Russia 2018

[GLewis]

Why do they bother with that 3rd place play off, feel sorry for everyone trying to get up for that, I bet all the Belgians and English want to do is get home now.

Roberto said it was really important for Belgium to win it!

[GLewis]

Has anyone really thought it's a "this is it" moment though? All the excitement has come from there being no expectations, which should be remembered now. 4 years ago England didn't win a game. There's the context.

Yeah pundits and on line stuff saying this young team will only get better.

[GLewis]

Not an unrealistic shout.

If meant on a linear progression point of view.

[GLewis]

Defence and keeper is sorted. So is the striker. Need a complete new midfield apart from trippier.

Looking forwards to the young lad Foden at City to break through.

Don’t think defence is that solid for 4 years time at least; think Walker over 30, how much will Stones be playing, not sold on Maguire long term.

Also just think 80% goals from set pieces is massively skewed from the norm.

Plus (as with previous tournaments that are considered to have been not great) if lost the shoot out it would have ended at last 16 and there wouldn’t be any euphoria.

[GLewis]

Croatia were there for the taking. We played a great first half, and totally shit bricks in the second.  Lads did great getting to the Semi but we blew up. We let them back in the game, let them grow, and in the end looked deserved losers.

Despite all the hate hes been getting, taking Sterling off ruined us as a real mobile threat going forward.

Still, better than most competitions England are part of.

Don’t think it was a mental thing.

Controlled possession when the momentum isn’t with the team has been missing for a long time.

Even saw it in the Nigeria friendly. Looked good first half, as soon as Nigeria changed shape at half time all control had gone.

It’s difficult to find that type of midfielder though (and I think is one of the limiting factors of how we play here) - L’pool aren’t good at it either.

[GLewis]

Agree with that.

I'm talking more about changing the system.

Seemed obvious we were getting over-run in the midfield last night. Instead of asking Lingard to drop in making a three, he kept it as it was and we couldn't get control of the game.

Even the subs he made were just like for like and had no impact. For me he should've put Dier alongside Henderson and gone to a more 3-5-2, or 5-4-1.

Regardless he's done a great job and should take this team forward. I said prior to the tournament we should do with southgate what the germans did with Lowe

It was too narrow.

Once Croatia had control of the ball their midfield were able to switch play time and time again to overloads as there was a FB and winger vs a wing back.

Particularly on Eng left, it was the RB whonwas causing lots of problems.

Should have asked Sterling or Rashford to mark him.

[GLewis]

Also Modric and Vrsaljko can fuck off with their snarky comments. Will be humming La Marseillaise loudly on Sunday.

Saw Modric saying about pundits and stuff.

Which I think he’s right about. Under appreciation of the opposition is a classic trait (Rio, Neville both said things along these lines).

Vrsaljko was more specific. Must have been irked by something. From the sounds of it their team had been using media comments about them/ the game as motivation.

[GLewis]

Yeah I totally disagreed. People gave Croatia respect, but they just thought England would win, based on form and fitness. Plenty of neutrals agreed with that, and I didn’t think the tone was remotely nationalistic tub-thumpingz

Obviously not everyone like that (and actually thought a few of the new snippets were surprisingly accurate in their acknowledgement that Croatia do have top players) but they’re not making this stuff up.

Might have been a bit less this time round but there is always “surprise” on a general level when England go out. But when only been to 4 semis in international tournaments ever it should actually be the other way round.

And those two might have been extreme (but we know enough to be recorded by the other team) but what on earth had they seen to be anything other than 50:50 nudging towards England through hope/ natural support?

This is morphing into a punditry complaint but there should be more cold analysis than that.

The pattern of lose control of the game and get punished by decent opposition happens all the time.

[GLewis]

I was just reading his comments and didn't see a lot wrong with it, fair play for using it as motivation. The only thing I did think was it's a bit of an overreaction for fairly nothing comments, I don't think anyone was calling them poorer or weaker than England just that they may be a bit tired after two games going to extra time and penalties which is a fair assumption.

Which might mean there is a general thought across the world that England thinks too much of itself/ not enough of everyone else.

A campaign probably lead by @Confucius 

[GLewis]

The ignorance there is breathtaking. All of that would be true....about 20 years ago.

In fairness, we're not popular abroad generally, are we? If you see most of the comments sections on the Guardian throughout the WC, there's been lots of people from other countries saying how shit we are, saying how much we overrate ourselves, arrogance etc etc

I think pictures of English fans celebrating and throwing lager around have probably been transmitted around the world, and possibly given a slightly false impression.

Obviously, you get a few people getting carried away with the nationalism and all that (as with any country), but I do think it's been different this time. People had low expectations, they like the manager and what he was trying to do, and they respected the effort of a limited group of players, who were a Harry Kane finish away from probably getting to the final.

Also the it’s coming home stuff is taken by some to be ironic and lighthearted and others really do mean it.

You can imagine other countries thinking that it’s a bit presumptuous given actual achievements.

And yes that was over the top response from Croatian press - a bit bizarre that they would go to such length unless, as you say there is an issue (fair or not) - and it would take longer than one tournament of being reasonable for that to filter through.

So they could easily see comments from famous players (like everyone here does from Maradona, for example) and the its coming home stuff and think “no it’s not actually” or words to that effect

Plus, look at Eurovision