Kid Icarus

Can't really put into words just how tacky I think gold looks on a football kit like. Absolutely rank

Aye it's getting a bit 'if you can't handle me at my worst, you don't deserve me at my best' at times

The inspiration for your Davey Brexit character is a bit clearer now

If you read the thread it's only a few like. I couldn't stand being on that forum with some of the mensa heeds on there.

Depends who's managing who.

It got onto that area of dicussion mainly because people are now trying to claim this generation of players is the best we've ever had, rather than giving the credit to Southgate. As has been said, Southgate's a victim of his own success on that front because before him these players weren't producing for England, don't play as well for for their clubs, and we're widely seen as post-golden generation no hopers. The way it's shifted from one to the other in such a short space of time has given me whiplash basically.

I know it's just an opinion like, it's fine for me to think it's an insane one.

It's cherry picking again. I rate Mount highly, but his best stuff is played at Chelsea not England, whereas Joe Cole (along with Beckham and Ashley Cole) was a regular performer for England, or at the very least didn't get the same criticism them others got.

Or Balon d'ors? There are plenty of metrics to point to where the '66 squad is concerned.

Is winning the world cup not a metric like?

Chilwell's played just over 100 games. Wayne Bridge was a consistently very good left back over a number of years and who came with the 'it's just a shame for him that Ashley Cole's ahead of him' tagline. Just absolute and total revisionism.

Just totally insane Making it an all time thing when we won the World Cup with a squad including 3 or 4 of the best players of all time in their positions (Banks, Moore, Charlton, Greaves) is just crackers. It would be bad enough thinking this is the best group of players in my lifetime ('84 onwards) tbh.

Baring in mind the only reason some of our current players have a reputation is because they've built them with England, not their club, this is the combined '04 and '21 squad Sven is picking imo (yes, I'm 12 years old) Robinson Pickford James Walker Alexander-Arnold Ferdinand Terry Campbell King Carragher Cole Bridge Trippier Gerrard Scholes Lampard Beckham Butt/Henderson Mount Dyer Rooney Kane Owen Sterling Foden Rashford

Absolutely bonkers. Not even worth it at this point. The sea-change in the way people think about the players in the current England squad should be a good thing. It should be good that they're now seemingly rated so highly. It's just a shame that the team's achievements are being used as a way to excuse Southgate of his part in it and to big up the players while also reverse engineering away the talent from previous generations who were much more highly rated and were far better at their clubs. It's just weird and wrong. Totally mental.

In terms of how they've actually performed for England, I don't think there can be that much of an argument with that line-up. I'd go Walker over James and Sterling over Rooney or Saka or Foden. The key thing is Southgate and the overhaul overall though isn't it? If you were choosing those players over the ones that played for their clubs the argument would be much bigger and aside from Kane, Foden, Sterling, none of them would be getting in a combined XI 'on talent'

I just don't see how they can revolutionise that team to the extent that it's doing better than Man City and Liverpool in the amount of time that Kane's likely to still be playing at the same level. I think it would mean a lot of stars aligning like.

By the same measure Maguire is atrocious for Man United, which is the entire point - that Southgate gets much more out of this England team than the sum of its parts. The players are nowhere near as good for their clubs as those players in 2004 were. The idea that Butt, Dyer, Bridge, and Robinson wouldn't make even make the England squad that was picked for the Euros is frankly laughable. Butt was England's best player at the 2002 World Cup and a Man United regular, Dyer would easily get in as a central midfield back up at least, Robinson was a safer pair of hands at Spurs than Pickford has been at Everton, Bridge was considered massively unlucky to be stuck behind Ashley Cole in the pecking order. As if pre-2020 anyone would be suggesting that they wouldn't have got in the squad ahead of the likes of Sam Johnstone, Ben White, Kalvin Phillips, Declan Rice or Dominic Calvert-Lewin, man. England have done well and now suddenly for some people the sum of its parts are better than those in an England team who massivlly underachieved. The revisionism is on another level.

Pickford has still never let England down Maguire is England's all-time top scoring defender, he's scored 5 in his last 11 man I think Shaw was maybe going to be replaced with Chilwell before his injury, but Shaw was my player of the tournament last year Sterling is absolutely shit hot when he plays for England Maguire especially is the most Jekyll and Hyde player when it comes to him playing for England or Man United, but the same applies to loads of them really.

Doesn't really align with Kane's ambition of winning major trophies, mind.

Phil Neville for England was nearly always poor IIRC and his performance vs Romania sticks in the memory especially. At the same time it's easy to forget that he was actually good for quite a while when he went to Everton.

Heskey was very good for England when he played with Owen. Sven's other choices, especially Vassell, were ridiculed at the time because the likes of Wright-Phillips, Defoe, Ashton, Beattie, Smith, Woodgate, weren't picked or weren't available. Neville was a utility player, but was picked on reputation and Scholes could have easily been replaced with one of Dyer, Butt, or Joe Cole in that match. This idea that after Sven's first choice XI he had no choice but to put poor players in just isn't true at all. Sven was regularly criticised for his squad picks and substitutions precisely because of better players being available to him. He had his favourites and regularly chose the worse player because of who they played for. Even besides all of that, of the back ups he did choose, the likes of 2004 Robinson, Bridge, Carragher, King, Butt, Dyer, and Hargreaves would all be in with an excellent shout of making this England starting XI, never mind the squad.

Arguably the 2 best Premier League Centre backs of all time, 2 of the league's best central midfielders of all time, England's last wonderkid who despite underachieving is this country's all time leading goalscorer, the best crosser of a ball I've seen in my life, and comfortably the best English left back in my lifetime. Compared with: Harry Maguire and John Stones Declan Rice and Kalvin Phillips Phil Foden (outstanding but nowhere near the hype Rooney had) TAA (the nearest player England has to Beckham) who only plays when tactics call for it Luke Shaw Southgate's created a team far greater than the sum of its parts, that doesn't suddenly mean the parts are better than in previous teams, it means he's achieved something he should be getting credit for.

It's utterly bizzare. I'd understand it if we'd had the players below 50 years ago, but it was literally the consistent generation before this one. The likes of Michael Carrick, Jermaine Defoe, Ledley King, and Jonathan Woodgate often couldn't get in that squad let alone the team, but the current England players are the best we've had in a lifetime? Laughable.

Was at a family get-together last night and it turns out my lass's auntie taught him at school. She gave a proper glowing report about his (and his brothers') character and leadership even when he was only 13. Sounds like he comes from a great family who've kept him grounded as well. Apparently he managed to be head boy while still being popular with everyone and not seen as a goody two shoes.

It's the font and banner binding that would need to be changed more than anything else I think like. The lion can probably stay looking like it's in blackface, the seahorses faces can stay as a homage to Peter Beardsley, and the lines can stay looking like 1995 clipart and they'd only be obvious design failures rather than accessibility ones. Considering it's just a clean up of the existing badge, and a really sensitively done one by a talented professional who also supports Newcastle, I can probably imagine the N-O reaction to any new and real badge designs.