Originally Posted by
ragingpup
Poor old gru, you can almost feel his pain each time England score a goal!
I thought we started well, and pretty much pinned Italy back until they scored with their first attack. After that, the defence wobbled worryingly, as our defence often does as it is very much our weakness. But once we got the equaliser, we hit them hard in the 2nd half and it was great to see us so dominant against one of Europe's strongest teams, although they are clearly rebuilding, and we also were lucky not to have Philips sent off which could have changed the game.
I also get frustrated by how quickly we seem to turn attack into defence with players seemingly under instructions not to risk getting caught on a quick turnover (as we were for their goal). Wobbly defence aside (although Guehi looked promising when he came on), with Bellingham now flourishing in that role, we are very good at what we do and I think our improvement under Southgate is continuing further and we are at a point, for the first time in my life, where I think we can go in against the top world teams as evens as opposed to underdogs. However, the ideal to move from here to consolidate that into genuine chance of winning is to move the ball much quicker through the middle into attacking positions on a more consistent basis - too often we get the ball in promising situations, and the man on the ball can't see the pass forwards, so backwards it goes. WE need to play it more like Italy as they were in the 2021 finals - quite ruthlessly quick from back to front.
But it's the best we've been since my first memory of going out of the WC qualifiers in 73 - so I'm not complaining. Southgate has built a culture where the players clearly flourish, so much so that they go in for duty, even if injured! That in itself is a very important aspect of getting right to the top and easily overlooked.