Here, Insigne again presents the ball to Rice…

…his touch is played between himself and Kalvin Phillips…

…there’s a brief moment of confusion between them, and Italy pounce to regain the ball, ending up in a better situation than when they lost it three seconds beforehand. Mason Mount would have been free to launch an attack, but England were unable to find him.

Shortly afterwards, Raheem Sterling tracked back to dispossess Verratti, knocking the ball through to Kyle Walker.

Walker thinks about a simple clearance downfield, then decides not to smash the ball away…

…tries to take his time…

…and then finds Insigne nipping in ahead to win the ball.

There’s an argument the aforementioned examples are about Italy’s counter-pressing more than England’s sloppiness, but even when under little pressure England did something similar. This Insigne cut-back is played straight to Phillips…

…who has no one around him, but launches the ball downfield towards Harry Kane…

…but Bonucci jumps in to win possession. England’s passing sequence lasted precisely one pass, and Italy are back on the attack.

The most damning example actually came at 1-1, when Maguire read play well and intercepted a pass, carried the ball out from defence a little…

…and then simply hoofed the ball out for a throw-in on the halfway line…

…with absolutely no evidence that he could have even vaguely been looking for a team-mate.

There is literally no attempt to make a successful transition into attack here — this is just kicking for touch and waiting for the ball to come back again. Maguire is often excellent on the ball, and played some good passes into attack when England had longer spells of possession. But in those first couple of seconds after regaining the ball, England just gave it away again.

It was most frustrating during that 65-minute period when England were ahead. They made this seem like one big struggle, as if getting an early goal was a dramatic setback. That’s when they should have thrived. For all the plaudits dished out to Giorgio Chiellini and Leonardo Bonucci, neither are particularly mobile. Chiellini was required to cover a huge amount of space when Emerson pushed forward down the left, and is very uncomfortable when dragged out towards the touchline. It took 90 minutes, until his cynical tug back on substitute Bukayo Saka, for England to test his pace.

England’s attacking speed is the envy of every other side in the competition, perhaps with the exception of France. Raheem Sterling, Marcus Rashford and Jadon Sancho comprise a trio of brilliant counter-attacking options. Playmakers like Saka, Jack Grealish and Phil Foden are all happiest breaking into space with the ball at their feet. Kane is exceptional at linking with counter-attacking runners at club level.

All these players can’t be on the same pitch at the same time, of course, but England should relish being 1-0 up; they should have been like Germany at World Cup 2010, who scored early goals against England and Argentina, which played into their hands because they could play almost the entire match on the break, and ended up putting four goals past both.

But in the final, between Shaw’s opener after two minutes, and Bonucci’s equaliser after 67, England only had two attempts at goal — one apiece from centre-back partners Maguire and John Stones, both at set pieces, both off-target.

Throughout the tournament, whereas Italy attempted seven shots in their seven matches in “fast break” situations, England only attempted one — Sterling, in the 120th minute of the 2-1 semi-final victory over Denmark.

That’s despite the fact England spent 265 minutes at 1-0 up in this tournament, more than any other side. That’s almost three complete games, but in that period England managed only 13 shots, and 3.0 xG, when you might have envisaged an attacking quartet, boosted by fresh options from the bench, to be creating repeated scoring chances.

England’s other trump card, aside from so many speedy attacking options, was the home support. But England retreated into their shell so dramatically that this became, if anything, a burden. For all the fuss about supporters singing “Football’s coming home”, English football fans generate atmosphere by reacting to events more than by creating a constant wall of sound, as you might find in other parts of Europe. Here, the home supporters had almost nothing to get excited about for long periods; no “Ooohs” when shots flashed wide, not even roars of encouragement as England launched breaks. There weren’t any.

Supporting England over the past month has been very different to analysing England.

As a supporter, you are desperately worried when your side are behind. But England were only behind for nine minutes, against Denmark, and during that period created two golden chances, the point-blank Sterling chance hit straight at Kasper Schmeichel, and then the move that led to Simon Kjaer’s own goal.

As a supporter, you’re tense when the scores are level. But England were, by and large, composed in those situations. Aside from a couple of nervy moments against Scotland, and one Timo Werner chance in the Germany game, England rarely looked like going behind.

As a supporter, you’re relatively relaxed when your side are ahead. But England did not maximise their potential in those situations, aside from against Ukraine. They nearly blew a 1-0 lead against Germany by gifting a chance to Thomas Muller in calamitous fashion and, in other matches, England were too content to sit on their lead rather than attempting to extend it.

England ultimately failed by losing on penalties after a drawn game. But really, they failed when they were winning.

[FlakeAway]

The victory is tainted @Fulvio_From_Aughnacloy

[Biff_Egan]

I’m inclined to believe Tiktok here.

[starryplough]

Squawka News

[Fulvio_From_Aughnacloy]

Kjaer and Schick robbed.

[Esso_Oil]

Jaysus Cashel looking well there

[Aristotle]

Lukaku over Schick is harsh on Schick.

Damsgaard unlucky too.

[farmerinthecity]

@Aristotle

Lukaku over Schick is harsh on Schick.

It is a ridiculous call.

[cowpat]

There’s an awful trampy undercurrent in Italian society. Gropey blokes and scantily clad women

[myboyblue]

I’ve warned you about posting Shite from Paddy Power here before. There’s lads on here who have a serious gambling problem and you’re in danger of triggering them.

[FlakeAway]

[myboyblue]

You’re a sick cunt

[cowpat]

Kind of has the look of a roaster who has a house abroad and back after a stint in the Canaries and out for a few pints.

[johnnysachs]

Having watched the game again last night England really had a paucity of ambition. Almost scared of winning. It will be interesting to see how they progress from here and ahead to Qatar. I think it will be looked at as 2 glorious opportunities spurned. Croatia in one semi final after coming through an easy enough passage at world cup and Italy who many English people/pundits may have perceived wrongly as more winnable that Spain, France, Belgium. They scored their only chance of note with Stones and Maguire having had you could say half chances from set pieces. Arguably the goal they got never gets scored if Veratti inexplicably did not stand so close to Insigne from the corner Maguire backpassed out of play.

[farmerinthecity]

They still have good players. That will stand to them obviously.

I really think what we saw on Sunday night was a manager and coaches out of their depth. They got their wing backs overlap right at the start from which their goal came but after that there were no tactical changes. The game is won in the 90-120 minutes and there was no sense of adjusting to how the game was playing out. Players have a lot of responsibility of course but international football is more fragmented player wise than club football, and coaches have responsibility as well. As a result England retreated and protected what they had - classic safety type behaviour.

Southgate’s CV doesn’t lie. Mediocre with Middlesboro from where he was sacked and then England U21s to the seniors. Holland, his assistant, mainly assistant roles. Up against Mancini who has won league titles and worked with top players time and time again. The sheer farce of bringing on two attackers cold to take penalties and ending up with them in defensive positions for the last Italy attack strikes me of complete inexperience and incompetence at that level.

The coaching team will remain until Qatar, and they will have learned from this, but to me that is England’s problem. They have the players.

[Little_Lord_Fauntleroy]

Other countries have better players

France have better players

[Big_Dan_Campbell]

I am nearly certain that Sven did the same with Jamie Carragher in 2006, brought him on in injury time of extra time against Portugal to take a penalty. He also missed.

[farmerinthecity]

They do but they have a good manager as well.

I am not necessarily saying that England have the best bunch of players but they have enough good players to be challenging at the top level.

[Fulvio_From_Aughnacloy]

Jorginho for the Ballon d’Or.