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"There's been a beheading at the women's cup game at St. James' Park, Chris Kamara, but who to?"

He hasn’t got Schar to back him up or the speed and movement of Almiron up front to create defences problems. The England team seems to stand around a lot not moving.

Thinking about who I was out for a drink with he’d have needed to be

it’s all static in front of him when he gets the ball, no-one buzzing around, creating space or making runs.

The other thing is he never hides. So if he’s trying things and it’s not coming off he keeps trying, keeps making himself available etc. So it sticks out if it’s not happening for him. I don’t think he’s been bad from a defensive pov either

Whoah! I don’t mind a bit of banter but that’s going a bit far

He was supposed to be hung like a horse of that makes you feel any better 👍🏻

I think Trippier as been a bit ropey in the WC. Certainly not hit levels he has with us. Mount needs dropping for Foden and Maddison needs some minutes. I'd also start Grealish over Sterling. Sterling maybe more potent but we could barely keep the ball v USA. Grealish is generally good at keeping possession and wins lots of fouls - which me might need.

It’s a weird one with Southgate because I genuinely think both sides of the argument on him are right It’s a strange one where you can’t really knock the record and how he’s basically transformed the culture around the squad but he’s also too cautious for his own good and needs cattle prodded into making any kind of substitution without thinking about it for 15 minutes.

I posted this a while back, RIP Doddie you handsome bastard ( @wykikitoon Carl Hogg was on Kevin Sinfield’s charity bike ride from Edinburgh to Manchester the other week) “Met Weir a couple of times in my youth (some mates played against him at school/youth games, I liked rugby but was never near that level) once I was escorting the cousin of one of his Scotland teammates out for a drink… things were going ok, then he walked into the bar we were in with his mate Carl Hogg (Hogg now married to Jill Douglas, BBC sports reporter and CEO of the DWF) my date immediately made a beeline for these two very tall athletic looking lads, I was introduced and after pointing out some mutual friends I was mostly silent, she spent the next hour heavily flirting with them and other rugby types. Didn’t see her again. “

🙂

Spot on. I get frustrated that any complaint about Southgate is directed to either a “you expect to thump everyone” or “he got to a final and semi final” response. I don’t expect England to go round smacking everyone 3-0 but we go many games without a fucking proper chance on goal and with the players he has at his disposal it’s a joke. His past tournament finishes have clearly been good, but there’s still frustration there - there were massive tactical failings on his part in both games and he did nowt to build confidence with performances in the lead up, despite a lot of weak opposition. I’ve said it before and some find it harsh but imo he left a fucking ton on the table in those tournaments. He also gets a ton of credit in the whole “doesn’t have much to pick from” stakes when it’s entirely unwarranted. He has the keepers from the top and 3rd top teams, he picks Pickford without fail. He could select a bloke that has won an Italian title, a renewed Smalling who Jose loves, Webster, White, or Burn - all three have been fantastic over the last two seasons, instead he picks a bloke that doesn’t play for his club and defends the decision as “he’s never let me down” that’s not improvement, those players may work better but you’re not fucking trying. The same way that he threw Phillips and Rice together for years (even so desperate to do it this tournament that he brought Phillips with his whole 2 minutes of PL footy this season), didn’t bother trying Ward-Prowse or other CMs. The bloke is stubborn, rigid, makes fucking terrible in game subs, tactically he’s terrified of losing to the point he stifles all of the attacking talent he has. I’m just glad I don’t have to particularly worry, I don’t rate him one bit and while it used to bother me when people told me I was wrong before we were treat to more of his stifling shite footy, now we have Eddie Howe and I can’t wait for this crap tournament to be over.

Kane is absolutely world class, the blokes record is insane and he’s done it, often, in pretty average or underachieving Spurs sides. The problem is that, the idea that you need 11 world class players to perform at a World Cup is total bollocks. France won in 1998 with Guivarch up front ffs. England have More than enough attacking talent where the manager can take off the handbrake but he simply refuses. The Iran game was great because you saw the players that perform fortheir club do the same for England; Kane was dropping deep and threading balls, Saka and Sterling were causing havoc out wide, Bellingham had full license to go forward and to see all of that curtailed is massively frustrating. England don’t have 11 world class players but they have enough players whose form is dovetailing where that should be harnessed and not suppressed. Wales on Tuesday has every chance to be a hard old game. They’ll not knock us out but fuck me, they could be as awkward as possible on the way out

By that logic there are what? 11 world class players at any one time? In which case practically no team has any world class players

A timely bump.

I mean...they weren't handing out free tickets at all but whatever Great day out, enjoyed myself.

Like they’re in a position to talk about free tickets.

New record attendance and they won 2-1

Not the dressing room snaps I was hoping for.

Just wait til you find out it’s been 11 years.

Don’t let that get in the way of moral outrage.

Guess who I bumped into on my way to get my glasses fixed? Everybody.

The man who won a world Cup final with a fucking dive - that Klinsmann?

Medieval is the word that springs to mind

Do they think that in the days Gateshead was in County Durham that it was wall to wall R&W country or something?

They’ll want to watch their step

When CT's taxi breaks down..... "Gott in himmel!!"

Meh, too late for them to do anything to us now.

Mein got!

I thought she was gonna live forever

Plans to beat it already in motion

There have been some cracking results so far makes our 0-0 v Yanks look respectable. I realise it was shit having said that.

Morning, Luke.

Fear I may have made a spectacle of myself with this one

if they world cup was this time next year i reckon Dan Burn might be starting instead. oh i forgot Southgate has his favourites

Can’t believe I got a stinking hangover off the back of that shite last night

If KSA could actually hit the onion bag they would be decent Be interesting to see the xG 🙄

Australia's back baby!

Zazah!

These ERG cunts have done their job, put in place to get hard Brexit delivered, job done so now fuck off with a nice secret bonus no doubt. No intention of being long term politicians even if they had any chance of reelection.

Quoted for truth. That is the essence of the SMB at the moment.

Alright Spartans, you can stand down now.

In other news …. Flew from Southampton to Glasgow this morning, picked a car up a drove here, about two hours north of Fort William where an old mate is getting married tomorrow….not sure if I’ll see the game tonight 😆

The Chelsea coach Emma Hayes agrees, the goals should be smaller….so should their shorts, and so should their tops…sorry, just came over all Sepp Blatter there for a second…