FIFA World Cup

[Mike]

25 minutes ago, midds said:

Cool

 

What are the general thoughts on doing the same again? Pros and cons?

 

Think it'd be nice.

[LiquidAK]

Yeah I thought it was great for the Euros, made things nice and clean, and those who don’t care about international football could just ignore it 

[cubaricho]

Canada will be the surprise team. Mark it. 

[TheBrownBottle]

3 minutes ago, cubaricho said:

Canada will be the surprise team. Mark it. 

They’ve got some canny players, it must be said.  They’ve also got a bastard of a group too though

[Jaqen]

France midfield really does look grim. 

 

All the top sides having noticeable weaknesses should make it interesting at least. 

[Magpie]

9 hours ago, midds said:

Cool

 

What are the general thoughts on doing the same again? Pros and cons?

Great idea. Sub forum with a thread for each group and then a thread for each stage of the knockout phase. Worked well last time I thought. 

[gbandit]

I’d do the sub-forum again, kept things tidy and was great to have a thread for all the games 

[samptime29]

10 hours ago, midds said:

Cool

 

What are the general thoughts on doing the same again? Pros and cons?

 

Yes please

[Flip]

Marco Reus out again because of injury apparently. Guy has no luck.

[toon25]

Is Roberto Martinez still using FM19 to scout his squad or are Belgium really struggling in bringing through the next generation?

[The Prophet]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/63590339

[Guest]

What's up with Germany? Shittest squad I've seen since 2000.

[Astroblack]

Pepe’s gonna be there for Portugal. Thought he’d retired but he’s still going strong at the age of 39! 

[ponsaelius]

2 hours ago, Optimistic Nut said:

What's up with Germany? Shittest squad I've seen since 2000.

 

It's not that bad mind. Bayern midfield alone makes it a match for most other sides in the tournament. England really missed out on Musiala considering our options in that position. Werner being out is probably a positive overall. Biggest weakness is at CB.

[Whitley mag]

Great article about the Brazil team from 82 could there have been a better team never to win it. The 3-2 against Italy is one of the first games I remember watching on tv, Rossi became the face of that World Cup but that Brazil team with Zico, Falcao, Junior and Socrates was something else.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/63568753

[RobsonsWonderland]

1 hour ago, Whitley mag said:

Great article about the Brazil team from 82 could there have been a better team never to win it. The 3-2 against Italy is one of the first games I remember watching on tv, Rossi became the face of that World Cup but that Brazil team with Zico, Falcao, Junior and Socrates was something else.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/63568753

Worst week of football ever... Brazil knocked out and Keegan missing a last minute header for England in their game.

As a kid I think it was the first time football broke my heart! 

[Disco]

13 hours ago, Optimistic Nut said:

What's up with Germany? Shittest squad I've seen since 2000.

Just mirrors the Bundesliga.

Loads of flighty/technically proficient midfielders and wide players but relatively soft at the back and about to play a mad defensive line for one dimensional reasons.

[LFEE]

3 hours ago, Whitley mag said:

Great article about the Brazil team from 82 could there have been a better team never to win it. The 3-2 against Italy is one of the first games I remember watching on tv, Rossi became the face of that World Cup but that Brazil team with Zico, Falcao, Junior and Socrates was something else.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/63568753

Would of won it at a canter if Careca wasn’t injured or Reinaldo had be selected (mixed views wether he was injured when Santana picked his squad). Felt a bit sorry for Serginho as is style wasn’t a good fit and the drop off from the other two was huge.

 

Would have Zico a lot higher than 14th in that magazine poll posted on here the other day. Top 5 easily. Such a shame for his own injuries.

[Mazzy]

13 hours ago, Optimistic Nut said:

What's up with Germany? Shittest squad I've seen since 2000.

 

I thought it was actually pretty decent. They've got fantastic central midfielders and wide forwards but lack a prolific number 9. Rudiger, Schlotterbeck and Sule are as good a CB trio as most countries have as well. Musiala will probably be Young Player of the Tournament. 

[Emotic]

Uruguay's squad reveal video is class.

 

 

[Paullow]

Belgium mustn't have produced many (central) defenders in recent years, 35 y/o Vertonghen and 33 y/o Alderweireld still there and both now play in Belgium (and not for Club Brugge).

 

I don't know much about some of them, but on paper it does look a big contrast to the other areas of their squad, especially the club's they represent.

[Groundhog63]

Outside The Strawberry, across the road from the Gallowgate End, a banner stretched above the entrance. It was January 2013, the month when Newcastle United signed Mathieu Debuchy, Moussa Sissoko, Mapou Yanga-Mbiwa, Yoan Gouffran and Massadio Haidara, taking their collection of French players into double figures. For a little while, one of the city’s most iconic watering holes renamed itself “La Fraise”.

 

It was “all tongue in cheek,” the pub’s co-owners said, an attempt to “welcome the new contingent and make them feel at home”. Inside, not much had changed — still full of team photos and Newcastle memorabilia — but these were early days. “We could start serving more French beers — we’ve got Kronenbourg at the moment — and I suppose maybe even French food. Watch this space,” they said.

The following month, the club announced their home game against Southampton would be “French Day”, “reminding fans to don their berets and stripy t-shirts (…) as we celebrate the club’s Gallic contingent.” There were can-can dancers in the stadium, supporters had tricolores painted on their faces and carried strings of garlic around their necks. La Marseillaise was played before kick-off. The Blaydon Races was sung in French.

This was probably the closest Newcastle came to an identity under Mike Ashley.

Thanks to the contacts of Graham Carr, their then-chief scout, there was a belief within the club that they had cornered the market for talented young French footballers; Hatem Ben Arfa, Sissoko and Yohan Cabaye were bought cheaply, under the noses of richer clubs. Southampton were beaten 4-2; Sissoko and Cabaye scored.

As with everything under Ashley, any sense of strategy swiftly melted away, if it was ever there in the first place.

After finishing fifth the season before — a high watermark — Newcastle made only one senior signing and left themselves woefully under-equipped for the Europa League. Those January transfers were a late attempt at correction, but far too late to escape pressure, a familiar gamble which ended in familiar disillusion.

In April 2013, Newcastle were beaten 3-0 by Sunderland at St James’. As Alan Pardew said later, they were “limping over the line”. They finished 16th that season. Decline would become entrenched. Three years later, they were relegated.

 

Ashley’s “French Revolution” brought change and carnage but not a lot in the way of lingering philosophy. Ultimately, it did not stand for very much.

 

Why bring this up now?

 

Another match against Southampton, another glimmer of progress at Newcastle, and a different sense of identity. At St Mary’s last weekend, Eddie Howe picked seven English players in his starting line-up for the fourth time this season. It was more than any other in the Premier League for that round of fixtures, and it was the second successive Newcastle game watched by Gareth Southgate, the England manager.

Southgate’s squad for the World Cup starting in Qatar just over a week from now includes three Newcastle players: Kieran Trippier, Callum Wilson and, fresh from his three brilliant saves in their Carabao Cup last-32 penalty shootout victory over Crystal Palace, Nick Pope. This equals the club’s record for most England players at a major tournament, which stretches back to the 1998 World Cup, when Glenn Hoddle picked Alan Shearer, Rob Lee and David Batty.

In England’s last six tournament appearances, there has been no representative from Newcastle, which is not too surprising when you consider the mediocrity which became institutionalised under Ashley, as well as his determination to find value in the market, where English players traditionally came with a premium.

The last Newcastle player to represent England in a World Cup was Michael Owen at Germany 2006.

Newcastle's major tournament players
COMPETITION    HOST    NEWCASTLE PLAYERS IN ENGLAND SQUAD
World Cup 2022
Qatar
3 (Kieran Trippier, Nick Pope, Callum Wilson)
Euro 2020
Europe-wide
0
Euro 2016
France
0
World Cup 2014
Brazil
0
Euro 2012
Poland/Ukraine
0
World Cup 2010
South Africa
0
World Cup 2006
Germany
1 (Michael Owen)
Euro 2004
Portugal
1 (Kieron Dyer)
World Cup 2002
Japan/South Korea
1 (Kieron Dyer)
Euro 2000
Netherlands/Belgium
1 (Alan Shearer)
World Cup 1998
France
3 (Alan Shearer, Rob Lee, David Batty)
Euro 1996
England
2 (Les Ferdinand, Steve Howey)
Euro 1992
Sweden
0
World Cup 1990
Italy
0
It feels like an under-reported aspect of Newcastle’s existence post-takeover — in fairness, there have been a lot of other things to write about — but for all the Brazilian flair of Bruno Guimaraes and the goals of Miguel Almiron, there is a core of English players to what is currently the Premier League’s third-best team.

As the statistics show, this is definitely rare in historical terms and it is definitely a thing. But what, if anything, does it mean for Newcastle, and is it a deliberate policy? And, on the quiet, has this rapidly evolving club suddenly become England’s biggest breeding ground?

 

The Southampton match was not an anomaly. Newcastle’s XIs this season have featured an average of six Englishmen per match and Howe is yet to name a starting line-up with fewer than five of them across their 14 league fixtures.

On the south coast last Sunday, Pope, Trippier, Dan Burn, Joe Willock, Sean Longstaff, Jacob Murphy and Wilson were all in the side, while Jonjo Shelvey came on as a substitute. Jamaal Lascelles, the club captain, and Matt Targett have also started five times collectively.

Last season, 42.2 per cent of top-flight playing time at Newcastle was given to English players. In 2022-23 so far, that has risen to 53.7 per cent (7,445 of the 13,860 combined minutes played).

Newcastle are very much bucking the Premier League trend, too, with The Times claiming that the number of England-qualified players starting top-flight matches has dropped to 33 per cent, from 38 per cent last season. In the most recent round of fixtures, only Newcastle (seven starters) and Everton (six) fielded XIs of which at least 50 per cent were Englishmen.

English players used last weekend
CLUB    STARTERS    SUBSTITUTES USED
Newcastle United
7
1
Everton
6
2
Bournemouth
5
3
Nottingham Forest
4
3
Aston Villa
4
2
Leicester City
4
2
Brighton & Hove Albion
4
1
Chelsea
4
1
West Ham United
4
1
Brentford
4
0
Crystal Palace
4
0
Southampton
3
2
Arsenal
3
1
Tottenham Hotspur
3
0
Manchester City
2
1
Manchester United
2
0
Liverpool
1
4
Leeds United
1
3
Fulham
1
0
Wolverhampton Wanderers
1
0
At Newcastle, 55 per cent of their league starters this season have been English. Across their 14 matches, 10 Englishmen have made appearances, with all bar Shelvey featuring in at least one starting XI. They have made a combined 110 appearances (the most in the Premier League), 83 of which have been starts (also the most), and played for a collective 7,445 minutes (behind only Everton’s 7,590 cumulative minutes).

Four of Newcastle’s six most frequent starters this season are English in Pope, Trippier, Burn and Willock, while they also occupy the top six places for minutes played. The transformed Almiron and Fabian Schar are the only non-Englishmen whose names are on both lists.

Of the seven Newcastle players to appear in every game, six are English — Almiron, who has started all 14 matches alongside Pope and Trippier, is the exception — with Longstaff and Murphy also being used constantly by Howe.

Newcastle's England-qualified contingent
PLAYER    STARTS (SUB)    MINUTES PLAYED
Nick Pope
14 (0)
1,260
Kieran Trippier
14 (0)
1,234
Dan Burn
13 (1)
1,134
Joe Willock
12 (2)
1,030
Sean Longstaff
10 (4)
966
Callum Wilson
10 (0)
772
Jacob Murphy
5 (9)
483
Matt Targett
4 (5)
422
Jamaal Lascelles
1 (3)
107
Jonjo Shelvey
0 (3)
37
Those figures do not feature Karl Darlow, who has been injured and is first-reserve goalkeeper behind Pope when fit. Nor do they include Elliot Anderson, who has played 103 minutes over seven appearances but is still considering whether to pledge his international allegiance to Scotland or England, given he has played for both at youth level, most recently for the former.

Whether by accident, design, or a combination of the two, Newcastle’s early-season Champions League push is being led by their homegrown contingent.

Not everybody cares about England or international football, which is fair enough, but increased representation at the highest level, as we are duty-bound to call it, feels like an important step for Newcastle.

To grow commercially, to get bigger and better, they need to sell their story, and if Trippier sets up a goal or helps keep a clean sheet in Qatar, if Wilson comes on and makes an impact, it reflects back on the club.

The same applies to Guimaraes with Brazil and Schar with Switzerland. Not since the days of Kevin Keegan, when Shearer joined for a world-record fee, or when they competed in the Champions League under Sir Bobby Robson, have Newcastle felt like a global entity.

“It builds the profile of Newcastle when you have players like Trips, Bruno and Fab going to the World Cup,” Lascelles said after the Palace match. “It just builds the profile of the club and the individuals as well. It’s special to have those players in the team, and we saw Nick Pope’s qualities — that’s why he should be starting for England.”

“In the next few seasons, I imagine England squads will regularly have multiple Newcastle players in,” Pope told The Athletic at the start of the season after his move from relegated Burnley. “That’s something others will consider — they’ll see Newcastle is a pathway to the England team now. I can’t imagine many other teams that an England player would rather sign for than Newcastle at the minute.”

In other words, England players, or potential England players, will have no reason to look at Newcastle as a graveyard for their international ambitions. They can come to Tyneside and kick on. “We want to develop players and progress their careers, so playing in World Cups is very, very important,” Howe said.

In the past 11 months, Newcastle have signed two England internationals in Pope and Trippier, which is a stark contrast to the Ashley era. During the previous owner’s 14 years, only four active Newcastle players played for England. The last of those to be capped, and the only one for a decade, was Andros Townsend in 2016, and he was already leaving following relegation. The others? Owen, a waning Alan Smith and a force-of-nature Andy Carroll, but even the Geordie academy product departed for Liverpool just two months after his international bow.

Yet now, why shouldn’t Burn, who is an integral part of the Premier League’s meanest defence, not have aspirations to play for England? Why shouldn’t Longstaff and Willock, playing well in a top-four side, look at Pope, Trippier and Wilson and think they wouldn’t mind a bit of that, particularly when Southgate is watching on?

“We must have a few other boys knocking on the England door,” said Lascelles.

“Sean has been brilliant this season,” said Trippier. “I speak to him and Burny — never say never for them because we’re flying at the moment and Gareth has been watching a lot of Newcastle games. Anything can happen.”

As to whether this is all part of a grand plan, the answer is slightly opaque.

Back in January, with the club desperately attempting to avoid relegation, Howe was adamant that Newcastle required an immediate injection of players with Premier League experience. As well as good players, he wanted sound, solid characters who would fit into the ethos of the group they already had.

Kieran Trippier, Eddie Howe
Trippier is off to the World Cup as a Newcastle player – the first time that’s been done in 16 years. 
That was what Trippier referenced when The Athletic asked him about Englishness and identity after the Palace game in midweek.

“When we started making signings, it’s been about bringing in the right characters,” he said. “You can see the steps we’ve taken. We’ve got a really good culture here, but that’s about everybody. We’ve got a really good bond. You need that, especially last season when we were fighting for our lives. Everybody has stepped up.”

“It can build a strong dressing room, having that English core,” Lascelles said. “I’ve been in dressing rooms before, when I first signed here, and that wasn’t there. There was no ‘dressing room’. The way we’ve got things, with the leadership squad and every single one of the boys… it’s just great for the team and the way we play.”

Right now, there is little debate. The spine of Newcastle’s side is English: Pope in goal, Trippier and Burn in defence, Longstaff and Willock in midfield and Wilson up top.

“I wouldn’t say it was necessarily a conscious decision to recruit English players, but I’d like to think you need a core of British players in any squad, because we’re playing in England,” Howe said. “I’d like that.”

Newcastle will look to get better, however they can, and as they adapt and move on, they will target more talent from overseas such as Guimaraes and Dutchman Sven Botman, as well as developing their own future England stars. “I’d like Geordies in the team,” Howe said. “I think it’s hugely important that we strive for that in the future consistently. But we welcome any nationality into the club. We’re very proud to have all our players with us.”

Perhaps this is merely a temporary quirk. Or perhaps it is just a small part of Newcastle’s emerging identity under Howe, that front-foot style, comfortable on the ball, relentless off it and us against them. If nothing else, it is an interesting, unusual little theme and, put together, unparalleled in the club’s history.

In 1990, when England reached a World Cup semi-final, they were managed by a Geordie in Robson and crammed with gifted, once-removed connections to Newcastle — Paul Gascoigne, Peter Beardsley, Chris Waddle.

It feels different now, England players arriving at the club rather than the other way around.

No need for The Strawberry to change its name and — please — no Morris Dancing at St James’ Park.

[Disco]

Dutch people simply should not be called Kenneth Taylor.

[Flip]

Spanish squad feels very meh as well.

[Deuce]

Hard to say who the strongest team is at this point. Probably France or Brazil.