dullard England.
So Southgate’s mates in the media have kept him in the five million quid a year job, he’s yet again shown he’s unsuitable for.
Newspaper men telling us “we’ve never had it so good”, about a manager who has basically done what all his predecessors have done, lose when it came to the crunch.
Amazingly there’s been one person who gets it… of all people Jamie Redknapp…
Should England be disappointed with their World Cup performance? 🤔 pic.twitter.com/KfZhjHjiI5
— FootballJOE (@FootballJOE) December 20, 2022
I mean if that dolt can see it.
But his mates point to a semi-final, a final and a quarter final, saying no manager has got that far, so often.
No they didn’t, because they met that better team earlier in the tournament. His record of just 4 wins in 24 games against teams ranked in the FIFA top 10, is so telling, and how many of those four victories came when it actually mattered?
The 2018 World Cup, lost to Belgium in the group stage, which opened up the easy side of the draw. So it was the semi-final before they played another decent side, Croatia, which they lost. Then lost the third/fourth playoff.
2020 Euros. Got out of an easy group, even with the struggles against the might of bottom of the group finishers Scotland. Didn’t play anyone until the final. Germany, in between two World Cups where they failed to get out of the group stages, in the dying days of the previous manager’s reign. Ukraine, placed outside the top 20 and Denmark, one of those top 10 teams, who were just playing on emotion after the incident with Eriksen.
That final against Italy, who were top 10 but had performed even worse than Germany in the surroundings World Cups, having not qualified for either. It was the one time Southgate’s side lost to the actual winners.
So this World Cup and after getting out of the group, even with that struggle against the US, they faltered yet again against the first decent side they met. France. One of Soughate’s main cheerleaders saying that we should be happy because we to claim Senegal was an easy game was ridiculous, because they are African champions. They also ranked about the same as Wales, who were the worst team in the tournament.
So as soon as a decent team shows up England lose and go out, which bar Roy Hodgson’s last two debacles, and Keggy’s, is how it’s gone for those managers that got England to a tournament in recent memory. Capello and Svennis, got out the group stage and then ht a decent team before or at the quarter-final stage and were then coming home. It’s just they met that better team earlier.
With Svennis it was Portuguese speakers. Portugal or Brazil, with Capello it was Germany. Glenn, Argentina, El Tel, Germany.
Hell, Roy Hodgson in his first campaign got out of a group with France, Ukraine and Swede. Can you honestly see Southgate doing that? No but rejoice at beating the might of Iran, Wales, Panama and scraping past Tunisia.
Rejoice, you’ve never seen anything as good as that, they tell us.
And while you’re watching Mac Allister star for Argentina in their World Cup victory, you wonder if Gareth knows where Brighton is and if he could, would he have picked this player ahead of someone who plays for a bigger name team, but isn’t actually performing? And you know the answer – as you watch 20 youth cap Lamptey turn out for Ghana.
England were ahead against Croatia and Italy and lost. They were within touching distance of France and lost. While Southgate sat there looking like an advert for confused dot com. And brought the likes of Mount on. And sticking with his strategy of pass it around at the back until you bore the opposition to death – because he read it in a book and can’t go against the book, even if he could figure out it ain’t working.
Euro 2024 will be another glorious failure, using the same players who have gloriously failed in the past, as long as Southgate is in charge, playing dull football, with XI star names, playing for the big clubs and not an actual team.
Why would Gareth want to give it up… it’s not like there’d be many clubs desperate for his signature… and life back at ITV can’t be that much of a pull…