The Euro 2012 Thread

[Dave]

Ah yes I see, sorry Andy for any confusion, however you did not make it clear which greek team you were talking about.

For me Nick, I would not have Andy Carroll any were near the England team, let alone put him on for Rooney, nothing agianst Carroll as a player, however it's his style of play, and what he forces the team to do.

As much as Roy Hodgson got it right in previuos games, think he got it all wrong last night, what on earth was the point of bringing on Walcott with Carroll, the moment you bring on Carroll you know whats going to happen, boot it long to Carroll who heads it on and hopes for the best, Walcott never got in the game because we were by passing him and chucking the ball up to Carroll, who was heading it everywhere and anywhere, but to an England player, largly because their was no one up there.

For me Milner is not an international standard player, and Ashley Young had a poor tournament, for me the change last night should have been Chamberlian and Walcott for Milner and young, and left Rooney and Welbeck on, maybe at alater stage brought on Defoe for Welbeck, the team were passing the ball fairly well untill Carroll came on, and we went hoof after hoof ball.

[stevegull]

On the contrary forevertufc, I think England stopped passing the ball about 20 minutes in.

I was thoroughly encouraged by the start we made, as we looked to break with some speed and midfield 'enforcers' Gerrard and Parker appeared to have a little more freedom to drive at the Italian defence. As well as the breaks, we had some periods of pressure, which encouraged me further.

However, for some reason, the encouraging start seemed to abruptly halt. England became incredibly wasteful in possession and seemed incapable of showing any kind of invention to get the ball forward. I think Roy was probably forced into the Carroll change, as the team already looked devoid of the ability to string passes together down the flanks to attack. Instead Roy decided to give the team a target to aim for, and it largely worked as his flicks bought the defence time and bought the attack some occassional possession if they collected the ball.

If Roy wants England playing like they did in the first 20 minutes, then great, and i look forward to watching England under Roy. However, if he is happy with the performance for the rest of the game, then i fear for our qualification for the world cup despite being in a VERY average group.

[Plymouth Gull]

As a nation, we will always be behind the other leading nations. Our top league has about 25% of English players in it. That's the problem. The Premiership has sacrificed the country's chance of success for money. Until the FA come up with a rule along the lines of 'you have to have x amount of English players in your starting 11/squad', we will always be so far behind the likes of Spain, Germany, even Italy. The FA should look at what Germany did 12 years ago, they pumped £750m into youth development, making it harder to get coaching badges, and so on. We need to do similar. Unfortunately, it won't happen. We'll continue to pin all our hopes on Wayne Rooney, who has never turned up at a major tournament for England. Until he does, he will never, ever be at the same level as the worlds elite. Look at Ronaldo - he has practically singlehandedly got Portugal into the last four. I hate the bloke but he is a brilliant player.

I agree with you about the likes of Carroll. They shouldn't be near the squad. But that's how far we've fallen on the national front. Hodgson is the right manager, in my opinion, and he's done well with the squad we have, but I just feel we'll never be able to really challenge Germany and Spain because of the lack of home talent in our top flight.

[Southampton Gull]

Sorry Dave but after 20 minutes our passing was absolutely abysmal. It was like watching some Conference standard players trying to play against Barcelona, absolutely terrible to watch and how Ashley Young managed to figure in all 4 games is beyond my comprehension, he was dire in every game. Agree with you about Carroll, Defoe and Wellbeck would have been a far better combination than any other. We looked an average team at best and at worst were incompetent.

I'm all for getting rid of Terry, Gerrard and Lampard, Parker etc and blooding the youngsters, we should have done it in the lead up to this tournament, let's face it, with an underperforming team we were still one of the top eight teams in Europe and with a little bit of forward thinking we could build a side to compete with the very best.

[Dave]

Stevegull, Dave S/G , yes I take the point, our passing from the 20 minute mark was no were near to the standard it should have been, I think you both uderstood however where I was coming from, which is the moment you bring some one like Carroll the team instantly is going adopt a different style, predictable throw it up to Caroll, who was blindly heading it on.

To me bring Chamberlian with his pace and power, also a young lad whp plays with no fear, and the pace of Walcott the other side, with Rooney and Welbeck still on, the team would have been encouraged to continue to pass it the right way, get a few passes out to Chamberlian and Walcott who would have had the beating of the Italian full backs all day long may have forced Italy to have droped off a bit, and relieved some of the pressure.

Actually felt sorry for Rooney last night, he was completely isolated, and often found himself 1 against 3-4 even 5 at times yet we expect him just to do something, thought he did well just hold possession the number of times he did.

[cambgull]

I was furious last night, I spent half the game shouting "CLOSE HIM DOWN" at the telly. How many times did Pirlo have the ball with no England player within 20 yards of him? Gerrard and Parker were not working hard enough for me, at all. When off the ball, we needed to have Welbeck up top and let Rooney fill in that attacking midfielder role he does quite well. Getting the ball from deep and starting off the attacks, the job he does for United every week and does very well. The 5 man midfield of Italy just took control after 20 minutes and we never had a chance of breaking out of our half.

Poor tactics from Hodgson, far too negative and it seemed like we didn't even try to combat the Italian approach, we just seemed to let them do whatever they want in the hope that the defence would sort it out. Fortunately, they did. Terry I thought had a very good game, I was ready to slate him and say he should never play for England again but actually, he was a rock. Lescott was average at best, I'd pick from Jones, Smalling, Cahill, Jagielka and Bob Smith down my local before choosing Lescott.

Time to start thinking European, 4-4-2 just doesn't work, hence why no other clubs/nations play it. One of the variations of 4-5-1 is usually the way to go. 3 in the middle who play simple passing football and wear down the opposition team, just like Italy did to us yesterday.

[Colorado Gull]

England were quite simply awful for about 80 minutes of the game, the extra time period was us just hanging on for penalties and we all knew what was going to happen at the penalty shoot out! We had a good 10 minutes knocking the ball around nicely and creating chances in the first half, but the rest, the second half and extra time was just abysmal. Our passing, overall, was terrible and we gave away possession so easily. When Italy was on the ball, we gave them so much space and the offside trap that we were playing to, was just not working!

Hodgson had the tactics all wrong IMO. I think he's a good manager, but if you can't see Milner is rubbish, Young is rubbish, Rooney is rubbish etc and you persist on playing them in the wrong formation, you've got no chance. I too am all for the likes of Terry, Cole, (even though I thought that they had a good game last night, a part from Cole's penalty!) Lampard, Rooney etc and bring in some young blood that would be fantastic. Get some players in that actually want to play for their country and actually perform like the way they do for their club! But the fact of the matter is, I don't think any manager has the bottle to do that.

[AustrianAndyGull]

Spain were deserved winners although they took time to come to the boil after a few tepid games. They are untouchable and i can sort of understand their tactics when most teams that play against them work hard and pack the defence and hit on the break. They pass them to death, tire them out and eventually they inevitably break through in the end. It is just a sad state of affairs when nobody is prepared to attack Spain and try to play them at their own game instead of employing the same tactics against them. I can understand why opponents do it but they aren't doing themselves or the game of football any favours to more or less admit defeat and go out there expecting defeat but hoping to shut them out. I enjoyed the tournament overall but was disappointed at the lack of 30 yard screamers or outside the box free kicks and special goals, there were a few but nowhere near like in other tournaments. Player of the tournament for me is Iniesta with best goal Van Der Vaart against Portugal. Well i'll look forward to the WC qualiifiers now and of course the certainty of Austria not qualifying again.

[Plymouth Gull]

Was it boring? Not a chance.

Jordi Alba was absolutely quality.

[happytorq]

Still think that Italy could have given them a game - critical juncture was Prandelli taking off Montelivo (who was really growing into the game) and replacing him with Thiago Motta - who pulled a hamstring 5 minutes later. They had no chance playing with 10 men for more than half an hour.

I mean, Spain probably would still have won, but I felt that in the opening few minutes of the second half Italy were starting to ask a few questions. playing with 10 men really messed that up.

And no, it wasn't boring - that's what Spain can do when they play with more of an intent to actually...score. Some of their games are rendered uninteresting because of their tendency to play keep away for 90 minutes. I know a 1-0 win is all that is required but still.