Whilst we mostly expected Sweden and Switzerland to claw their way, in a battle of attrition, through their round of 16 tie, I don't think even the most damaged England fans really expected the 2.5 hours of utter torture that ensued last night.
With Sweden the prize for progression to the Quarters, England and Columbia faced off last night, in a game I expected to be quite flowing and fun. How very wrong I was. After a bright start, with England bossing possession and looking generally threatening from set pieces, Jose Peckerman seemed to make a "99 call" and all hell broke loose.
Refereeing leniency hit an all time high as Barios first got away with his double headbutt on Henderson and then later managed to do a two-footed stamp with no recourse. Falcao was at his angsty best, and tempers boiled over all over the place. In years gone by Scholes, Beckham, Gerard would all have lost their heads and places on the pitch, but the becalmed England team took it in their stride and have come through without a rash of suspensions for the next match. It seems odd that any team would actually expect such a physically inert collection of players (Sterling, Lingard, Alli are hardly fighters, despite Alli's faux-aura of being nasty - and so we missed out on what otherwise might have been an absolute blood-bath of a game).
Kane slapped in yet another penalty, which amazed me, it must be so hard having to take any more than one penalty with any conviction during a tournament. Still, our Harry keeps dousing himself in pheromones each game, with the resultant defender humpage that seems to now happen at every set piece -and its yielding results. "Taking one for the team" has hit new heights. Even the crushing equaliser didn;t leave me too worried as I'd not seen enough to think we'd lose.
It only really dawned on me after 110 minutes that we've let the game evolve from one we were bossing almost entirely, via an hour of staccato nonsense to one where we looked identical to England we've all seen at tournaments for 20+ years now, low on confidence, tired, and stumbling abjectly towards certain elimination. As Henderson stepped up I just knew that it was over. The pen was saved and I answered affirmatively to Mrs Birchy's assertion that "that's it isn't it, we're going to lose on penalties".
The next few minutes panned out, and all of a sudden the large dose of the same old nervous tournament wreckage became the new dawn of English football. One thing is for sure, we have the look of one of those teams who is progressing without impressing, and often that is a winning formula; we just need to pull a performance out of the bag at the right time and it could, just maybe, be coming home.
With Sweden the prize for progression to the Quarters, England and Columbia faced off last night, in a game I expected to be quite flowing and fun. How very wrong I was. After a bright start, with England bossing possession and looking generally threatening from set pieces, Jose Peckerman seemed to make a "99 call" and all hell broke loose.
Refereeing leniency hit an all time high as Barios first got away with his double headbutt on Henderson and then later managed to do a two-footed stamp with no recourse. Falcao was at his angsty best, and tempers boiled over all over the place. In years gone by Scholes, Beckham, Gerard would all have lost their heads and places on the pitch, but the becalmed England team took it in their stride and have come through without a rash of suspensions for the next match. It seems odd that any team would actually expect such a physically inert collection of players (Sterling, Lingard, Alli are hardly fighters, despite Alli's faux-aura of being nasty - and so we missed out on what otherwise might have been an absolute blood-bath of a game).
Kane slapped in yet another penalty, which amazed me, it must be so hard having to take any more than one penalty with any conviction during a tournament. Still, our Harry keeps dousing himself in pheromones each game, with the resultant defender humpage that seems to now happen at every set piece -and its yielding results. "Taking one for the team" has hit new heights. Even the crushing equaliser didn;t leave me too worried as I'd not seen enough to think we'd lose.
It only really dawned on me after 110 minutes that we've let the game evolve from one we were bossing almost entirely, via an hour of staccato nonsense to one where we looked identical to England we've all seen at tournaments for 20+ years now, low on confidence, tired, and stumbling abjectly towards certain elimination. As Henderson stepped up I just knew that it was over. The pen was saved and I answered affirmatively to Mrs Birchy's assertion that "that's it isn't it, we're going to lose on penalties".
The next few minutes panned out, and all of a sudden the large dose of the same old nervous tournament wreckage became the new dawn of English football. One thing is for sure, we have the look of one of those teams who is progressing without impressing, and often that is a winning formula; we just need to pull a performance out of the bag at the right time and it could, just maybe, be coming home.
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