World Cup England WC games

[ZeroTheHero]

It just struck me that I hadn't seen any posts at all about the England-Andorra game, and nothing about tonight's Serbia-England game either.

For what its worth, I did watch the Andorra game (I was at the mother in law's!) and it was terrible. I know it's fashionable and a bit of a cliché to criticise the England football team - but that doesn't mean it is not correct to do so. It takes a particular skill from a manager and players to have a team with some talented players in it and somehow make the team a good deal LESS than the sum of it's parts. I can understand swanning about at half speed in a friendly, and even in that Nations League (which is really friendlies with points) - but in a world cup qualifier when you are presumably playing for a place in the team at the World Cup Finals?

Tonight's Serbia game might be more interesting as they will provide sterner opposition. Will England step up? Can they?

It's a sad indictment of the national team when meaningful, international matches don't get a mention on a forum full of pretty avid football lovers.

 

[sideshowrob]

4 wins out of 4 and no goals conceeded. It's been dull so far but they are getting the job done. Tonight should be much more of a test.

 

[The Voice Of Reason]

Kane isn't the force he was on international football use him as a sub and give the new ones coming thru a chance, surprised we didn't against Andorra, great chance

 

[ZeroTheHero]

4 wins out of 4 and no goals conceeded. It's been dull so far but they are getting the job done. Tonight should be much more of a test.

Well yes, but two of those games were against Andorra and one was against Latvia with the footballing might of Albania being the other. World rankings? Respectively: 174th, 137th and 68th. You really would expect England to beat them, surely? Serbia are ranked 32nd and England ranked 4th (somehow!). Yes it is getting the job done - so far at least - but blimey it is dull to watch. As evident by the complete lack if interest on here (which was one of the reasons for the post).

And, seeing your avatar, I have to say I am looking forward to the release of LSD in a few days time quite a lot more than watching tonight's game!

 

[holdsteady]

We have looked terrible under Tuchel so far, worse than under Southgate. Add in the friendly beating we took at the hands of Senegal and its hard to see his appointment being much more than a flop and a waste of time and money. Should have enough to qualify but not certain tonight will go that well.
Hopefully I am wrong and its a glorious summer but struggling to see anything pointing that way from the performances under him so far.

 

[Common Villager]

It just struck me that I hadn't seen any posts at all about the England-Andorra game, and nothing about tonight's Serbia-England game either.

For what its worth, I did watch the Andorra game (I was at the mother in law's!) and it was terrible. I know it's fashionable and a bit of a cliché to criticise the England football team - but that doesn't mean it is not correct to do so. It takes a particular skill from a manager and players to have a team with some talented players in it and somehow make the team a good deal LESS than the sum of it's parts. I can understand swanning about at half speed in a friendly, and even in that Nations League (which is really friendlies with points) - but in a world cup qualifier when you are presumably playing for a place in the team at the World Cup Finals?

Tonight's Serbia game might be more interesting as they will provide sterner opposition. Will England step up? Can they?

It's a sad indictment of the national team when meaningful, international matches don't get a mention on a forum full of pretty avid football lovers.

I was actually at the Andorra match.

It was a poor game, as you say. Lacking any sort of inventiveness or creativity. We didn't need Rice and Anderson in midfield (the latter was one of the only bright sparks), we could have easily sacrificed one of them for a more creative midfielder e.g. Gibbs-White or Morgan Rogers.

 

[SteMerritt]

Didn't watch Saturday, and will only follow tonight's game online whilst watching something else. Really can't be doing with putting myself through watching qualifiers, the actual tournament games are bad enough.

Don't know when it changed for me, probably early 2010s I'd guess.

 

[90syeIlow]

I just don’t think the majority of players care about playing for England.

There’s no passion.

 

[Oufcrealist]

Didn't watch Saturday, and will only follow tonight's game online whilst watching something else. Really can't be doing with putting myself through watching qualifiers, the actual tournament games are bad enough.

Don't know when it changed for me, probably early 2010s I'd guess.

Agreed. Watching England under Tuchel is like watching paint dry! If they were playing at the Kassam I wouldn't make the effort. So dull and boring.

 

[WE Yellow]

It's much easier to disassociate yourself from qualifiers/friendlies by treating it as a completely different sport to tournament football. It has always been boring and fairly pointless for a nation like us who qualify most of the time. The media will lap up a poor performance and question the manager and a majority of fans will get on board with it, did the same with Southgate and there was this incredibly jarring period where he was "never the man" to lead us at the next tournament, even though if you look at his tournament performances alone he's probably our greatest ever manager over a sustained period.

These games are for testing new systems, getting used to new players, the players getting used to their new coaches' methods and getting through them relatively unscathed, which we have done so far and will continue to do for the next 50 years.

Tuchel will obviously be judged by how we perform next summer, so maybe just wait until next summer to judge him? I don't need to see drivel like he's not a good manager or our squad isn't that good because we've beaten Andorra 2-0.

 

[CaptainOx]

Reading a lot of media coverage talking about what the squad could be at the World Cup which feels a bit ahead of time given we've still got Serbia to play twice in qualification and only the winner qualifies automatically.

There needs to be a significant improvement to what's gone before under Tuchel for us to get there, I think we're lucky that Serbia drew in Albania, but I don't think them taking 4 points off us and sending us to a March playoff is entirely impossible.

Both games versus Andorra have been uninspiring and it's those types of performances that switch people off from the national team outside of tournaments.
These qualifying games are generally straightforward and good for trying different players and systems. But you're guaranteed at least a couple of stern tests in each group, Serbia away is definitely one of those. Think this a really interesting and important game for Tuchel.

On a betting note, you could get over 4/1 on Serbia winning tonight as recently as this morning.
England 1/25 to win the group with Serbia at 11/1 also seems nuts given the fixtures.

 

[holdsteady]

Actually feels like Tuchels first proper game tonight, my interest levels have gone up. Definitely going to have to play better.

 

[WarwickOx]

Well yes, but two of those games were against Andorra and one was against Latvia with the footballing might of Albania being the other. World rankings? Respectively: 174th, 137th and 68th. You really would expect England to beat them, surely? Serbia are ranked 32nd and England ranked 4th (somehow!). Yes it is getting the job done - so far at least - but blimey it is dull to watch. As evident by the complete lack if interest on here (which was one of the reasons for the post).

And, seeing your avatar, I have to say I am looking forward to the release of LSD in a few days time quite a lot more than watching tonight's game!

#TeammslikeAndorra
Works both ways i guess.

 

[Swaby39]

It’ll never be glistening stuff under Tuchel, but where he really tends to shine (from limited memory of his club management) is in the big games where margins are everything. Consider the CL final as Chelsea manager against Man City. Coincidentally this is exactly where Southgate fell down - he got exposed in those big games against the French, the Italians etc where nouse rose to the surface.

It’s boring so far under Tuchel, but it’s no more insufferable than it was with Southgate and it really was turgid at times.

But, I think what’ll come out in time is a bloody difficult side to beat in a tournament. And one huge positive from the Andorra game was Elliot Anderson who, if he backs that up with a repeat tonight, could finally answer our decade-long scramble for a midfielder that can dictate a game to allow our ridiculous attacking players do the damage.

But, as a general rule I hate international football outside of the tournaments. It’s boring, routine and slow. But I am quite intrigued by what Tuchel will bring - I think we’ll evolve in to a side that wont concede a goal lightly, let alone lose. And knowing we’ve got a team that shouldn’t struggle for goals, that’s quite encouraging when looking for a trophy.

 

[SirAndyOfCrosby]

#TeammslikeAndorra
Works both ways i guess.

The difference being that Andorra, with all due respect, haven't earnt the right to be treated as equals at this level. The nature of international football qualfiers produces these mismatches.

They're the international equivalent of Stalybridge Celtic competing against Leeds in the Cup.

Whereas we're the club equivalent of Switzerland at a major tournament. Proud history, a relatively recent modest rebirth - and certainly not out of place at this level.

Which is why 'teamslikeoxford' is so distasteful.

 

[tonyw]

Tend to agree - in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't really matter if you beat the international also-rans in comprehensive, all action fashion or in a series of uninspired, tedious, painstaking struggles. You just bank the points and move on.

Tuchel's success and failure as England manager is going to depend entirely on what happens in the knockout stages next summer. We're not going to remember a limp 2-0 against Andorra if he does the business then. But if we lose on penalties to Uzbekistan* in the Last 32, he's going to be run out of town very quickly indeed.

As an aside, I see England now haven't lost a World Cup qualifier since 2009, and only four in the past 30 years. That's pretty darn impressive when you're old enough to remember the 1994 World Cup qualifiers!


*As a secondary aside, Uzbekistan look like they're very soon going to be usurped as my go-to outsider for all World Cup posts by the Cape Verde Islands, who are now almost certain to be in the US next summer at Cameroon's expense after beating them 1-0 today........

 

[bert]

Didn't watch Saturday, and will only follow tonight's game online whilst watching something else. Really can't be doing with putting myself through watching qualifiers, the actual tournament games are bad enough.

Don't know when it changed for me, probably early 2010s I'd guess.

I'm much the same. I tried the Andorra game the other day but switched off at half time.

Edit: I've now put the telly on to see what the first half is like tonight!

 

[Ox4Eva]

Gone from a keen England follower to not even watching a game for about 6 years or more.
I just cannot get interested in watching a group of millionaires with no REAL passion or pride !

And that goes for all international football, not watched any of it and couldn't care less.

 

[bert]

Gone from a keen England follower to not even watching a game for about 6 years or more.
I just cannot get interested in watching a group of millionaires with no REAL passion or pride !

And that goes for all international football, not watched any of it and couldn't care less.

If we got to the premier league and were paying 18 year olds 30k a week to sit on the bench and senior players millions per year, would you lose interest too? (I know we don't have the budget - just being theoretical)

Not criticising you at all - I hate the premier league so not sure how I'd feel.

 

[Mad Dog]

It comes to something when I'm more annoyed that the England game means Emmerdale's not on tonight.

Couldn't care less about the shower of shite.

 

[bert]

Whenever we play Serbia, I'm always reminded of this KLF track:

 

[Coffin Dodger]

Watching at the moment, it looks like some of the England players need to be introduced to each other, have they actually trained together.

 

[ZeroTheHero]

#TeammslikeAndorra
Works both ways i guess.

Yes, but Andorra are only in the competition because they are a country with a football team. Oxford United are playing teams at a certain level because they have earned that right. Not the same at all really. If we (OUFC) were playing a scratch side from Stanton-St-John in the 'All Oxon Football Clubs Cup' and cocked it up, I think we should be beating #clubslikestantonstjohn!

 

[Cass63]

I watched the Andorra game in a bar in Crete, there were 5 of us in there supporting England, by full time it was just me, it was awful, I haven’t even tried to find a bar for the game tonight.

 

[Ox4Eva]

If we got to the premier league and were paying 18 year olds 30k a week to sit on the bench and senior players millions per year, would you lose interest too? (I know we don't have the budget - just being theoretical)

Not criticising you at all - I hate the premier league so not sure how I'd feel.

I despise the premier league and all it stands for so I actually hope we stay at this level, yes i know we should hope for more for our club.

But I have seen us play in the top league before it went bad!

OUFC means more to me than England, even back when I used to go to England games.

Fair play to those who can still stomach it, but not for me..

 

[holdsteady]

Looking brighter so far.

 

[Cass63]

On the plus side, Iceland are beating France

 

[holdsteady]

Good old Harry.

 

[Foley]

I think we have been really bright and some very good performances so far.
Deserved goal ( Kane of course)

 

[ZeroTheHero]

Tend to agree - in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't really matter if you beat the international also-rans in comprehensive, all action fashion or in a series of uninspired, tedious, painstaking struggles. You just bank the points and move on.

It doesn't matter IF you can then play better against the better teams when you need to. And the only clues you have as to whether they can do so, is to watch how they play in other games.

So far, based on what we have seen, I don't think any of us are convinced that this collection of players have got a snowball's chance in hell of suddenly becoming (literally) world-beaters.

The best rated team we have played recently was Senegal (rated 18th in the world) and we lost at home.

Still, we have just gone one up against Serbia