Yorkie

World Cup winner and runner-up, a Champions League final, Ligue 1 winner, four French League Cups.

Thought that was a decent and balanced debate on ITV ahead of this France game, there. It wasn't pretty last night but the win was so important and affords us the time to fine-tune and grow into this system in the remaining games. Obviously if it goes badly wrong against Denmark then you change it up. It's the age-old issue with the England team but the fact of the matter is - those front six are the six best players. They've given themselves the breathing space to try and make it work, so they should go unchanged for me.

It's unfortunate and obviously never gets pulled back in a non-VAR world, but slowed down to 1 million frames per second, his hand does help the flight of the ball into his path. It's not clear and obvious, not deliberate, and not good for our game - which is supposed to be beautifully imperfect and, importantly, analogue... but it's not the worst decision I've seen.

Shows how much attention I pay week on week but I never realised Onana was such a beanpole.

Calamity Jane stuff all round. The finish which the keeper parried was terrible. Got lucky that it fell straight to another attacker.

Dubs plenty involved so far. Disco what's with this deviance of spaces in the scoreline. Slovakia gol

Because the clause gives us the cojones to say "£100m or get lost." It's an aspirational figure from our point of view. It's highly likely teams start testing our (and the player's) resolve once that is out of the picture imo.

The speculation, if anything, will ramp up once the clause is no longer in effect, imo.

Fair enough, misremembering.

Agree of course but if this is a comment on the atmosphere then it's not as if there was an absence of that in Qatar.

It's a battering now

Keeper having a mare, mind.

Great goal

Yeah I think you're right tbh. It was 4-2-3-1 out of possession but 4-3-3 in it. This is Bellingham's touch map.

Going as well as you might expect, then.

Was watching Gary Neville's thing with Rooney and the latter (who I do really like) said that Trippier had had a bad season for Newcastle. I took it almost personally. I mean it's completely inaccurate too; he was world class until December; had a ropey patch, recovered, and then finished the season with another rick at Old Trafford.

Tbf Bowen came on and almost immediately delivered an assist; it was only a genuinely brilliant save which prevented that, and the game is then killed stone dead. That's not to say there wasn't room for Gordon too, but the Bowen sub wasn't ineffective.

Thought this lad was quality last night. I feel like it's gonna take very little effort for me to completely u-turn and desperately hope he stays at Newcastle. Technically he's still a truly brilliant player; just worry about the psychological side/concentration.

Yep. Literally all that matters in a tournament is progress. I do feel like (... and this is one of my principal defenses of Southgate) stuff gets analysed like we're talking about a 38 game season, where performances and patterns of play are more validly picked apart to the nth degree. Winning teams often don't come flying out of the traps anyway, as you say. 2022: Argentina 1-2 Saudi Arabia 2016: Portugal 1-1 Iceland 2014: France 2-1 Australia 2012: Spain 1-1 Italy 2010: Spain 0-1 Switzerland

I wasn't being deadly serious; speaking out of frustration at his latest shite performance in an England shirt. The general point was that the actual England manager would be on a hiding to nothing by not playing someone like Foden imo, especially after the season he had. We're almost certainly a lot more balanced tonight if there's a straight swap between Gordon and Foden, but I can't blame Southgate too much for trying to find a way to have his cake and eat it, in terms of having both Bellingham and Foden in very advanced positions. A more tactically astute manager would probably find a way (does it have to be 4-2-3-1, for instance?) but again I think Foden let him down tonight with just how ineffectual he was.

Tbf my team would have Bellingham in CM role as well. I'm just recoiling at the inferences of Southgate being [insert vitriol] because he should obviously be doing X; when it's not actually that obvious. Incidentally, @Shearergol, this is an example of my general position on Southgate: not that he's brilliant; rather that the criticism is OTT/unjustified. Bellingham hardly played like a typical number 10 tonight anyway, imo. He patrolled the middle column and drifted wide too. It looks to me like Southgate has identified him as the key for England and so he's putting him in the position which makes him the most impactful. That's 10 rather than 8. I think there's sound logic in that; the only problem is that Foden - also a 10 - has to make way. LW isn't natural to him but he needs to be better than absolutely fucking shit before we're levelling the dysfunction squarely at the manager.

It's so obvious and yet Bellingham was the match-winner and arguably MOTM in the 10 position. I dunno what the solution is but I do think we're having a different debate if Foden isn't getting the absolute fucking basics wrong.

Fair enough regarding the CM position, but if Gallagher or Mainoo are in there then it only emphasises the lunacy (imo) that is calling us the favourites. Not only due to how dysfunctional (Trent)/unimpressive (others) the CM is - but we don't have a left-back either. Southgate can't leave Foden out, absolutely no way, he'd by lynched. After that insipid individual performance I'd be trebucheting the lad back to Manchester personally, but there's absolutely no way the England manager would be allowed to leave the Prem's player of the season out. Nor should he; he has to to do everything he can to find a way to make that work.

The main problem for me in that second half was how sloppy we were in possession. That's under zero threat, too, just wayward passes under no pressure. Even down to lobbing it straight to the opposition from throw-ins. I don't know how much of that you can level at Southgate. I think there's a lot to improve on but I think you can afford the tactical performance a bit of grace; we're shoe-horning Trent in because there isn't an obvious partner for Rice (plus he's so talented), and it's similar with Foden - he has to play but the left is the only available place. Meanwhile, the balance is out of whack cos we've no fit LB. Essentially we're going into the tournament with an experimental side and, clearly, it needs time to settle. Despite this, we've beaten a capable and spirited side with pretty minimal fuss.