The world cup

[horseplayer]

About the 20th minute one of the Columbian technical staff passed a note on

Presume it said we can't live with this time to go to plan b

[horseplayer]

Highlights now on the beeb!

Let's go again

[hhyftrftdr]

Well done England.

Best team won the match. I'm not sure how the ref didnt send of at least one Columbian player for their antics.  No place for that in the game imo,

Worldy of a save by Pickford just before Columbia equalised.  Deserves more praise.

England have a real chance here to get to the Final, though they rely far too much on Kane.  Rashford must start in place of Sterling, who has been anonymous in this World Cup.

Rashford is nowhere near good enough to be starting regularly for England. I'm sure he will be in a couple of years but not at the moment.

Whilst it's flavour of the month/year/decade to bash Sterling, and yes he doesn't get on the scoresheet as much as he should (though that can be levelled at plenty of other players), he offers way more to the team than Rashford.

His runs, his ability to create space, he occupies defenders, his link up play. He starts for England on merit, and whilst he isn't pulling up any trees this comp, his all round game is contributing to this 'success' England are enjoying.

[Doobs]

Do think we lost something when Sterling went off.   Rashford made a bigger difference than Vardy, though that might just be because they were given different instructions.

[nirvana]

England controlled the game until tbey became conscious of needing to control the game.

Better performance than I thought we were capable of and most enjoyable 80 odd minutes of watching England in a tourney for a while

[horseplayer]

Sterling is playing fine just needs a goal

Amazing how perception changes around Henderson

Looking at the highlights again another ref he gets sent off for reacting during the penalty award. The game seemed to pass him by and he never controlled it at any point.

As ever could never fault his effort

[horseplayer]

The mail release an article slagging Sterling just after the final penalty

Great work Matt lawton you moron

[nirvana]

Massive respect for Southgate too - can't really find any fault in anything he has done since taking over and presents himself so well compared with so many arrogant idiot predecessors in the role

[hhyftrftdr]

The mail release an article slagging Sterling just after the final penalty

Great work Matt lawton you moron

The media hatchet job has worked wonders.

Now your average simpleton down the pub hates Sterling and they don't even know why.

[horseplayer]

Massive respect for Southgate too - can't really find any fault in anything he has done since taking over and presents himself so well compared with so many arrogant idiot predecessors in the role

Correct

Credit to the much maligned Dan ashworth as well was a massive cheerleader for Southgate since he was appointed to oversee all the changes

[BigAdz]

The mail release an article slagging Sterling just after the final penalty

Great work Matt lawton you moron

The media hatchet job has worked wonders.

Now your average simpleton down the pub hates Sterling and they don't even know why.

The media are dicks, as per.

Lack of proper research and the desire to scare everyone is why we are so relatively poorly supported, when there appears to be very little risk in being there.

[dino1980]

very surprised that Vardy didn't take one. 80% success rate for club

wonder why. maybe lacking a bit of confidence as you imply

Presumably he was 6th?

good pens though, even Henderson's was a good save rather than a bad pen


Harry Maguire had a really really good game (trying to be objective but failing)

Re: Vardy and not taking a penalty. My guesstimate is that in the majority of Southgate's scenarios where England got to penalties then Vardy wouldn't have been on the pitch, given that Rashford seems to have been the Plan A attacking replacement. Whereas the five who went ahead of him were likely to be on the pitch (Dier not as much I confess). I realise in this particular scenario he was and I'm also surprised he didn't take one. But the whole 'owning the process' mantra that Southgate has preached recently almost certainly had Player X taking Penalty Y and I presume that Dier was always pencilled in for spot-kick number five if he was on the pitch. Forgetting his performances in Russia so far he has a) captained England and b) taken free kicks for England (e.g. vs. Russia in Euro 2016) so certainly seems to have the mental ability to be trusted in such a situation and the technique at dead ball situations.

p.s. not a dig at you Rich, just quoting you out of the many who asked the same question.
p.p.s. I know you're a stats man, the xG of a penalty is 76% according to understat.com's xG model, so Vardy is above average...just.

[Woodsey]

The two years of debate after we lose to Colombia will be fun

Yup 

[MANTIS01]

Overwhelming to win on penalties, long time coming

Maguire was a colossus at the back and really penetrating running the ball forwards. In fact the back 3 looked composed in possession at the back, liking it.

Trippier has impressed on the international scene

Henderson is the ghost of David Batty, penalty miss was totally expected. In ET when we need a moment of magic JH is incapable. Bringing Jonjo Shelvey on for that 30mins would have been just the ticket.

Bring on Sweden yah.

[buffyslayer1]

Re: Vardy taking a pen

I read or heard somewhere (maybe twitter) vardy said no to taking a pen when asked. Not sure how true that is though