England let us down again - they were a DISCGRACE.

[FamilyGuy]

Any defence of the England performance will focus on the doggedness of the England back four once Portugal had decided to push everything forward into getting an equaliser. But why the hell did the midfield settle into defensive mode? That simply gave all of the initiative to Portugal and wrote Owen and Vassell out of the game.

The entire England team fell into a defensive mentality, it got to the stage where if an England player kicked the ball vaguely towards the Portugese end, our players still sat back and waited for Portugal to collect it and come back at them. No imagination, no initiation, no chance of scoring...................................and then as soon as Portugal got their goal we miraculously remembered how to move forward again - and scored a bloody goal!!! Why didn't we do that earlier

Too little too late. Our players didn't deserve to win because for much of the game they didn't even try to win.

Beckham should resign as captain in favour of Gerrard.

 

[FamilyGuy]

..................and the referee should never be allowed to officaite in a game again. Inconsistent, undecisive bollocks!!

 

[Marshy]

Very Harsh Easy, and I have to disagree with you for once.

To say only Campbell and Cole can come out with there heads held high is over stepping the mark.
Although Campbell and Cole were star performers.
I thought the back 4 were superb all night, Neville and Terry both had very strong games when you consider we were under the cosh for 115 mins.

The problem was as soon as Rooney went of we lost the link from midfield to attack, we brought Vassell on, who is far to similar a player to Owen.

The goal was a definate goal obviously, The ref dissalowed it for a push and there clearly wasnt one.

HE SIMPLY BOTTLED it, and rumour has it this guy is in line for the FINAL ! ! ! ! !

 

[lincs seagull]

Easy i am shocked i agree with most things you say but this one is bollocks

yes same result again the defence was excellent but where forced to be with a poor keeper and a poor performance On the day from

Beckham, Gerrard, Scholes and lesser Lampard

We where not a disgrace we played well as a unit in four matches the major issue as ever with england is

A) we must stop revolving round one player Ronney gone we played one dimensional
B) out to penalitys no blame Beckcham summed his tournement up but how do we pick our self up we are getting to the stage where penalies and the team think we wont do it.

I am in shock pissed off and was close to tears for the first time i thought we would win the euros

but no disgrace boys we just have another two years to wait before the agony starts again

 

[Easy 10]

We where not a disgrace we played well as a unit in four matches

If you honestly believe that, then you've been watching a different tournament to me.

France - we had one of our "heroic failures" yet again. Backs to the wall, we defended for our lives and were unlucky to lose. But it was one-way traffic all the way, and the law of averages meant that sooner or later (as it turns out, later), the opposition would get something. You rarely win a match at that level by letting the opposition have the ball for 90 minutes.

Switzerland - we were piss poor. 3-0 was VERY flattering, and until we went one up, against the run of play, the Swiss (probably the weakest team in the tournament) were passing us to death and whipping in some EVIL crosses that we simply couldn't deal with. We were exceptionally lucky not to go a goal down off any one of a number of crosses which James allowed to bounce around in front of him. Its easy to be blinded by the scoreline, but if you watched that match again, you'd see how garbage our passing was - something that came home to roost BIG TIME last night.

Croatia - Excellent. The passing and movement was superb, and despite going a goal down, an equaliser always looked inevitable. Every time we had the ball, there seemed to be 2 or 3 options on for the pass, and we used it very well and battered them. That really was a top class display.

Portugal - I've said my piece. A shameful performance.

One good performance out of four - we deserve to be on the plane home. We stank the place out.

 

[lincs seagull]

Bollocks yet again this is the problem we where not playing well but we dug in and battled.

a disgrace would be players not giving as much as they could and some players out of form still tried hard.

disgrace is a f***ing stpid word to say england fan yeah right

 

[Skaville]

I think England had a good tournament. We scored 10 goals in 4 games. We lost to the host nation in a penalty shoot out in the quarter finals. It's not that bloody bad.

The ref wasn't great. Rooney got injured, the players had a day less to recover than Portugal, which however you look at is a factor in that heat.

At the end of the day, we just don't have a squad that is good enough to play seven games and come out on top. We have maybe fourteen players that are good enough and that's it.

Those fourteen players all tried their hardest, worked tirelessly as a team but got beaten by the better side. I'm disappointed but I have no complaints.

 

[London Calling]

f*** the "hard luck" stories. Yes, that goal in the 90th should have been allowed, and it is a DISGRACE that it was disallowed. But that would have completely ignored that fact that Portugal absolutely played us off the park tonight.

What the f*** happened to our midfield ? Lampard and Scholes could not find a white shirt to save their lives, Beckham was not involved, and Gerrard looked f***ed from the word go. We were ABYSMAL tonight, and I am f***ing angry. We were overrun by a pretty average Portugal side. England have let us down, big time.
Only Cole and Campbell looked like the players they are supposed to be, although Owen / Vassell did the best they could with the utter SHITE they were dealt with all night from the rest of the crap that was masquerading as a midfield.

The Rooney substitution was an irrelevence. The team just did not function as a unit from the word go - the passing was frankly embarassing at times.

No doubt the tabloids will focus on the travesty of the disallowed goal, but that really is a smokescreen. We got the perfect start against oppostition who, man for man, we should have been capable of overturning. And yet the whole match turned into a "HEROIC" reguard action from a match we were in a position to have controlled, and WON, at a canter.

Aside from Owen and Vassell (who did what they could) and Cole and Campbell (who were magnificent), the rest of those players should HANG THEIR HEADS - because all they did was thump it to red shirts all night, and quite honestly, we were damn lucky to get as far as pens.

I am LIVID.

AGREE WORD FOR WORD. WHY HAVE AN ATTACKING MIDFIELD AND THE DEFEND DEEP. WE HAD 6 ATTACKING PLAYERS ON THAT PARK.

PLUS WHY ARE WE SO INTO DEFENDING A 1-0 LEAD. WE CAN'T DO IT

LOOK AT OUR TRACK RECORS, WE DECEDE A GOAL NEARLY EVERY GAME. THAT IS NOT A SIDE CAPABLE OF DEFENDING.

CHANGE THE TACTICS SVEN.

AND GET SOL AS CAPTAIN. THE MAN WAS AWESOME AGAIN TONIGHT AS HE WAS IN THE WORLD CUP. A CLASS MAN AND DEFENDER.

LC

 

[Sorrel]

I agree with Jimmy Saville, there's no way I'd consider the teams efforts "a disgrace".

However, it is also my wife's fault. An hour before kick-off yesterday she was making arrangements for where we should go for the semi-final. I explained this would cause England to lose, but she persisted. And so we lost.

 

[Easy 10]

Bollocks yet again this is the problem we where not playing well but we dug in and battled.

a disgrace would be players not giving as much as they could and some players out of form still tried hard.

disgrace is a f***ing stpid word to say england fan yeah right

I AM an England fan and I desperately want us to do well.

But I am absolutely fed up to the back teeth of the same old shit. You don't win tournaments by "digging in and battling". That is simply NOT GOOD ENOUGH. We are led to believe that we have some of the best players in the world at our disposal. ANY old shit team can "dig in and battle" for christs sake - arn't we supposed to have a bit more about us than that ? Or is that the sum total of what our multi-millionaire, coveted "heros" are capable of when we come up against a bit of quality ?

As always, England talk a good game. All week we hear "the lads are confident" and "great spirit in the squad" and "everyone feels fully fit" - and then they run out and PLAY LIKE SHIT.

THEN we hear "terrible ref" and "it was hot out there" and "Portugal had an extra day to recover". Piss off. England were GARBAGE (again) and they've LET US DOWN (again). You might swallow the guff that Eriksson comes out with, but I certainly won't. We deserved nothing out of that game last night.

 

[Marshy]

You raise a couple of Valid points Easy, but your still being far too harsh.
Understandable i know as were all still pissed off but i think if you look at it again in a couple of days your opinion will change slightly.

As has been said we are the highest goalscorers in the competition that sais something at least, and just got a shocking ref decision.

 

[lincs seagull]

Easy no i dont except the one day less excuse yes its bollocks.

disgrace is still to strong we need to change mentality of players and the manager should extract this i dont like venables but he made people believe in them selfs

i doubt sven can do this in the hour of need.

i agree the ref did not help but was not the cause

certain players where poor but the team at no stage was a disgrace

 

[Rambo]

I have been anylising this game in my sleep all night.
We were not up to the challenge of Portugal last night.
Agree midfield were non existant, Beckham proved his ego is bigger than his skill at taking penalties.
We did not deserve to win on the balance of play, you can moan all you like about the ref, we just were not good enough.

Another let down, which is now perfectly normal and expected.

Oh well, another 2 year wait to get over excited, get to the quarters/semis and lose on penalties - really something to look forward to.

Could be worse - we could be Spain.

 

[Easy 10]

certain players where poor but the team at no stage was a disgrace

We'll have to agree to disagree on this then (and Marshy).

That team WAS a disgrace last night, because once again, they have let us down badly when it really mattered. Player-for-player, we should have been superior to Portugal in just about every department. And yet they absolutely overran us for the entire match.

If anyone had watched that match not knowing who Portugal were playing, they'd have thought England were some crap, third-rate backwater footballing nation for the display they put in. We have a RIGHT to expect players of the calibre of Lampard, Scholes, Gerrard and Beckham to get a grip, COMPETE, and provide some service for the likes of Owen and Vassell.

Instead, they utterly stank the place out, and once again we meekly surrender, clutching our usual hard-luck story. Disgrace is not too harsh a word for it at all - and its typical that we accept performances like that which cost us these tournaments without giving it the condemnation it fully deserves.

 

[Marshy]

Agreed, we will agree to disagree !

Easy id be interested in your thoughts on my " Time to change Manager " thread.

 

[London Calling]

We'll have to agree to disagree on this then (and Marshy).



If anyone had watched that match not knowing who Portugal were playing, they'd have thought England were some crap, third-rate backwater footballing nation for the display they put in. We have a RIGHT to expect players of the calibre of Lampard, Scholes, Gerrard and Beckham to get a grip, COMPETE, and provide some service for the likes of Owen and Vassell.

EASY

LAST NIGHT AGAIN SHOWED THAT WHEN UNDER PRESSURE FROM A GOOD SIDE, OUR SO CALLED PLAYERS OF CALIBRE ARE NOT UP TO IT. THEY PLAYED PANIC FOOTBALL, DID NOT HOLD THE BALL AND WENT FOR THE EASY OPTION OF LUMPING THE BALL UP FIELD FOR OWEN TO FOLLOW.

LC

 

[Easy 10]

LAST NIGHT AGAIN SHOWED THAT WHEN UNDER PRESSURE FROM A GOOD SIDE, OUR SO CALLED PLAYERS OF CALIBRE ARE NOT UP TO IT. THEY PLAYED PANIC FOOTBALL, DID NOT HOLD THE BALL AND WENT FOR THE EASY OPTION OF LUMPING THE BALL UP FIELD FOR OWEN TO FOLLOW.

LC

Absolutely spot on LC.
All the excuses about refereeing decisions, tiredness, injuries, the temperature etc etc do not disguise the fact that our so-called star performers were absolutely pathetic last night. By half time, I was almost wishing Sven could throw on 7 or 8 subs like in his friendlies, or at least haul off the entire midfield, because to a man, they were totally incompetent and gutless. I just could not believe what I was watching - some of the passing was Sunday League stuff.

Beckham, Scholes, Lampard, Gerrard, Terry, and James should all be EMBARRASSED by their performances last night.

 

[Uncle Spielberg]

Even though we were " robbed " with a perfectly good goal, who could honestly say in the cold light of day and with no beer inside them that Portugal were much the better side over the 90 and wanted it more and deserved it more.

I was shouted myself hoarse but thought at the time how much more pressure can we take. The midfield just kept giving possession aay and their was no relief for 80 minutes for the defence.

Their equaliser was inevitable with the tactics we played.

 

[zefarelly]

agreed Gareth . . .it was just a case of when . . . .I thought when we scored it was going to cause more trouble than good . . .we'd have been better off going one down and being forced to up[ the performance to get back into it

 

[Seagull's Return]

Sky has some stats on England's midfield passing last night which back up the impression that the midfielders didn't do enough to control the game. I think it gives a 39% success rate for Steve Gerard's passes, which is pretty poor, and the rest weren't great either (they make the point that Scholes's passing was the most successful, but that he only made about 15 in total): overall there didn't seem to have been many passes at all from them in the match.

So yes, it seems England were robbed, but they could have done more to win the game anyway. As to whether that's a disgrace, I'm not sure. Certainly there's an argument that Engish football would benefit from shedding the idea that effort is a form of achievement in its own right, rather than a means to an end.