Group D Discussion - Ukraine, Sweden, France, England

[Scaly piscine]

Hmm taking off probably one of the players with the most energy in Ox?

Oh god why Henderson.

 

[thierry henry]

Poor old Ox touched the ball about 4 times in the first half but I thought he was one of your best in the second

 

[Scaly piscine]

Ribery made of glass rolls over. Insta-foul.

 

[thierry henry]

This was not worth getting up at 4am for.

 

[sledger]

Good performance and a good result. Well done England.

Ref had a shocker though.

 

[Scaly piscine]

Considering what England are usually like in those sorts of conditions that was a pretty good performance. Just backed off completely when they took the lead, that and the referee and it would have been 3 points.

 

[GIMH]

Yeah, happy enough with that.

 

[sledger]

England with about 7 players on the edge of the box is all Hodgson's design.

Call me crazy, but it's almost as if the team is managed by Roy Hodgson!

 

[Scaly piscine]

Yay back to being a draw.

 

[Scaly piscine]

Hmm Ukraine take the lead. Not totally sure what the best result would be for England.

 

[Pothas]

Would not go as far as to say it was in anyway a good performance, was the most boring game so far.

France were fairly average, will be interesting to see how England go about trying to win a game.

 

[sledger]

Whilst France are no great shakes, the technique (and probably quality, individually anyway) within their squad far surpasses what is available to England at the moment. I think the fact that England weren't ever really troubled throughout is fairly encouraging.

Like you say though, the real assessment will come when in the next match they really have to come out and go for the win rather than staying on the back foot.

 

[Scaly piscine]

Well England need a win and a draw basically, so they won't necessarily have to come out and go for it. But the fact that the other two games are in the later time slot should help.

 

[sledger]

Well, I suppose technically they don't need to win the next game. But I don't think it would be acceptable for them to adopt similar tactics as they did today in either of their next two fixtures. They might be underdogs against France, but they shouldn't be thought of as such against Ukraine or Sweden.

 

[Scaly piscine]

England were fairly positive for large periods, they just did what they usually do and immediately backed off into their own penalty area when they get the lead.

If they play like that again they'll probably win both games.

 

[TT Boy]

Great for Shev, great for the Ukraine, not so great for England as Ukraine looked half decent as did Sweden. Shev humbled Zlatan, Zlatan looked at Shev prior to kick-off like Shev was just some failed Chelsea chump.

England will be hoping for a more sympathetic ref next time. He didn’t seem to like our diving technique see falling to ground with no contact as opposed to minimal contact and given we play an 8 man defence, set pieces and wining soft decisions could be critical to progressing. Thought Parker and Gerrard were awful but I don’t think Roy wants more from either of them, disrupt play, play deep, that’s it. Prior to kick-off I couldn’t believe France were playing Malouda and Diarra, after 30 minutes I still couldn’t understand why both were playing but Diarra particularly had a storming second half while Malouda hasn’t played that well in years.

 

[social]

Considering what England are usually like in those sorts of conditions that was a pretty good performance. Just backed off completely when they took the lead, that and the referee and it would have been 3 points.

No way that the ref influenced that result

Sure there could've been a couple of extra frees (virtually nothing within miles of the French goal though) but Milner and Gerrard should both have been booked for shameless dives so it evened itself out

IMO, Woy should be given credit for organizing Eng well and they should be pleased to hold a faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar more talented team to a draw despite it being almost totally one way traffic

 

[Ikki]

Call me crazy, but it's almost as if the team is managed by Roy Hodgson!

LOL, I meant to say that with people all over whining about how deep the players are it is by design and not because the players suddenly want France to **** all over them.

I think it was a good game for England and showed, if they get out of the group, they will be hard to beat and could surprise people.

As an aside, the ref really missed a lot of fouls for England. And I reckon on the dead-ball situations England could have had even better chances.

 

[Ikki]

No way that the ref influenced that result[/LEFT]

Sure there could've been a couple of extra frees (virtually nothing within miles of the French goal though) but Milner and Gerrard should both have been booked for shameless dives so it evened itself out

IMO, Woy should be given credit for organizing Eng well and they should be pleased to hold a faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar more talented team to a draw despite it being almost totally one way traffic

Gerrard played it up a bit, but it was definitely a foul as he was obstructed. Don't remember the Milner one you're talking about.

 

[GIMH]

Yeah the Gerrard one was a foul, pure and simple.

The ref was poor but none of the decisions were huge ones, just thought he was lacking in competence tbh.