WC 2014 Match 22 - Uruguay vs England

[jd82]

Basically what I couldn't be bothered to write. Especially the last line.

[Royalclapper]

'We could've won both the games?'

And 'England have played better than the majority of other teams'.

Crikey, that is exactly the kind of spin that means England will never be able to compete seriously for a tournament win. We played well at times against Italy but they slowed the game down to a snails pace to suit them and then raised it when they needed to, they were always in control of the outcome of that game.

Last night was one great scrappy mess decided by the class act on the field, I agree with the ref comments though - we got bugger all out of him.

[Libertine]

England was ranked 3rd in their group in terms of world rankings (10th) behind Uruguay (7th) and Italy (9th). And if they defeat Costa Rica that is probably where they will end up in the group.

I was lamenting the US's draw with Germany, Portugal and Ghana. England got almost as tough a group as the US did. They got defeated by two highly ranked, very skillful teams, who have a good deal of world class difference making players. What I saw from England was they have no player who is a difference maker, a player who can rise to the occasion and give you those moments of brilliance needed to win close games against world class opposition. Italy and Uruguay have those players. Why do Italy and Uruguay have those kind of players and England don't? I think a case could be made about it coming down to the nature of the professional leagues in England and their reliance on foreign born superstars instead of homegrown ones. All the best players in the PL seem to be born in places other than England...

[Ouroboros]

'We could've won both the games?'

And 'England have played better than the majority of other teams'.

Crikey, that is exactly the kind of spin that means England will never be able to compete seriously for a tournament win.

Agreed - for all our quality on the pitch, the standard of our interweb mongboards is years below that of the major nations. Something needs to change.

[jd82]

England was ranked

I know this isn't exactly your fault, but it really winds me up when you Yanks refer to teams in the singular like this.

[soggy biscuit]

England was ranked

I know this isn't exactly your fault, but it really winds me up when you Yanks refer to teams in the singular like this.

Agreed. Its no 'normalcy' though

[Hoop Blah]

'We could've won both the games?'

And 'England have played better than the majority of other teams'.

Crikey, that is exactly the kind of spin that means England will never be able to compete seriously for a tournament win.

Well, we've played two good sides and run them close. We've lacked that composure, class, fortune, call it what you will, to get us a result in either yes but IF (and I hate to use an if, especially when it's referee related) we'd got the penalty against Italy and Godin got sent off last night we could easily be sat on 4 points right now without really playing any better.

Although they won, I think we outplayed Uruguay over the 90 minutes. They had us on the ropes after half time, but apart from that I think we were the dominant team. We weren't great no, but we still edged it IMO.

Elsewhere, Spain, Brazil and Argentina have been just as bad, if not worse than us against largely weaker opposition. Watching Portugal get ripped apart by Germany (the best team performance in the tournament for me) I didn't see anything in their performance to think they'd played half as well as us against Italy. Chile, France and the Netherlands have looked good yes, but the lesser have had entertaining games but I can't say I've seen many sides that have looked better than us against Italy or for periods of last night.

England fans seem to expect perfection from our players and the team as a whole. No team in this tournament is going to live up to those expectations let alone our side with a number of players who are too average to excel at this level.

[tulip]

England was ranked 3rd in their group in terms of world rankings (10th) behind Uruguay (7th) and Italy (9th). And if they defeat Costa Rica that is probably where they will end up in the group.

I was lamenting the US's draw with Germany, Portugal and Ghana. England got almost as tough a group as the US did. They got defeated by two highly ranked, very skillful teams, who have a good deal of world class difference making players. What I saw from England was they have no player who is a difference maker, a player who can rise to the occasion and give you those moments of brilliance needed to win close games against world class opposition. Italy and Uruguay have those players. Why do Italy and Uruguay have those kind of players and England don't? I think a case could be made about it coming down to the nature of the professional leagues in England and their reliance on foreign born superstars instead of homegrown ones. All the best players in the PL seem to be born in places other than England...

Agreed. England needed a Suarez then they probably would have won. The Premier league IS the problem.

[soggy biscuit]

Before the PL was in place we were world beaters!

[melonhead]

if English players are not good enough to play in the prem why is this going to improve by making it less competitive

You get good enough by being given the chance to develop properly and play.

At the moment the first sign of a decent young English player they get snapped up to rot in a big club's reserves, or get overexposed and overpressurised too soon.

thats no ones fault but their own tbf

[Avon Royal]

Genuine LOL at all the people using the FIFA rankings as some sort of justification for England failing to get out the group

They have the Netherlands at 15th place FFS. They are utterly irrelevant.

[soggy biscuit]

33% of kids are overw8 and 20% are obese so we are already rounding the pool of potentials down to 47%, split that in half for girls and boys (though being a young fatty is more of a girl problem than boy problem) and you are down to 23.5% to choose from.

stop them eating so much cake and we will deffo get better

[Bandini]

I'm getting irrit8d with the various calls for change and so on and so forth. I'd like to see a pundit just say that we should do nothing and w8 for the accidents of genetics to produce a team of world beaters.

[mr_number]

I'm getting irrit8d with the various calls for change and so on and so forth. I'd like to see a pundit just say that we should do nothing and w8 for the accidents of genetics to produce a team of world beaters.

The real question here is why w8 for accidents? Can't we force some of our less shit players to get friendly with some of the leading wimmin players? Isn't this the answer?
(If it is, I'm claiming all credit when we win the world cup in 2040)

[soggy biscuit]

Make it easier to adopt babies from Brazil

[Hoop Blah]

Genuine LOL at all the people using the FIFA rankings as some sort of justification for England failing to get out the group

They have the Netherlands at 15th place FFS. They are utterly irrelevant.

Of course they're not utterly irrelevant. They're a reasonable reflection of form and, less so, ability.

Netherlands are lower ranked than they should be if you're just comparing the quality of the players available to them, and Switzerland over-rated, but it's based on their results and Uruguay are still a decent team and Italy likewise.

Ours is a tough group and they were two tough games. It's like Everton or Newcastle playing United and Spurs and being distraught at not winning both games depsite having a good chance of doing so in both games.

It seems all that sensible lowering of expectation has been thrown out of the window.

[Whatevs]

I'm getting irrit8d with the various calls for change and so on and so forth. I'd like to see a pundit just say that we should do nothing and w8 for the accidents of genetics to produce a team of world beaters.

The real question here is why w8 for accidents? Can't we force some of our less shit players to get friendly with some of the leading wimmin players? Isn't this the answer?
(If it is, I'm claiming all credit when we win the world cup in 2040)

you'd have to drown the females that get produced

[Whatevs]

@NateSilver538
Cheer up, England! You still have a 4% chance of advancing. http://fivethirtyeight.com/interactives/world-cup/

http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/were ... -a-chance/

[Ian Royal]

Genuine LOL at all the people using the FIFA rankings as some sort of justification for England failing to get out the group

They have the Netherlands at 15th place FFS. They are utterly irrelevant.

Of course they're not utterly irrelevant. They're a reasonable reflection of form and, less so, ability.

Netherlands are lower ranked than they should be if you're just comparing the quality of the players available to them, and Switzerland over-rated, but it's based on their results and Uruguay are still a decent team and Italy likewise.

Ours is a tough group and they were two tough games. It's like Everton or Newcastle playing United and Spurs and being distraught at not winning both games depsite having a good chance of doing so in both games.

It seems all that sensible lowering of expectation has been thrown out of the window.

Agree with virtually everything you've said over the last page or so. The good performance against Italy and disappointment of the result, combined with Uruguay's shit start against Costa Rica for people to forget that everyone with a brain thought we'd do well to get out of the group before the tournament started.

Our friendlies were not a particularly positive sign.
Our pre-tournament preparation involved the weather not actually being as comparable as we wanted
We got injuries and suspensions
We had to play our first game against a really good team, that has our number, in conditions poorly suited to us.
We played our second game, needing to win with all the pressure that brings, against a good team, that has our number, who'd put in a really sub par performance in the previous game and got their best player back for us
We had a young team, light on experience and not used to playing together

If you just look at performances, there are certainly issues, but there are also a lot of signs of growth. If you just look at results and ignore context then yeah, we're shit and the sky is falling.

The aim must be to keep Hodgson for now and see how he solidifies a team into qualifying for the Euros and how they do there.

[winchester_royal]

Not sure that a cap on foreigners would help tbh. It would just make the few talented Brits even more in demand, meaning that those who show even an ounce of talent at youth level will get snapped up by the bigger clubs and when they reach senior level their wages increase massively thus increasing the divide between them and the public and no doubt lowering their 'passion' for international football.

The problem is not, imo, the premier league. It's looked to pump plenty of money into youth football and has made a number of structural changes over the years in an attempt to improve academies. We want to have one of the best leagues in the world. It's important for attracting young sporting talent into football and keeping national interest high. We want the football played in the league to be at a top level so that those English players who do play have the biggest opportunity develop, capping foreign players will severely impact this.. We want the league structure to be geared towards competitive football rather than just acting as a training ground for the national team as, lets be honest, major tournaments are once every 2 years and the domestic season makes up 80% of each year. I know who out of England and Reading I've been more worried about this season, and it isn't Wayne & co.

The issue comes with grassroots coaching and the quality of football being played at youth level. If academies produce good players then PL clubs will play them. You only have to see the premium paid for top English talent by PL clubs to understand that. The path of blaming the PL is the easiest one, as it would be a quick fix if true, but the problem is a much deeper one.

The FA need to do more to attract intelligent young people into coaching. Having a decent playing career should not be the main criteria for being hired as a coach/manager. Coaching is about motivation/training/development and being able to kick a football pretty well does not necessarily make you good at any of those 3 skills.