It’s not quite anarchy just yet in the England camp, but after a cathartic shootout victory, Gareth’s tie was very much askew. We’re on our way.
Where to start? Well, let’s start with the positives:
Aside from 10 seconds of panic at having to deal with a last minute corner, the England team were well organized and more impressively disciplined in the face of a rampaging Colombian team who looked like they had snuck into the alley behind the Russian team hotel and scored some discarded chemical waste. Make no mistake, their pre-match preparation had been watching endless replays of Beckham and Rooney receiving petulance-induced red cards. Hell, they probably threw in footage of Ray Wilkins throwing the ball at the ref in ‘86. The English lose their cool more frequently than Neymar changes his hairstyle. Just wind them up and they will implode.
But we didn’t. Quite the opposite. We met the South American needle with a bit of our own while staying mostly within the rules of the game, not that the New Jersey ref was able to keep up either way. After embarrassingly failing to qualify for the finals, the US was not exactly redeemed by the refereeing display here. Taking 4 minutes to quell Colombian annoyance at the penalty, just set the tone for the remainder of the game. This was a little more high octane than Columbus Crew vs DC
United.
Kieran Trippier.... maybe my fave England player and definitely my MoM here. Seems perfectly suited by the system we play and dispatched his pen superbly.
Sir Harry... the only real class player on the team. Streets ahead of everyone else, but seems genuine and without the hype and ego of past “heroes” (see prior red mist comment), validated by the fact he seems content to play for Spurs...
Jordan (the good one). Probably the victim of the biggest conspiracy since JFK: obtaining footage of his miraculous save of the World Cup in the last minute from Uribe seems to be harder to find than footage of Gareth in beaten up T-shirt and shorts. Victim of the ensuing corner and bedlam, but still bizarre in this day and age of a gazillion cameras and tv coverage.
Penalties: The curse is lifted. The end of fear itself.
And here’s the balanced not so positives:
It was an awful actual game in terms of quality and we created very little. Now, I can accept this was largely down to the Colombian tactics, which just made it impossible to get any kind of rhythm in the game, but they were also organised at the back. Something that Sweden do in their sleep. The midfield need to do a hell of a lot better
Eric Dier - yes, glory glory, penalty kick. But he completely lived up to his name since entering the game - even his pen was not very good really...
Jordan (the not so good one). All the talk of practice and “owning the process”. I think my 5 year old was about to launch himself to his left off the couch it was that obvious which way he was going.
Ashley Young - we’ve had such a historic problem with the left side, that maybe we feel compelled to play Ashley here. But we all know he’s going to cut in on his right foot, do we really think Sweden’s going to think differently? Danny Rose came on and almost scored. ( with an actual left foot no less)
Onwards!
Sweden up next. They are a complete bogey team for us, have seen off Italy and Germany and appear to have the defensive abilities to shackle Sir Harry (without resorting to rugby tackles). They do look a bit woeful upfront though. This will be very tight. Interesting to read Sweden seem to be thinking the same “this side of the draw is a piece of...”, given their Brolin, Dahlin, Broliiinnn! history against us, who can blame them.
Interesting stat of the day: Only 2 out of 14 teams since France 98 who won penalty shootouts have gone on to win their next game. Something has to give in Croatia v Russia!, not a good omen for Gareth’s boys
2018 World Irony Cup goes toooo..... Maradona. Who else. Stating that England had committed a “monumental robbery”. Hmmm. Surely he hasn’t taken that much coke that he’s forgotten, has he?!!
And finally: special mention for Friday. Two amazing games and a return to avoiding scores, eye contact or really any human interaction at work.
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