What a shame the so called fans causes a lot of unrest in London last night with a number of police getting injured. There was also a group trying to break into Wembley. Add to that the booing etc and it all adds up to a disgraceful end to what was an excellent footballing tournament.
It is no wonder that the Europeans dislike us so. Shameful thuggery.
To be fair it was always going to be a case of Win? Smash up London. Lose? Smash up London. Boo 'political gesture' then sing about how if they had ever been in the forces they would never surrender to the IRA, have a patriotic fight with the police and home to post racist abuse about the players. Not classy but not entirely unpredictable.
Maybe you are right but it is still not something we should accept. I am totally ashamed of those thugs.
A tournament that was showing football at its best is basically dragged into the gutter by these thugs.
If Wycombe lose, a few thousand people may be saddened - perhaps up to 20,000 if it’s, for example, the semifinal of a major competition. The mood of the nation is unaffected. Yesterday, a huge proportion of the population were high with expectation, heightened unbelievably by the brilliance of England in the opening few minutes. Feelings of gloom gradually descended during the second half and the sense of disappointment and deja vu ultimately struck home,
In ‘normal’ times, this would have been bad enough but the impact at a time when so many of us were clinging to the hope of experiencing supreme joy must have been massive. Feelings of disappointment will no doubt be compounded by the realisation that so-called ‘freedom’ day is likely to be sullied by a further spike in the number of Covid19 infections.
I plead guilty @bookertease and @TheDancingYak to having reacted stupidly to the succession of penalty misses (third, fourth and fifth) but make no apology for having reacted as I did to @Right_in_the_Middle’s sarcastic comment, which he tried ridiculously to pass off as a compliment.
I loved the desperate spin which one or two pundits tried to put on Marcus Rashford’s Ministry of Silly Walks run-up by commenting that it fooled Demerara into diving the wrong way and it was the execution that was at fault, not the run-up.
@glasshalffull said:
Some astonishing posts on here this morning. I’m afraid the bottom line is that the best team won.
Also the team that played with at least one player up front. It's amazingly difficult to win a football match playing a 5-5 formation with no strikers.
Stat of the day was that Kane did not have a single touch in the Italian box the whole game. Always 2 sides to every story but that is fairly shocking.
My big takeaway from last night is Saka. He is a terrific lad whenever I see him interviewed and I am really disappointed in the senior players not stepping up to take the ALWAYS critical last penalty. I know Southgate said it was all pre-agreed but he was like a rabbit in the headlights when he came on and the camera images of the England huddle before the penalties would suggest a different story to the official line by Gareth. I'm afraid in my book if you are BIG player paid BIG bucks you step up at the BIG moments and don't hide behind a kid.
I really wonder what the posts would have been like if that defensive line up had won last night.
People would have been praising Southgate for achieving a win with a great tactical master class.
As @glasshalffull said, we were beaten by the better team and their form throughout the tournament was top notch. Good luck to Italy they never gave up and thoroughly deserved their victory.
It is only a game and now we can get back to our day jobs of supporting the Mighty Wycombe.
We should be proud of the whole England set-up, manager, players, coaches and support staff. We should also be disgusted with a section of our country for their unacceptable behaviour.
We gave it our all and fell just short.
Southgate tried to make positive changes bringing Saka and Henderson on with 20 minutes to go. Grealish got 20 minutes in extra time. I think a lot of credit really needs to go to Italy who were very good and didn't let us play in that last hour, completely nullifying us.
I was slightly surprised this morning to read that Southgate chose the penalty takers based on training, rather than let people step forward on the night and then choosing 5 from those that stepped forward.
It's also interesting that throughout the tournament a lot of defenders have taken penalties and been very successful. I'd like to see the stats on how many defenders, midfielders, strikers took penalties and the success rates of each of them.
I apologise for my swearing last night, I definitely let the emotion get to me.
I just find it infuriating, as a kid growing up I supported all of the home nations no matter what. Go on social media today and you'd think that Scotland had won the final last night.
@glasshalffull said:
Some astonishing posts on here this morning. I’m afraid the bottom line is that the best team won.
I 100% agree the best team won. Which leads to the wider debate of best players v best team. By market prices I would suggest we have the best team and maybe their inflated sense of worth contributes to under performance. And the argument from the great unwashed will always be if you want to be paid £300k a week you should be able to get a ball in an 8 yard gap. But that leads to the argument of players don't want to be paid £300k a week they are offered it.
@micra said:
If Wycombe lose, a few thousand people may be saddened - perhaps up to 20,000 if it’s, for example, the semifinal of a major competition. The mood of the nation is unaffected. Yesterday, a huge proportion of the population were high with expectation, heightened unbelievably by the brilliance of England in the opening few minutes. Feelings of gloom gradually descended during the second half and the sense of disappointment and deja vu ultimately struck home,
In ‘normal’ times, this would have been bad enough but the impact at a time when so many of us were clinging to the hope of experiencing supreme joy must have been massive. Feelings of disappointment will no doubt be compounded by the realisation that so-called ‘freedom’ day is likely to be sullied by a further spike in the number of Covid19 infections.
I plead guilty @bookertease and @TheDancingYak to having reacted stupidly to the succession of penalty misses (third, fourth and fifth) but make no apology for having reacted as I did to @Right_in_the_Middle’s sarcastic comment, which he tried ridiculously to pass off as a compliment.
Right has form for frequently making apparently massively sarcastic comments that he insists are not.
I think he might just have an unfortunate way of writing.
Italy had better players and a better team. You don't go on an unbeaten run for 35 games without being exceptional. They also benefitted by being significantly more experienced than our team.
I didn't get the impression from our players of them having an inflated sense of self worth. One of the joys of the tournament for me was just what a thoroughly nice bunch of lads our squad was. Those players deserve our country to be proud of them to a man IMHO. Sadly not sure the players should be as proud of some elements of the country in return.
OK three young lads with an average age of less than 21 missed their penalties. With the weight of history and 30m supporters hopes and dreams on their shoulders, they did well to actually kick the ball IMHO. I hope the experience doesn't damage their future careers.
What is Gareth's quote about winning with humility and losing with grace. Perhaps we should all follow his lead.
That team is not far off winning something at all. A bit more adventure in possession and we'll pretty much be there - although part of me would rather we didn't win the next World Cup so we don't have to have our success associated with that abomination.
Ah, the morning after, Some very odd stuff above, seems to reflect the country, a few old agendas, a bit of barely concealed racism and very little perspective, oh and we lose on penalties again.
Difficult to be too Anti Southgate and his overall approach as having a happy, united, focussed squad trying their best and taking the winners to penalties in the final is better than most would have hoped for and better than we've done in decades. We've played crap opposition in tournaments before btw and got nothing from them.
Some Individual decisions and the quality of the opposition on the day cost in the end on the day, If we'd gone gung ho and been battered that would also have been the managers fault. The subs made weren't adventurous enough though, didn't really help and the pen choices were all a mess too, also we really need to be able to take off players who aren't contributing much rather than sanctify them and hope blindly that it'll suddenly click.
The Italians were professional and ruthless partly supported by a type of low key refereeing that most of us had called for but wasn't really appropriate in the game as it was played.
As for the in person scumbags punching and littering, the politicians bandwaggonning in then pivoting, and the keyboard warriors attacking kids they can all just fuck off, actual fans are tired of these pricks embarrassing us constantly and having to justify why we aren't all like that.
Just reading more about some of the 'scenes' at Wembley yesterday. Extremely concerning - normally impossible to get anywhere near the stadium itself without a ticket. Bracing for one hell of a Covid spike as well now.
Wimbledon, Goodwood, F1 next weekend. All potential superspeaders
But you would have thought that the virus has developed enough intelligence to keep away from the moronic thugs that claim to be football fans. So can’t blame the Euros as a spreader event.
Personally I haven't seen any anti-Southgate campaigns. I am sure he will reflect on what he could do better and that is why he's such a good manager.
Equally my socials have not included any race related comments and negativity about any of the aspect of the players who scored, missed, played well, didn't play as well.
I would like to think it is because the vast majority of commentators share my love and appreciation of the past 4 weeks. BUT clearly there are some pond life out there and I don't care to try and find their evil bile. And today it is such a shame that their unforgivable spewing is the headline.
As for the fans it was always going to happen. Everyone knew it was going to happen. It was unstoppable. Why they did not do fan parks to mitigate it I don't know. Yes Covid. But why not have Covid controlled areas rather than the scenes in Leicester square. Was this UEFA, the FA, the government? Thank Christ the breaking in was actually not more sinister or else no one would be talking about football today.
I will be amazed if we don't end up with games behind closed doors. And we can kiss goodbye to any hopes of hosting a major tournament in the near future.
Personally I haven't seen any anti-Southgate campaigns. I am sure he will reflect on what he could do better and that is why he's such a good manager.
Equally my socials have not included any race related comments and negativity about any of the aspect of the players who scored, missed, played well, didn't play as well.
I would like to think it is because the vast majority of commentators share my love and appreciation of the past 4 weeks. BUT clearly there are some pond life out there and I don't care to try and find their evil bile. And today it is such a shame that their unforgivable spewing is the headline.
As for the fans it was always going to happen. Everyone knew it was going to happen. It was unstoppable. Why they did not do fan parks to mitigate it I don't know. Yes Covid. But why not have Covid controlled areas rather than the scenes in Leicester square. Was this UEFA, the FA, the government? Thank Christ the breaking in was actually not more sinister or else no one would be talking about football today.
Absolutely, if you don't follow obvious arseholes or go looking for it you won't see even a tiny percentage of abuse but it doesn't mean it's not there and players should have to deal with it, or that it won't reflect badly on Football supporters as a whole.
On the event management side it looks to have been an utter shambles, not that it excuses the individual acts of violence. 8pm kick off was always a bad idea, really week cordons, far too many people allowed near without tickets, Uefa insisting on bypassing any schemes the FA set up and selling direct to whoever wants etc etc
On the event management side it looks to have been an utter shambles, not that it excuses the individual acts of violence. 8pm kick off was always a bad idea, really week cordons, far too many people allowed near without tickets, Uefa insisting on bypassing any schemes the FA set up and selling direct to whoever wants etc etc
This isn’t an excuse or the only reason for the ‘scenes’ last night, but it’s worth thinking about. 8pm Sunday is a ridiculous time for a final to kick off, it was after midnight in most of Europe when the trophy was presented. There’s no reason it can’t have kicked off at 3 or 4. Or noon to be honest.
Comments
@Blue_since_1990 said:
To be fair it was always going to be a case of Win? Smash up London. Lose? Smash up London. Boo 'political gesture' then sing about how if they had ever been in the forces they would never surrender to the IRA, have a patriotic fight with the police and home to post racist abuse about the players. Not classy but not entirely unpredictable.
Maybe you are right but it is still not something we should accept. I am totally ashamed of those thugs.
A tournament that was showing football at its best is basically dragged into the gutter by these thugs.
If Wycombe lose, a few thousand people may be saddened - perhaps up to 20,000 if it’s, for example, the semifinal of a major competition. The mood of the nation is unaffected. Yesterday, a huge proportion of the population were high with expectation, heightened unbelievably by the brilliance of England in the opening few minutes. Feelings of gloom gradually descended during the second half and the sense of disappointment and deja vu ultimately struck home,
In ‘normal’ times, this would have been bad enough but the impact at a time when so many of us were clinging to the hope of experiencing supreme joy must have been massive. Feelings of disappointment will no doubt be compounded by the realisation that so-called ‘freedom’ day is likely to be sullied by a further spike in the number of Covid19 infections.
I plead guilty @bookertease and @TheDancingYak to having reacted stupidly to the succession of penalty misses (third, fourth and fifth) but make no apology for having reacted as I did to @Right_in_the_Middle’s sarcastic comment, which he tried ridiculously to pass off as a compliment.
Good lord. Reading the gasroom this morning I fully believe those stats about rises in domestic violence when England lose.
Some astonishing posts on here this morning. I’m afraid the bottom line is that the best team won.
I loved the desperate spin which one or two pundits tried to put on Marcus Rashford’s Ministry of Silly Walks run-up by commenting that it fooled Demerara into diving the wrong way and it was the execution that was at fault, not the run-up.
Apologies. Donnarumma.
It was!
Also the team that played with at least one player up front. It's amazingly difficult to win a football match playing a 5-5 formation with no strikers.
Stat of the day was that Kane did not have a single touch in the Italian box the whole game. Always 2 sides to every story but that is fairly shocking.
My big takeaway from last night is Saka. He is a terrific lad whenever I see him interviewed and I am really disappointed in the senior players not stepping up to take the ALWAYS critical last penalty. I know Southgate said it was all pre-agreed but he was like a rabbit in the headlights when he came on and the camera images of the England huddle before the penalties would suggest a different story to the official line by Gareth. I'm afraid in my book if you are BIG player paid BIG bucks you step up at the BIG moments and don't hide behind a kid.
I really wonder what the posts would have been like if that defensive line up had won last night.
People would have been praising Southgate for achieving a win with a great tactical master class.
As @glasshalffull said, we were beaten by the better team and their form throughout the tournament was top notch. Good luck to Italy they never gave up and thoroughly deserved their victory.
It is only a game and now we can get back to our day jobs of supporting the Mighty Wycombe.
Spot on @Blue_since_1990.
We should be proud of the whole England set-up, manager, players, coaches and support staff. We should also be disgusted with a section of our country for their unacceptable behaviour.
We gave it our all and fell just short.
Southgate tried to make positive changes bringing Saka and Henderson on with 20 minutes to go. Grealish got 20 minutes in extra time. I think a lot of credit really needs to go to Italy who were very good and didn't let us play in that last hour, completely nullifying us.
I was slightly surprised this morning to read that Southgate chose the penalty takers based on training, rather than let people step forward on the night and then choosing 5 from those that stepped forward.
It's also interesting that throughout the tournament a lot of defenders have taken penalties and been very successful. I'd like to see the stats on how many defenders, midfielders, strikers took penalties and the success rates of each of them.
Bring on Accrington!
I apologise for my swearing last night, I definitely let the emotion get to me.
I just find it infuriating, as a kid growing up I supported all of the home nations no matter what. Go on social media today and you'd think that Scotland had won the final last night.
I 100% agree the best team won. Which leads to the wider debate of best players v best team. By market prices I would suggest we have the best team and maybe their inflated sense of worth contributes to under performance. And the argument from the great unwashed will always be if you want to be paid £300k a week you should be able to get a ball in an 8 yard gap. But that leads to the argument of players don't want to be paid £300k a week they are offered it.
Anyway back to real life
"under performance"? Strewth.
Right has form for frequently making apparently massively sarcastic comments that he insists are not.
I think he might just have an unfortunate way of writing.
All history now just move on and rise above it all.
Italy had better players and a better team. You don't go on an unbeaten run for 35 games without being exceptional. They also benefitted by being significantly more experienced than our team.
I didn't get the impression from our players of them having an inflated sense of self worth. One of the joys of the tournament for me was just what a thoroughly nice bunch of lads our squad was. Those players deserve our country to be proud of them to a man IMHO. Sadly not sure the players should be as proud of some elements of the country in return.
OK three young lads with an average age of less than 21 missed their penalties. With the weight of history and 30m supporters hopes and dreams on their shoulders, they did well to actually kick the ball IMHO. I hope the experience doesn't damage their future careers.
What is Gareth's quote about winning with humility and losing with grace. Perhaps we should all follow his lead.
That team is not far off winning something at all. A bit more adventure in possession and we'll pretty much be there - although part of me would rather we didn't win the next World Cup so we don't have to have our success associated with that abomination.
Last night I think some individuals under performed. For sure. You may disagree and I won't be make snide remarks if you want to.
Ah, the morning after, Some very odd stuff above, seems to reflect the country, a few old agendas, a bit of barely concealed racism and very little perspective, oh and we lose on penalties again.
Difficult to be too Anti Southgate and his overall approach as having a happy, united, focussed squad trying their best and taking the winners to penalties in the final is better than most would have hoped for and better than we've done in decades. We've played crap opposition in tournaments before btw and got nothing from them.
Some Individual decisions and the quality of the opposition on the day cost in the end on the day, If we'd gone gung ho and been battered that would also have been the managers fault. The subs made weren't adventurous enough though, didn't really help and the pen choices were all a mess too, also we really need to be able to take off players who aren't contributing much rather than sanctify them and hope blindly that it'll suddenly click.
The Italians were professional and ruthless partly supported by a type of low key refereeing that most of us had called for but wasn't really appropriate in the game as it was played.
As for the in person scumbags punching and littering, the politicians bandwaggonning in then pivoting, and the keyboard warriors attacking kids they can all just fuck off, actual fans are tired of these pricks embarrassing us constantly and having to justify why we aren't all like that.
Post of the Tournament @StrongestTeam
Just reading more about some of the 'scenes' at Wembley yesterday. Extremely concerning - normally impossible to get anywhere near the stadium itself without a ticket. Bracing for one hell of a Covid spike as well now.
Wimbledon, Goodwood, F1 next weekend. All potential superspeaders
But you would have thought that the virus has developed enough intelligence to keep away from the moronic thugs that claim to be football fans. So can’t blame the Euros as a spreader event.
@StrongestTeam
Personally I haven't seen any anti-Southgate campaigns. I am sure he will reflect on what he could do better and that is why he's such a good manager.
Equally my socials have not included any race related comments and negativity about any of the aspect of the players who scored, missed, played well, didn't play as well.
I would like to think it is because the vast majority of commentators share my love and appreciation of the past 4 weeks. BUT clearly there are some pond life out there and I don't care to try and find their evil bile. And today it is such a shame that their unforgivable spewing is the headline.
As for the fans it was always going to happen. Everyone knew it was going to happen. It was unstoppable. Why they did not do fan parks to mitigate it I don't know. Yes Covid. But why not have Covid controlled areas rather than the scenes in Leicester square. Was this UEFA, the FA, the government? Thank Christ the breaking in was actually not more sinister or else no one would be talking about football today.
I will be amazed if we don't end up with games behind closed doors. And we can kiss goodbye to any hopes of hosting a major tournament in the near future.
I hate the vogue for building new stadia out of town away from amenities, but after last night I understand why it makes sense.
Absolutely, if you don't follow obvious arseholes or go looking for it you won't see even a tiny percentage of abuse but it doesn't mean it's not there and players should have to deal with it, or that it won't reflect badly on Football supporters as a whole.
On the event management side it looks to have been an utter shambles, not that it excuses the individual acts of violence. 8pm kick off was always a bad idea, really week cordons, far too many people allowed near without tickets, Uefa insisting on bypassing any schemes the FA set up and selling direct to whoever wants etc etc
This isn’t an excuse or the only reason for the ‘scenes’ last night, but it’s worth thinking about. 8pm Sunday is a ridiculous time for a final to kick off, it was after midnight in most of Europe when the trophy was presented. There’s no reason it can’t have kicked off at 3 or 4. Or noon to be honest.