Kyle walker, Luke Shaw and graylish would have been my first three choices, stones should have taken one too, then Kane and Maguire.
The first three are street urchin types well able for it.
Walker and Shaw in particular if they weren’t playing would have been rioting outside. What passes for officer class these days.
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This is true, but picking lads to take penalties based on jumpers for goalposts in the park is fucking stupid.
It’s clear as day who the slightly deranged lads on the England team are, and who the mentally strong ones are. It is from these two groups alone you pick your penalty takers.
Picking a lad you’d want to wrap in a blanket and bring home (saka), and two lads you didn’t trust with even 5 minutes of football was just idiotic.
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Phillips too - the yorkshire lads are made of good stuff
Pickford and Phillips were next up after Saka
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He got it spectacularly wrong the misfortune.
Looks like Luke Shaw was 8.
Harry Maguire on the ball reminds me of the lad in every 5 a side whompkays at the back to tackle people but has a big target on his head when gets a pass.
Rashford seems to be getting the he’s only a young lad stuff that Jesse whats his name used to get, well into his mid 20’s.
Rashford is 23 with nearly 50 caps and over 200 professional appearances. He isn’t a kid
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Eh Italy had 20 shots. England had 6. Italy had 6 shots on target, England just 1.
There is a lot of “scoreboard journalism” that takes place alright where the result dictates the analysis. But Italy were very much the dominant team last night.
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He’s nearly 24 as well. Playing regularly for Man Utd and indeed England since 2016.
Pickford seems to hold too much seniority within the squad. There’s an advert on Sky of him saving a pen and then scoring one against Switzerland in a Nations League place shootout from a couple of years ago that portrays him as a heroic figure. 6th penalty taker🙄
He looks absolutely all over the shop there all shaky and everything.
England were well on top for the first 20-25 minutes - they had Italy run ragged. Italy were actually all over the shop, they had no shape and the passing was off. Jorginho went down off the ball and Mancini was able to get messages in - they steadied the ship until half time.
Southgate let England drop extremely deep in the second half and tried to protect the one goal lead, instead of doing what caused Italy problems in the first place. They ceded the tempo and midfield and started hoofing it out of fear. He looked at Mount doing nothing all night instead of getting pace on against the Italy back 4
I’m glad Italy won - they went balls out all tournament and were by far the most entertaining team to watch. That’s the type of soccer that should be rewarded
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Like a lad on a foreign holiday 15 years ago with a few printed out directions from Google Maps trying to find the correct bus station
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He’s like a teacher in a schools final talking to 13 year olds
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Always felt like England were playing a very rigid game and that there was very little freedom for players to express themselves in game. It suited tournament football in that they were resolute and compact with all the numbers back there but I don’t think the performances were as impressive as the outcome of reaching a final would suggest.
Southgate has done a good job by virtue of reaching a tournament semi-final and final back to back, which no English manager of the past 50 years has achieved but I still feel that they sold themselves short in an attacking sense. They had an incredible bench to choose from. I feel the development of Jude Bellingham over the next couple of years will aid their chances as they won’t be reliant on a Rice-Phillips midfield axis.
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There was a period towards end of ET with Sancho and Rashford waiting to come on, clearly just to take penalties. Italy had the ball and were in no rush and I thought they might run out the clock to prevent a break in play and allow the substitutions being made. Good thing they didn’t.
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Would England have been a bit vulnerable in those last couple of minutes with Sancho and Rashford on? They suddenly didn’t have a bank of defensive players to protect Pickford.
Oh absolutely England started better. (Funny though how the goal would have helped them. It was a great goal but it came after real panic from Maguire. I wonder how rattled they’d have been if they didn’t get the lead.)
As you said though Italy took that off them and controlled midfield and controlled where the game was played. I’m just pointing out that Italy dominated more of the game and as a result had many more shots.
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