Football

http://www.spiegel.de/sport/fussball/ian-wright-fussball-hat-nicht-die-macht-rassismus-zu-bekaempfen-a-1216319-amp.html?__twitter_impression=true

Not enjoying all this tactical analysis and discussion of actual football in this thread. When does the football season start so we can support opposing teams again?

Putin on the piano

https://twitter.com/megamk35/status/1014599705794371584

Forest are shit

I've just had to subscribe to r/championship on reddit for the first time in 8 years. I don't want to talk about real football for as long as possible...

Also are you going to Clacton for this?

I think we all enjoyed @bikes_knob 's report of the Nottingham quiz night pub fight, without which we might have forgotten about Forest for another season

may be a moot point if Vardy is injured, then we're talking Rashford or Welbeck.
Agree Alli's been poor, still hold out hope for Sterling. But if Southgate has got this far on the meritocracy and in form player getting the nod, then Alli and Sterling need to be replaced, as they haven't done enough.
Reading/listening to some of the reaction to the upcoming Sweden/England match, it seems the Swede's believe we we are beatable, not as good as we think we are and that our natural arrogance and tendency to overlook opponents will be our undoing...

poorly remembered factoid:
the team that wins a penno shootout tends to go out the next round.

I think it's a bit "regression to the mean".
We'll be facing a team who most likely could have beaten us.

Sweden are fucking dull. Even with Zlatan they were fucking dull.
No wonder Roy H. fitted in. Or maybe they're dull because of Roy H.

may be a moot point if Vardy is injured

Trudat, which also answers those who doubted his confidence in taking a penalty. I understand it was Southgate's decision after he strained his calf in extra-time.

Rashford over Welbeck for me.

The little bit of MoTD analysis I saw after 'Rboys' beat Colombia,
showed a well marshalled '2 lines of 4' defence,
typical of Pulisball, and several other EPL also-rans.
All the English squad play for teams that routinely break down and score against these type of sides.

At the worst we score from a couple of set pieces, at the very worst we pick up at least 1 penalty from MMA marking.

How do we beat Croatia?

Rashford over Welbeck for me.

Why would it be any other way?

The only criteria for picking Shelvey is that he could have pinged balls over the top for Vardy all night long.

Then again, Shelvey, for all his increased discipline in 2018, would probably have got sent off in the Colombia game so shrug

The England squad may well routinely play against such teams, but the players who do the breaking down are not English.

Firmino
Silva
DeBruyne
Ericsson
etc

I was helping Corny out

He'd already have been suspended by the Colombia game for saying something racist to the Panamaniacs.

It's always been this way hasn't it?*

But the axis of Gerrard and Lampard had others around them doing the bits that made them look good.

This time it appears we've got the people doing the bits that make others look good (Henderson,Young) but no one to give them (Alli, Sterling, Kane, Lindgard) anything good.

• I mean we've had Hoddle, Waddle, Gazza, Platt, Butch, and Tony Daley. And nobody got the best out of Tony Daley.
  

Pretty sure Sid Lowe et al have written the words for Blackfootation.

Unlike others I don't mind Sterling too much. He always shows for the ball, he keeps defenders occupied with his movement (Lingard has exploited those gaps a bit, Alli less so), he tries to carry the ball forwards which is something not enough of our team do.

On the flip side, when it isn't going for him he tries to do too much himself and inevitably loses the ball as he's trying to beat the man rather than play the easy ball.

I wouldn't mind him playing a bit deeper in place of Alli and Rashford coming in but if it's a matter of him or Alli being dropped then I'd say Alli hasn't done enough (and possibly isn't fit).

I can't see Southgate making multiple changes, he's decided on his team and system and they haven't lost yet.

...and they haven't lost yet.

Um, Belgium?

you keep sticking the knife in, and I'm doing my best to avoid getting involved.
Not amusing or engaging.
old trope, is old.
I've no interest in constantly banging on about your height in every post, so why do you and others feel the need to keep regurgitating this?
I like you IRL but I can do without you on here, in this thread.
Not bants or amusing, just lazy and plain fucking annoying.
Is the point, to get a rise from me by constantly digging then say ho ho, look you fell for it?
Serious question?

#2muchbantz #itscominghone

Lads, lads, lads, no need for infighting now, you all seem to be forgetting the fact that it's coming home. Tho if any of you own a Volvo you might want to consider finding a garage to hide it in on Saturday.

I'd steer clear of IKEA too.

Though that's always a good thing to do.

I'm going to Ikea on Saturday.