Euro 2016
- Thread starter Neki
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Szlia
Member
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It should be mentioned though that this Iceland team is not like, say, the Faroe Islands team where half the players are amateurs competing in the Faroe league and the other half navigate between the first and second division of the danish league. Iceland is obviously at a demographic disadvantage and they don't have a star, but they are still able to field six or seven players that compete in high level championships and/or european level clubs. So, as a David, they are still smaller than Goliath, but not exactly puny.
Dandain
Trakanon Raider
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You might say that, but this is like Boise, Idaho being a sufficient population base to make round of 8 in the Euro. This is a remarkable achievement of such a small quantity of people. Iceland has a smaller population than the smallest US state. There are twice as many people and some in Alaska, The District of Columbia has 2x as many residents. Our least populous state nearly doubles Iceland's population.
This page makes Iceland's accomplishment even more fucking ridiculous.
List of European countries by population - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Wales 3,063,456
Northern Ireland 1,810,863
England 53,012,456
Only 160 times the population of Iceland. They could field 160 world class players at the rate of 1 to every 160. By the same density.
This page makes Iceland's accomplishment even more fucking ridiculous.
List of European countries by population - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Wales 3,063,456
Northern Ireland 1,810,863
England 53,012,456
Only 160 times the population of Iceland. They could field 160 world class players at the rate of 1 to every 160. By the same density.
Neki
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The thing with Iceland is that they know exactly how they wanted to play, exactly what formation to use, which players are playing and which position. They know their tactics and what each player is responsible for and they execute it as a team with everyone know what they are doing.
England on the other hand came into the tournament not knowing what their best team was, what their best formation was (4-4-2, 4-2-3-1, 4-3-3 were all used recently), players out of form yet still in the team because of reputation, they made Kane their free kick and corner taker one game before the tournament (WTF is that? He is awful at them), the Portugal friendly just game before the tournament; Kane was on the right wing - Vardy on the left wing and Rooney through the middle... FUCKING LOL. Alli played number 10 in the Germany friendly and was excellent but when Rooney came back from injury, he was shifted to be one of a mid field two beside Rooney which is NOT his best position. You got two players crowding each other out trying to get forward causing congestion and confusion.
This is the formation England played when they had that impressive friendly win against Germany:
and this is the formation played against Iceland or indeed the whole tournament
Man Utd fans will tell you that midfield is NOT Rooney's position and he is showhorned into there. You might as well played a specialist midfielder in there like Barkley or Henderson. Yeah, Rooney played alright during the tournament but that's because Hodgson built the team around HIM and the other players didn't perform well because of this.
Hodgson's tactics were to throw as many forwards on the field as possible when chasing a result causing no shape and cohesion and just aiming long balls into the area hoping one of the forwards will get a lucky bounce.
No tactics, confused formation, chopping and changing players for no reason, players played out of best position, unclear way on how to play and to attack. It's no wonder England are the worst team in the tournament (yes, even worse than Russia - England got a lucky win against the Welsh in the last minute).
Well done, Hodgson. You most probably fucked up the confidence of the Spurs players heading into the new season.
Fuck you.
Jozu
Bronze Baronet of the Realm
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Rooney needed to be in the striker position. I understand they have other, more spry options up front, but Hodgson is a fucking idiot, why the fuck would he put Rashford in with 3 minutes left in the game????
Unbelievable.
If they lose this fucking game it has to be the biggest football disappointment in a major tournament. And then has Kane take the fucking kick! This fucking manager might be worse than Capello!
edit: football is a wonderfully cruel mistress though, England can still score here.
Unbelievable.
If they lose this fucking game it has to be the biggest football disappointment in a major tournament. And then has Kane take the fucking kick! This fucking manager might be worse than Capello!
edit: football is a wonderfully cruel mistress though, England can still score here.
Aaron
Goonsquad Officer
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Isn't this possibly the answer:
Iceland has no star players so there are no super egos to appease (either from the egos or the fans). England's team is filled with super egos and drama queens and so the team's composition needs to be more "political" than tactical.
Iceland has no star players so there are no super egos to appease (either from the egos or the fans). England's team is filled with super egos and drama queens and so the team's composition needs to be more "political" than tactical.
Neki
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Portugal have one player that has the ability to carry an underperforming team through against lesser teams. Same with Wales. England does not have that.
The England management didn't even have the balls or any idea how to set the team up to play to their strengths. There are no 'English stars'. Sure, there are players with exciting potential but proven already? No, not really. (Rooney is not a star) although he does have a massive ego.
All this cannot be blamed on the Tottenham players too. The game against Slovakia, Hodgson rotated out most of the Spurs players and still England played like shit. It's the inability of the management to properly coach, set up and apply tactics to the players that is the problem.
It's fucking baffling. The moment a player pulls on a England shirt, they suddenly underperform to the extreme. Shit is amazing. Happened to the so called 'Golden generation' such as Lampard, Gerrard, Ferdinand, Scholes, Beckham and now, the current squad.
With the United system when he was in the midfield he was at the back alongside someone, and he was fine. It didn't cause the team around him to fail although some parallels could be made with United but we've had that issue with or without Rooney there. Utd didn't play this 4-3-3 Hodgson style but even then in these games Rooney wasn't that bad. He had a more advanced role so my question is why did Alli struggle with being along side him there? Rooney was awful in the second half vs Iceland but that was just his technique being god awful all of a sudden yet the rest of the time he was very decent.
Dier was good and did his job - something that Carrick would have offered the England team in many previous years but got ignored. That's at least a step forward.
Kane though? I got angry with him especially. If he's in the NT because he's our most prolific goal scorer and sharpest finisher, why was he so awful at it then? Does he need countless more chances provided from Eriksen or something? I'm massively biased because when he plays Utd he also goes missing and that's a large part of my judgement as we'd keep tight defenders on him. So it was annoying to see him drop back and waste shot after shot from distance. I also blocked the last match against Tottenham out of my memory.
Walker? We all know he has defensive liabilities so it's no shocker we conceded something like that. He's good going forward but I doubt any Italian would care about forward ability if you don't get the basics on set pieces right. Anyway, can't complain as there aren't too many reasonable alternatives.
/Blame Tottenham /Blame Pochettino
Aaron
Goonsquad Officer
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On a small side note for all the Iceland fans here, apparently they kick ass in theWomen's Leaguetoo!
Neki
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Yep, and England performed amazing when it was full of Man Utd and Liverpool players/Blame Tottenham /Blame Pochettino
Asshat Brando
Potato del Grande
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Spain was pretty terrible at the WC in Brazil so I'm not sure their Euro performance was that surprising. Supposedly Xavi did an interview about how they always have trouble with a back 3 and yet Del Bosque never made any adjustments. Think he's just burned out and a new coach would freshen up things.
For England, we're talking about a manager who obviously has no thoughts on offensive patterns of play other than throwing on every striker. Kane was garbage the whole tourny yet he starts up top with Sturridge wide right? You had Barkley, Lallana, Milner and Henderson on the bench and you bring on Wilshire? Rooney is not a midfielder, all he can do is spray the ball wide. He can't run with it nor make any type of incisive passes. Watching him and Ibra plod around the pitch this upcoming year is going to be hilarious. What a joke, Iceland thoroughly deserved the win.
For England, we're talking about a manager who obviously has no thoughts on offensive patterns of play other than throwing on every striker. Kane was garbage the whole tourny yet he starts up top with Sturridge wide right? You had Barkley, Lallana, Milner and Henderson on the bench and you bring on Wilshire? Rooney is not a midfielder, all he can do is spray the ball wide. He can't run with it nor make any type of incisive passes. Watching him and Ibra plod around the pitch this upcoming year is going to be hilarious. What a joke, Iceland thoroughly deserved the win.
