Everybody loves Gareth

[EmmersonForest4]

I think it is changing and has been over the last couple of decades, I agree grassroots still needs a lot more investment if we're to catch up with other countries but I think attitude towards the young players we're brining through has changed, you don't have to be a big Steven Gerrard type anymore to be considered good enough to 'make it' and those smaller, technical midfielders aren't being forced to play out wide these day, if Scholes was in his prime now there's no way he'd be playing left midfield for England like he was back then.

Its definitely changing but that I think is down to the clubs and St Georges Park getting these kids earlier and teaching them. I think the next stage is as Chris says about money and facilities.

Chris definitely correct on that and as a member of my local cricket club who pays membership each year and gets involved in funding projects like our bonus ball it does bear fruit. We have just had this year new nets installed at our ground that was partly funded by the club and they have been amazing.

Its not even necessarily about green spaces being sold off which of course dosent help we just need some better facilities that clubs can even share and more support for amateur coaching and even a stronger county structure with professional coaching?

 

[Lee]

After 3 minutes it should have been plain sailing. Too many players had off days towards the front.

Still, i'm very proud of what has been achieved even though we blew it.

 

[Francis Benali (on loan)]

Difficult to know whether he's genuine or not, Southgates always been a willing fall guy.

Id like to think Grealish & Sterling put their hand up before Saka though, both should have been further up the queue. Saka putting his penalty in the exact same spot Sanchos was saved probably testament to that.

It really doesn't work that. Standing on the half way asking for volunteers is how we approached penalty shoot outs in glory days of the nineties. It's how Southgate came to take and miss one while Paul Ince turned away. Anyone seriously suggesting we should go back to those days, come on. There's enough pressure as it is. At least let the player have no surprises, know their job, and be prepared so they can concentrate on executing what they already know they have planned to do.

There's no blame for Grealish, Sterling or whoever for not sticking their hand up in the heat of the moment. It's all pre-planned. They were never in the first five, and almost certainly would have been known before the Germany game.

 

[Trents]

Difficult to know whether he's genuine or not, Southgates always been a willing fall guy.

Id like to think Grealish & Sterling put their hand up before Saka though, both should have been further up the queue. Saka putting his penalty in the exact same spot Sanchos was saved probably testament to that.

Grealish has already said he asked to take one but the list had already been set by then.

 

[Project Zeus]

It really doesn't work that. Standing on the half way asking for volunteers is how we approached penalty shoot outs in glory days of the nineties. It's how Southgate came to take and miss one while Paul Ince turned away. Anyone seriously suggesting we should go back to those days, come on. There's enough pressure as it is. At least let the player have no surprises, know their job, and be prepared so they can concentrate on executing what they already know they have planned to do.

There's no blame for Grealish, Sterling or whoever for not sticking their hand up in the heat of the moment. It's all pre-planned. They were never in the first five, and almost certainly would have been known before the Germany game.

It's still a strange decision to pick Sako and Sancho to take the 4th and 5th penalties, even if that decision is made days in advance on the training pitch.

Even then, you've got to consider that they're young, inexperienced players who will feel the pressure more.

Sent from my SM-G960F using Tapatalk

 

[MASE]

It really doesn't work that. Standing on the half way asking for volunteers is how we approached penalty shoot outs in glory days of the nineties. It's how Southgate came to take and miss one while Paul Ince turned away. Anyone seriously suggesting we should go back to those days, come on. There's enough pressure as it is. At least let the player have no surprises, know their job, and be prepared so they can concentrate on executing what they already know they have planned to do.

There's no blame for Grealish, Sterling or whoever for not sticking their hand up in the heat of the moment. It's all pre-planned. They were never in the first five, and almost certainly would have been known before the Germany game.

I take the point, planning is everything but in this case there's a case for being reactive. Rashford & Sancho were caught cold, Saka was awful on the night & the latter two are kids.

 

[Raymondo Ponte']

As mardy Mourhinio once said about Arsenal's Wenger...

We're experts at failure.

 

[adam09]

Only based on cameos really but I don’t really see what Bellingham is. Not defensive and combative like a Rice or attacking like Grealish or Foden.

Sterling, goals on a plate aside, was largely poor again. Kane had a good half an hour then disappeared completely. Saka has done little except an easy square ball for an own goal.

I don’t get why Grealish and Sancho weren’t brought on earlier.

Think it says more about the level of competition than anything. Spain passed it about nicely but lacked cutting edge, Italy similar mostly resorting to long range efforts.

That said, it does make for more competitive games and a feeling anybody can beat anybody, which made for a really fun tournament.

 

[Francis Benali (on loan)]

I take the point, planning is everything but in this case there's a case for being reactive. Rashford & Sancho were caught cold, Saka was awful on the night & the latter two are kids.

It didn't work, so it's easy to knock the approach. We lost, and missed three. There were obviously errors.

But read anything from a sports psychologist and they'll say to perform under pressure, as far as you can eliminate the unknowns.

In 96 Southgate was asked if he would take the sixth. He didn't shirk the responsibility and said yes. But he has said he was not the right man to have taken that penalty. He hadn't taken a penalty before in pro football. He hadn't known he would be given the responsibility and had to decide there and then what to do with it. All these things muddling the thought process. And results from this approach England had speaks for itself. Volunteering on the spot just got England a lot of defeats.

Trying to eliminate the confusion and having players clear on when they would be up and what they were going to do have England a fighting chance in these things. We did win our last two. Whoever is on charge in the next World Cup has to continue with it, and just decide what we still got wrong to improve it.

On the issues with players coming off the bench just for one kick, or using a nineteen year old last, there are people employed to study data on all of that. If it was the case that players brought on specifically for penalties missed more, or teenagers missed more I don't think either things would have happened. It was all data-driven. We all nineteen year old taking the fifth and thought oh no, but we were basing that on a gut feeling with beer in hand sat in armchair or stood in a pub with all the knowledge of the average person you find our position in these circumstances.

Data determined sports tactics are never foolproof though, it takes out all the context and we came a cropper. It's been reported that they've found the fifth taker is not the most important. You put your best takers at the front. But this shoot-out didn't follow that. Maguire had the easiest penalty last night. There's less pressure when following an opponent who just missed. In the worst case scenario, he misses and it's still level. It showed because Maguire looked cool and took a brilliant penalty. Rashford then missed following an Italian who scored to level it. Sancho then had to score or we're hanging by a thread. Saka had to score are were fcked.

Nobody will need to point out to Sancho and Saka that they put penalties at the perfect place for the keeper to save them. They won't have planned to put them there. They didn't execute well under the pressure. And they both faced even more pressure than the kickers who went before them.

We went with the data and lost. But even then, Pickford saving two suggests the approach worked for the five England faced.

I bet one thing they will think they have to change from last night now is scrap the stuttering run ups. Donnarumma didn't flinch for Rashford's kick. And if it's too much on the spot thinking to muddle brains to ask players to watch the keeper and adapt during the shoot out, then you can't have that run up. Sancho stuttered, Donnarumma stood still as the last penalty had already indicated he would, and we missed again.

That's how I saw it. The approach was not wrong, it's just forming tactics based on data is not guaranteed to succeed. It's a percentages thing isn't it. We've won more than we've lost with it. We've certainly won more than we won with volunteering on the spot approach. That's as good as we're ever going to get it.

 

[MaxiRobriguez]

On the issues with players coming off the bench just for one kick, or using a nineteen year old last, there are people employed to study data on all of that.

I'm as big a 'data' guy as anyone here but I challenge the notion that there was enough data to warrant Saka taking a penalty ahead of Sterling or Grealish.

How many penalties has Saka actually taken in a competitive game? I genuinely can't remember him ever taking any.

Slotting it away in training is one thing with no pressure but Saka will have faced absolutely nothing like last night in his one year career playing for a mid-table side. Grealish has played in promotion and relegation deciders, Sterling in championship winning games.

Enormous pressure requires coolest heads to replicate what's done in training. Don't buy it that there was a raft of data on Saka to merit him as 5th choice. No way. Far too much responsibility heaped on his shoulders.

 

[Francis Benali (on loan)]

I'm as big a 'data' guy as anyone here but I challenge the notion that there was enough data to warrant Saka taking a penalty ahead of Sterling or Grealish.

How many penalties has Saka actually taken in a competitive game? I genuinely can't remember him ever taking any.

Slotting it away in training is one thing with no pressure but Saka will have faced absolutely nothing like last night in his one year career playing for a mid-table side. Grealish has played in promotion and relegation deciders, Sterling in championship winning games.

Enormous pressure requires coolest heads to replicate what's done in training. Don't buy it that there was a raft of data on Saka to merit him as 5th choice. No way. Far too much responsibility heaped on his shoulders.

I'm not saying there's data saying specifically Saka should take one. Everybody is questioning why a teenager was given the responsibility. I'm saying if bloke in the pub is questioning that, they would have definitely thought about that too. Given how much of the shootout is about psychology and who copes well under the pressure, they will have studied data on players ages and success rates along with everything else. Our hunch that Saka was too young for that will have been disproven by the data. And they'll say his miss was not down to his age.

 

[adam09]

Saka is a kid who has not long become a regular for Arsenal. He’s played a few big-ish games but nothing like that.

You can’t imagine that insane amount of pressure.

 

[Erik]

It didn't work, so it's easy to knock the approach. We lost, and missed three. There were obviously errors.

But read anything from a sports psychologist and they'll say to perform under pressure, as far as you can eliminate the unknowns.

In 96 Southgate was asked if he would take the sixth. He didn't shirk the responsibility and said yes. But he has said he was not the right man to have taken that penalty. He hadn't taken a penalty before in pro football. He hadn't known he would be given the responsibility and had to decide there and then what to do with it. All these things muddling the thought process. And results from this approach England had speaks for itself. Volunteering on the spot just got England a lot of defeats.

Trying to eliminate the confusion and having players clear on when they would be up and what they were going to do have England a fighting chance in these things. We did win our last two. Whoever is on charge in the next World Cup has to continue with it, and just decide what we still got wrong to improve it.

On the issues with players coming off the bench just for one kick, or using a nineteen year old last, there are people employed to study data on all of that. If it was the case that players brought on specifically for penalties missed more, or teenagers missed more I don't think either things would have happened. It was all data-driven. We all nineteen year old taking the fifth and thought oh no, but we were basing that on a gut feeling with beer in hand sat in armchair or stood in a pub with all the knowledge of the average person you find our position in these circumstances.

Data determined sports tactics are never foolproof though, it takes out all the context and we came a cropper. It's been reported that they've found the fifth taker is not the most important. You put your best takers at the front. But this shoot-out didn't follow that. Maguire had the easiest penalty last night. There's less pressure when following an opponent who just missed. In the worst case scenario, he misses and it's still level. It showed because Maguire looked cool and took a brilliant penalty. Rashford then missed following an Italian who scored to level it. Sancho then had to score or we're hanging by a thread. Saka had to score are were fcked.

Nobody will need to point out to Sancho and Saka that they put penalties at the perfect place for the keeper to save them. They won't have planned to put them there. They didn't execute well under the pressure. And they both faced even more pressure than the kickers who went before them.

We went with the data and lost. But even then, Pickford saving two suggests the approach worked for the five England faced.

I bet one thing they will think they have to change from last night now is scrap the stuttering run ups. Donnarumma didn't flinch for Rashford's kick. And if it's too much on the spot thinking to muddle brains to ask players to watch the keeper and adapt during the shoot out, then you can't have that run up. Sancho stuttered, Donnarumma stood still as the last penalty had already indicated he would, and we missed again.

That's how I saw it. The approach was not wrong, it's just forming tactics based on data is not guaranteed to succeed. It's a percentages thing isn't it. We've won more than we've lost with it. We've certainly won more than we won with volunteering on the spot approach. That's as good as we're ever going to get it.

There was nothing wrong with the approach to the penalties. It was planned and thought through, not random.

No problem with us missing penalties in a shootout. Shit happens and it is, no matter how well thought through, a bit of a lottery.

The issue was that it should never have got to penalties in the first place. Which is another matter.

 

[MASE]

I'm not saying there's data saying specifically Saka should take one. Everybody is questioning why a teenager was given the responsibility. I'm saying if bloke in the pub is questioning that, they would have definitely thought about that too. Given how much of the shootout is about psychology and who copes well under the pressure, they will have studied data on players ages and success rates along with everything else. Our hunch that Saka was too young for that will have been disproven by the data. And they'll say his miss was not down to his age.

I'm not convinced, everyone is different & Saka doesnt have anything like a portfolio you could bank on in terms of bottle. To that end, he should have been nowhere near penalty 5.

Im more inclined to think his fearless tendency to run at the opposition & a few decent penalties in training got him that gig. Suffice to say it didnt work.

 

[Francis Benali (on loan)]

I'm not convinced, everyone is different & Saka doesnt have anything like a portfolio you could bank on in terms of bottle. To that end, he should have been nowhere near penalty 5.

Im more inclined to think his fearless tendency to run at the opposition & a few decent penalties in training got him that gig. Suffice to say it didnt work.

Yeah, with hindsight he took a nervy weak penalty. Not the right call.

Just doubt his miss can be put down to his age. Think there will be plenty of players of a similar age who scored in big shoot outs.

I was trying think of young players off top of my head who took penalties in shoot-outs. Owen in 98, Prosinecki wasn't very old in 1990 and was about the only Yugoslavian who scored. Ronaldo in 04. They'll be loads.

 

[Francis Benali (on loan)]

Anyway, I had a feeling Pickford would save from Jorginho then score the winner himself.

That's who me as fan in my shed with some beer and no data would have gone with. He's scored before. He was a having great game, would have been on a high from the save. He was probably on sixth.

 

[forestzoe]

Just seen a video clip on the news from 2013 when Greg Dyke said the "plan" was semi finals for 2020 and win the WC 2022. They just reinterviewed him also where he stated that we are ahead of the plan as we made the final.

Sent from my SM-N986B using Tapatalk

 

[Master Yates]

Anyway, I had a feeling Pickford would save from Jorginho then score the winner himself.

That's who me as fan in my shed with some beer and no data would have gone with. He's scored before. He was a having great game, would have been on a high from the save. He was probably on sixth.

Pickford was 6th, Phillips 7th


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[valspoodle]

I'm as big a 'data' guy as anyone here but I challenge the notion that there was enough data to warrant Saka taking a penalty ahead of Sterling or Grealish.

How many penalties has Saka actually taken in a competitive game? I genuinely can't remember him ever taking any.

Slotting it away in training is one thing with no pressure but Saka will have faced absolutely nothing like last night in his one year career playing for a mid-table side. Grealish has played in promotion and relegation deciders, Sterling in championship winning games.

Enormous pressure requires coolest heads to replicate what's done in training. Don't buy it that there was a raft of data on Saka to merit him as 5th choice. No way. Far too much responsibility heaped on his shoulders.

This morning someone put together Saka's penalty experience and it was something like one penalty for the England U19s and two for Arsenal U21s. Never taken one for Arsenal first team. He must have been bloody good in practice.

And apparently Grealish offered to take a penalty, but was told the list had already been drawn up.

 

[ubik]

I bet one thing they will think they have to change from last night now is scrap the stuttering run ups.

Totally agree - I'd go further and ban stuttering run ups, but that's another argument.

I disagree with the rest of your post as the whole thing looked over thought out. From bringing on two supposed penalty aces in the last minute of the game to the too-clever run ups, it felt wrong.

If Rashford's penalty had gone in off the post everything might have been different, but I still don't agree with stop-start run ups.

 

[valspoodle]

Let's admit it, the whole penalty thing, with the late subs and the Saka fiasco, was a total balls up and belies the careful considered Southgate approach. He went for players from his Young England days.

 

[Francis Benali (on loan)]

Totally agree - I'd go further and ban stuttering run ups, but that's another argument.

I disagree with the rest of your post as the whole thing looked over thought out. From bringing on two supposed penalty aces in the last minute of the game to the too-clever run ups, it felt wrong.

If Rashford's penalty had gone in off the post everything might have been different, but I still don't agree with stop-start run ups.

Yep, perhaps. If there's anyone who is going to overthink a penalty shootout it is someone whose is best known for missing in one. Stuart Pearce in a recent book talks about the things they worked on to decide penalty takers with the U21s. He'd be another coach who was driven to try to understand how to win at them by past experiences.

But so long as his record in them as England coach is better than everybody else's, that's enough for me to say he is the first coach we've had who is on the right track with penalties.

I'd agree on the stuttering run. If it's not my team, I'm always happy to see any player who does it miss. Always seems a bit like gamesmanship anyway. Thought they were close to banning it back when Aldridge used to do it. But seems to be allowed now.

 

[adam09]

I can’t imagine Grealish not wanting to take one? He’s a confident lad and takes them for Villa.

 

[EmmersonForest4]

I dont think Southgate can get an enormous part of the blame here for the pennos. Yes the Saka one maybe a bit odd but Rashord is one of the best penalty takers in Europe and Sancho has taken them for Dortmund.

Sad thing was the English players just bottled it and nerves got to them. Southagte brought on 2 great penalty takers there was an obvious pre meditated plan and thats what you want really which is very good preparation.

I am not trying to have a go at the players by saying they bottled it, I know they didnt do it on purpose and I feel for them tremendously and Im hurting but feck me compared to them its nothing. But its just simple facts they bottled and let nerves get the best of them.

My hope is these experiences are taken into the future and capitalised on. You learn so much from defeat, teh next stage in our development is being able to press teams and get hold of the ball against the better sides.

 

[Haych]

Rashford usually takes good penalties, he’s scored a few high pressure ones as well.

It’s the saka choice which was madness, he’s so inexperienced and a player who’s a few years from his prime so I’m surprised he got so much game time over Sancho, Grealish who are a few years ahead of the lad in terms of development. Hopefully it doesn’t knacker his career before it’s started.