England vs Belgium

[eyepie]

England reserves v Belgium reserves was a completely bizarre game, and about as interesting as a Notts game under Ian McParland.
I didn't know whether to celebrate their goal or be upset by it. The undoubted highlight was Batshuayi's one-two with the post goal 'celebration', he couldn't even pretend it didn't hurt!

Spot on Elite - really enjoyed the goal post job.

[BigFatPie]

The performance was an insult to the England fans who traveled all that way to watch. What did we learn? Delph is ****e, but we knew that already. Loftus Cheek is built like a fridge and plays like one. He made Fellaini look mobile. I think this self indulgence by Gareth 'Interesting' Southgate will cost us dear.

I thought RLC was alright, but other than that agree. We played a second string against Slovakia 2 years ago, played crap, and then went out with the “strongest”side against Iceland and were even worse.

We had an easy chance to play Japan instead of Colombia in the last 16 and blew it. I fully expect Colombia to beat us fairly easily, particularly if Rodriguez is fit. On the other hand, I reckon a fit and firing Belgium could go all the way, including beating Brazil.

[the_anticlough]

I'm OK with us being influenced by a possible QF v Sweden/Switzerland and increasing our chances of reaching the semis overall.
I agree with BFP that Belgium can beat Brazil but I don't think we could get past them.
Columbia will be a tough game and I'd make them slight favourites.
Nobody should EXPECT England to beat Columbia (about the same population of England but 10 times the size). They were Quarter-finalists in 2014 and I've been watching them in qualifying - they've got flair up front, but it's their really tough backline that stands out for me.
Southgate's England are better than we thought they'd be, James Rodrigues looks crocked and maybe VAR will help us if their defenders get too physical with us from set-pieces. We've got a good chance of a QF v Sweden/Swiss and I'd put it at 52/48 them and we know it's possible to overturn something like that

[drillerpie]

I thought RLC was alright, but other than that agree. We played a second string against Slovakia 2 years ago, played crap, and then went out with the “strongest”side against Iceland and were even worse.

We had an easy chance to play Japan instead of Colombia in the last 16 and blew it. I fully expect Colombia to beat us fairly easily, particularly if Rodriguez is fit. On the other hand, I reckon a fit and firing Belgium could go all the way, including beating Brazil.

RLC has definitely got something, the way he charges through tackles is quite rare but his end product was virtually non existent last night.

[drillerpie]

I'm OK with us being influenced by a possible QF v Sweden/Switzerland and increasing our chances of reaching the semis overall.
I agree with BFP that Belgium can beat Brazil but I don't think we could get past them.
Columbia will be a tough game and I'd make them slight favourites.
Nobody should EXPECT England to beat Columbia (about the same population of England but 10 times the size). They were Quarter-finalists in 2014 and I've been watching them in qualifying - they've got flair up front, but it's their really tough backline that stands out for me.
Southgate's England are better than we thought they'd be, James Rodrigues looks crocked and maybe VAR will help us if their defenders get too physical with us from set-pieces. We've got a good chance of a QF v Sweden/Swiss and I'd put it at 52/48 them and we know it's possible to overturn something like that

Colombia will be a tough game, I just hope we put a decent performance in and don't fold mentally and what will be will be.

[the_anticlough]

Colombia will be a tough game, I just hope we put a decent performance in and don't fold mentally and what will be will be.

That by itself would be a massive improvement on the last few tournaments

[drillerpie]

That by itself would be a massive improvement on the last few tournaments

Exactly!

[the_anticlough]

I thought RLC was alright, but other than that agree. We played a second string against Slovakia 2 years ago, played crap, and then went out with the “strongest”side against Iceland and were even worse.

I think that was different - all about 'giving the lads a game' rather than strategy. England should have picked a strong team to beat Slovakia, play N.Ireland and be in the easier half of the draw. At that time nobody knew Iceland would edge out Portugal into 3rd place and Germany, Italy, Spain and France were all sitting in that half of the draw anyway. That was an enormous cock-up by Hodgson and it turned out that way. England squads had reached a point where they WANTED the most difficult opponents so that there isn't so much shame in losing to them (no signs of wanting to play to win the tournament at all)

This time round there's a good tactical reason to come 2nd. Columbia and Switz/Sweden for a world cup semi, who wouldn't like that?

[navypie]

I thought RLC was alright, but other than that agree. We played a second string against Slovakia 2 years ago, played crap, and then went out with the “strongest”side against Iceland and were even worse.

We had an easy chance to play Japan instead of Colombia in the last 16 and blew it. I fully expect Colombia to beat us fairly easily, particularly if Rodriguez is fit. On the other hand, I reckon a fit and firing Belgium could go all the way, including beating Brazil.

What's this "we" and "us" ?

[Bohinen]

This time round there's a good tactical reason to come 2nd. Columbia and Switz/Sweden for a world cup semi, who wouldn't like that?

I'm sure we would like that, but how do we get to the semi by winning just one game? Colombia are far harder to get past than Japan, so tactically it was a poor decision. If and when we get past them, we'll find Sweden are no mugs, they saw off Holland and Italy in the WC qualifiers.