(12-07-2021 14:50 )HannahsPet Wrote: (12-07-2021 13:50 )KerrAvon Wrote: First good team we meet in the tournament and we go out, it's as simple as that
Are you saying Croatia Scotland and Germany and Denmark are shit teams
Lets look at England's last two tournaments: In 2018 they qualified for the knockout stages by beating two teams outside the top 50 then lost to Belgium. The played a Colombia side that were definitely a threat but not as good as they were in 2014 & it went to penalties, they then played a Sweden team who were well organised but carried no real threat, of Sweden's two strikers one played in the United Arab Emirates league, the other played in the French Ligue 1 & was sold to an Australian team that summer. Then they got to the Semi's where they lost to Croatia & then lost to Belgium in the 3rd place play off. So England's record at Russia against teams that could of beat them was played 4, won 1 & lost 3
On to Euro 2020, Croatia were not the side they were at World Cup 3 yrs earlier, with no Mandzukic they were without the tip of the spear to their attack & never really looked like threatening. Scotland played against them with real impetus but lacked the quality to put them away. Czech Republic were ranked 40th in the world & again like Croatia had no real drive against England. Germany are of course a team of world class players but again had no real energy to get at them, yet despite that up until England scored in 75th min anyone could of won that game. Ukraine were basically Sweden & had no real chance of ever beating England, a team that is bereft of quality players & no real attacking threat. I honestly thought they were out of the tournament until i looked at the round of 16 fixtures on the TV guide saw that they were playing Sweden & said to my self "Fuck sake Ukraine are still in the tournament, when did that happen ?" Then the semi against Denmark where England are the better team but Denmark are at least a team that are good enough to beat England on their day, England won that & then lost to Italy.
So England's record against teams that could beat them: Belgium, Colombia, Croatia, Belgium again, Germany, Denmark & Italy is played 7 won 3 lost 4 & their record against teams that are on their level i.e subtract Colombia & Denmark because even though they are capable of an upset England clearly are a step up in terms of quality then the record is played 5 won 1 lost 4
In those 3 matches that they won they scraped past Colombia on penalties, beat a poor Germany without being that good themselves & scraped past Denmark with an OG & an extremely dubious penalty on the rebound.
In the matches they lost Belgium won both without conceding, Croatia were considerably better for 75 minutes & Italy dominated the game with 66% possession, were the better team for 75 minutes & lets be honest in a game that lasted for, once you add four periods of stoppage time, about 130 minutes England scored in the 2nd minute but can anyone really remember a good chance they had for the 128 mins after Shaw's goal ? The were definitely the poorer team in all matches its not like it was a 12 round heavyweight match that was ended on points.
With the the exception of Germany before playing Italy in the final did England up against any top quality attackers who score consistently at club level ?
In both tournaments England had a guilded route to the last two matches, with the exception of Germany who were poor. That doesn't mean to say that they could not have gone to the semi's or the final in the other half of the draw but based on these performances it would of been a lot harder