[Football] Southgate Stays

[Thunder Bolt]

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8 years before Southgate

Euro 2008: didn’t qualify
WC 2010: Last 16 defeat
Euro 2012: quarter finals defeat (1st knockout)
WC 2014: out in the groups
Euro 2016: last 16 defeat

After Southgate

WC 2018: Semis
Euro 20: Final
WC 22: 1/4s defeat

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[Justice]

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8 years before Southgate

Euro 2008: didn’t qualify
WC 2010: Last 16 defeat
Euro 2012: quarter finals defeat (1st knockout)
WC 2014: out in the groups
Euro 2016: last 16 defeat

After Southgate

WC 2018: Semis
Euro 20: Final
WC 22: 1/4s defeat

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Very favourable groups beats a few African sides and then loses every time against a decent European side. The penalty jinx only appears to be a jinx because they can’t score in open play against quality sides. Croatia/Italy both there for the taking against Italy Kane didn’t have a touch in the Italian box because he goes all Hughton.

 

[Rookie]

I don’t get it, both Southgate and Kane get an easy ride from the press (if Beckham or Rooney had missed the pen like Kane they would have been slated by the tabloids).
Southgate has been found wanting every time he comes up against a decent team / manager.
He has created a team in his own style, dull and defensive. He knows that no decent club would take him so it was clear he would stay on.

 

[drew]

Copied and pasted

8 years before Southgate

Euro 2008: didn’t qualify
WC 2010: Last 16 defeat
Euro 2012: quarter finals defeat (1st knockout)
WC 2014: out in the groups
Euro 2016: last 16 defeat

After Southgate

WC 2018: Semis
Euro 20: Final
WC 22: 1/4s defeat

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Stats look good but when you delve a little deeper, Justice is right about straightforward groups and the fact he can't beat top teams. It's a bit like praising Hughton because he took us to a cup semi final then you remember that we beat Bournemouth reserves, West Brom, Derby and got very lucky against Millwall!!!

 

[Stat Brother]

Stats look good

Thanks.
It's my phenomenal hair that sets me apart.

 

[Motogull]

Which Premier League chairmen would entrust Southgate with their side?

Beaky. He'd see it as another 'box office' appointment designed to appeal to investors.

Hopefully he won't be a premier league chairman for too long.

 

[smillie's garden]

Might as well, as Al Green would sing.

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

The talent at his disposal that never gets a game is criminal Trent wanting to retire from international football until Southgate goes says it all, BW will join him.

Is this true?

Couldn’t see it anywhere

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

Copied and pasted

8 years before Southgate

Euro 2008: didn’t qualify
WC 2010: Last 16 defeat
Euro 2012: quarter finals defeat (1st knockout)
WC 2014: out in the groups
Euro 2016: last 16 defeat

After Southgate

WC 2018: Semis
Euro 20: Final
WC 22: 1/4s defeat

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I would argue the players Southgate had to call on are much better squad wise, plus the players seem to actually be grown ups.

4 wins in 24 against top 10 side is the stat that matters.

 

[Icy Gull]

Fine with me.

And I don't even like him.

Come on, blow-hards, what would have (sorry, of) been a better option?

I’m in this camp too, but as I don’t feel fervent support for England that may be influencing my thoughts. If he was Albion manager I‘d be screaming for his head.

In fairness he had a better tournament this time imo, we did not go out on a whimper as in the last two

 

[Garry Nelson's Left Foot]

I guess I will continue to support Ecuador over England

Ecuador's loss is England's gain.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I’m in this camp too, but as I don’t feel fervent support for England that may be influencing my thoughts. If he was Albion manager I‘d be screaming for his head.

In fairness he had a better tournament this time imo, we did not go out on a whimper as in the last two

Club management is evidently as similar to international management as the test cricket snooze-athon is to that madcap 20-over competition

 

[One Teddy Maybank]

Fine with me.

And I don't even like him.

Come on, blow-hards, what would have (sorry, of) been a better option?

Potter - you shouldn’t have to ask

More tactical nous than Southgate could ever dream of, unlikely to have bias to individuals and arguably plays more progressively than Southgate.

Contractually would have been challenging for the FA, but undoubtedly a better option IMO.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

Thanks.
It's my phenomenal hair that sets me apart.

Thanks to you, and your Davy Propper posts of yore, ever since, when I watch telly football with my old pal, Bob the (retired) social worker, I normally find that I'm able to find a player about whom I can say "he's having only a moderately competent game....but he does have lovely hair".

An odd thing, though. While it is easy to find examples of lovely hair in the EPL, I find it much harder for lower league football, and the best I have been able to do at league 1 level is comment that player X "is having a bit of a stinker, but he does have quite nice hair".

All this, all of it, is your fault.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

Potter - you shouldn’t have to ask

More tactical nous than Southgate could ever dream of, unlikely to have bias to individuals and arguably plays more progressively than Southgate.

Contractually would have been challenging for the FA, but undoubtedly a better option IMO.

I though you had to have won something substantial to become England manager?

Hang on.....

No, as you were. Potter it is, then!

 

[TottonSeagull]

Southgate rewarded for failure again!

 

[West Upper Seagull]

Southgate continuing?

Never been a fan, but he's done OK. Just OK. I've got a feeling (not shared by many, I suspect, but that's their privelege) that Stevie G. might be better suited to an international role rather than club management. Unemployed at the moment - good opportunity to bring him on board in a junior assistant manager role.

Based on evidence so far, Stevie G has very little tactical nous and has relied on Mick Beale in the past - just ask the Villa fans. Appointing him would be a massive backward step in my opinion

 

[West Upper Seagull]

Southgate rewarded for failure again!

He’s not being rewarded, he’s simply confirmed he’s seeing out his contract - he’s not being offered a new one

 

[Garry Nelson's Left Foot]

Stats look good but when you delve a little deeper, Justice is right about straightforward groups and the fact he can't beat top teams. It's a bit like praising Hughton because he took us to a cup semi final then you remember that we beat Bournemouth reserves, West Brom, Derby and got very lucky against Millwall!!!

@Justice

Very favourable groups beats a few African sides and then loses every time against a decent European side. The penalty jinx only appears to be a jinx because they can’t score in open play against quality sides. Croatia/Italy both there for the taking against Italy Kane didn’t have a touch in the Italian box because he goes all Hughton.

I disagree.

This post has turned out longer than i intended so if TL;DR then:

Everything you criticise Southgate for was there but worse in the five preceding tournaments that @Thunder Bolt highlighted.

You're both ignoring the facts that:

2008 - we didn't even qualify. Southgate even gets shit for qualifying easily.

2010 - our group consisted of the U.S, Algeria and Slovenia. We drew with the U.S and Algeria and barely squeezed past Slovenia 1-0. We then got demolished by the Germans in the last 16.

2012 - Tough group. France, Ukraine, Sweden. We qualified unbeaten and then proceeded to play the most boring game of football I've ever seen(and I include fans utd 2 against Doncaster in that). I've never watched a game and wanted the opposition to score past us just so I could go to bed(we didn't leave our penalty box so there was no threat of us scoring), but no, the bus was so well and truly parked we managed to bore our way to penalties. Where we lost. This was the game where our most successful pass combination was Hart to Andy f***ing Carrol.

2014 - Group consisting of Uruguay, Italy and costa rica. A group of death that we died in. We lost to both Italy and Uruguay before gaining a heroic 0-0 draw against Costa Rica.

2016 - Group of Russia, Wales, Slovakia. We drew with Slovakia and Russia and only beat Wales with a last minute goal. We then got knocked out by Iceland.

So what we have in those five tournaments is:

one failure to even qualify.

two piss easy groups where we struggled to score let alone beat anyone, just about sneaking through before either getting humped by a decent team or losing to a bunch of fishermen and snowmen.

One hard group that we actually did well in before playing the most life endangeringly dull game before losing on penalties.

One hard group where we picked up one point. Against costa rica.

In short all the things that are used as criticisms of Southgate were there, bigger, more glaring and much worse in the preceding decade. Easy groups navigated badly, failure to beat anyone of note, knocked out by big/small nations, negative tactics, losing pk shootouts . You name it, we did it. Badly.

In contrast southgate has qualified for every tournament comfortably, has navigated the group stage easily(winning 6 and only losing 1 of those games), has won 6 knockout games, including winning a pk shoot out, has equaled our best ever tournament finish on foreign soil, has reached only our second ever final(a tournament where, incidentally, the first time we were behind in the whole tournament was after the seventh pk in the final shootout) and he's even managed to beat an actual big team in a tournament, something we hadn't done since 2002.

Give him some respect.

 

[Lyndhurst 14]

Southgate decides to stay on - fair enough.

Just don't expect anything to change because it won't