Cricket-Match-Special ... A forum for discussion

The nation's cup, what is the point?

I preferred it when it was meaningless friendlies.

If it was down to me I'd shut down international football for a year between tournaments.

Also, how on earth in Jordan Henderson in the England or Liverpool side? He's worse than Milner!

ITV's highlights of the math showed 15 mins.... of which about 3 or 4 were watching the medico's helping Luke Shaw, so it's hard to assess England's performance.

From what I saw, Rashford ought really to have had a hat trick, Kane was way off the pace, England were poor defensively, and the ruled out equaliser looked like a perfectly good goal to me..... says to keeper that if you completely misjudge a catch and spill the ball in front of the attacker to poke home...... make sure you bump into that attacker and go to ground to get it cancelled out.

injury to Shaw looked nasty.... for once, Sergio the thug was nowhere near that sort of incident

Yeah seems like a pointless 'tournament' to me, Friendlies weren't too bad, at least gave some fringe players a go, but whole thing here seems pointless....or just do qualifiers and do away with other international matches

0-0 in front of an empty stadium really doesn't get anyone enthused in the slightest about this ridiculous tournament. Get rid.

Got to put up with two weeks without top flight club football for this pile of shite. Well done Gareth Southgate for the decent showing in the World Cup and all that, but essentially you're a second rate manager, and pretty boring, and I'm getting fed up seeing your face on our tv screens for two weeks out of every month. Kindly do one and take that ridiculous idea of the new young breed taking England to greatness in the future with you. It isn't going to happen, they'll win the odd under 17 tournament, but as they won't get a look in in top flight football that's as far as it goes. TBH I don't care a tosh about the England team anymore, club football is where it's at, and what motivates the vast majority of football fans in this country.

Not being on FTA TV won't help things. I watched the ITV highlights, of which there was not a lot and I was a bit bemused when the panel started to discuss Kan'e disallowed goal, because I had noticed it when watching the highlights. Not surprising that I missed it, because I went back through the match highlights and it wasn't there.

who in their right mind edits out a disallowed goal, and having taken that decision, then discusses it later?

No wonder I hardly ever watch ITV

change of formation for England. 4-3-3, which suggests that SG is confident about the pairing of Stones and Maguire

England still missing lots of goal opportunities, Rashford guilty this time. Dier hit the post and Kane the crossbar. Probably should have been a narrow England win

Holland thrashed Germany 3-0!

Virgil van Dijk headed past a Neuer who was all over the place. Depay took advantage of a slow moving German defence to make it two. Wijnaldum cut through the hapless defence to wrap it up.

mikesiva wrote:Holland thrashed Germany 3-0!

Virgil van Dijk headed past a Neuer who was all over the place. Depay took advantage of a slow moving German defence to make it two. Wijnaldum cut through the hapless defence to wrap it up.

Shame Holland were not at the world cup. but we got to watch panama instead

Holland missed the Euros prior to the World Cup, been going through a lean period in recent years.

Possibly now coming out of it, lack a high quality striker though.

budgetmeansbudget wrote:Holland missed the Euros prior to the World Cup, been going through a lean period in recent years. Possibly now coming out of it, lack a high quality striker though.

The Dutch are going through a bit of a crisis of how to approach football in the modern age. In the 70s to 90s, their top teams were revolutionary in coaching players, and their youth setups were an example to the rest of the world, but everyone has copied their systems and learned from them, and now they no longer hold an advantage. Dutch media seem to think that the Division is at (by far) its worst levels of quality in nearly 50 years, and I guess this can to a certain extent be show by how many of their talented players find their way to top clubs. There used to be a mark of "hes dutch, hes young, he will be good", and those players filtered to top clubs; now top clubs are scared excelling in the Dutch league means nothing.

Looking at the team, its a mix of younger stand out lads from domestic leagues who are yet to attract foreigners, or failed imports like Babel, Depay, Blind. The exception could be the two Ajax lads, de Ligt and De Jong are seen as the next generation, and City and Barcelona are apparently trying to sign them. If they turn out to be flops like others in the past, then its hard to see how Holland can move on.

To give you a perspective of the perceived problems, only last week the Dutch mega clubs (PSV, Ajax and Feyenoord) all reached an agreement where they will voluntarily start to give up champions league revenue to be shared to other dutch clubs, in the hope extra investment in the middle and bottom of the league will improve the quality, and help the top clubs players to play better football, which has knock on effects in Europe and Internationals. I think this year 10% each of total revenue is distributed, but over the coming years it will start to increase to 50-60%. Pretty amazing of these clubs to come together and volunteer this, but the Dutch are clueless how to work out the funk, and are trying once again to think out the box and get investment into the grassroots.

Well this is going well for England.

And just as you said that Spain score!

Not that I've watched any of it, get those buzzes from the Fotmob app, and couldn't quite believe the first three. The fourth buzz was more expected.

Nice to see Sterling having a quality game

after the first 3 buzzes im sure you thought the app was broken.

sussexpob wrote:Nice to see Sterling having a quality game

That first goal was pretty special.

yuppie wrote:

sussexpob wrote:Nice to see Sterling having a quality game

That first goal was pretty special.

Yes, very nice finish. Build up to the third was nice