Career Football's coming home....maybe! - England Career

[FuddledFox]

Footballs coming home...Maybe - England Career Ep1

 

Welcome to my attempt at International management. I have never been able to make a International save stick on FM but I feel the quick gameplay of FMM will help keep my interest as there is less wait for games and no need to just holiday through. I was also inspired by Mcandrew003 article on the subject which can be found here 

 

To make the save more interesting and keep me from picking the same old names I have set myself a squad selection rule.

Any player over 30 at start of new tournament cycle(first qualifying game)  will not be picked for England again (even with injurys and suspensions). Rooney, Cahill, Milner and Vardy have potentially one more tournament. Leighton Baines, Defoe and Ashley Young have played there last games for England

This means I will prioritize youth early to get them used to International football and may mean players like Rooney won’t get selected. I have identified three players as stars of the future and who will be fast tracked into the squad.

Marcus Rashford

Patrick Roberts

James Ward Prowse

2016 Season

My first squad

Harry Kane was in squad just not photo.

 Harry Maguire was a surprise inclusion but a player I like the look of. I like his technical stats although I would like to see his mental stats go up although at only 23 that is still possible.

Tactics

This is the basic starting shape of the team. As the match progresses I will tinker. The wingers can be pushed up as inside forwards or dropped back to create a 4-1-4-1. The AP can be pushed up behind the striker or the DLP can drop back into DM. I think this shows how a basic 4-3-3 can be adapted around the circumstances of the match.

I prefer a shorter passing style and trying to keep it simple at the start of a game. Instructions can change depending on circumstances. In the game against Slovenia we were one down so I pushed wingers up and went direct attacking which got us the result in the end.

Results

We aren’t setting the world on fire yet (after all we are England!) but it’s a promising start if you exclude the Slovakia game when we just never turned up.

Its always good to put one over the Auld enemy. I was disappointed in the amount of possession we had but we did create the best chances. It was also great to see Maguire score his first England goal.

 

Back down to earth with a bump. Im sure the tabloids had a field day after this result! A rare start for Harry Kane as he has been injured for long spells at the start of the season. Rashford looked lively as the inside forward on the left.

As mentioned above I had to make tactical changes in this game which paid off in last 10 minutes as we got the win. That was Rushford’s 3^rd goal for me as he scored 2 vs Poland in a friendly.

Callum Wilson has started the season on fire for Bournemouth and got a deserved call up in place of the injured Kane. He rewarded my faith with a goal and MOM performance in a straight forward win over Malta.

 

Top of the table going into the new year. In truth, we should walk the group next year but as Slovakia proved we can be vulnerable and we do have the trip to Hampden to come.

I have started the 2017 season and hope to have update two out very soon

Thank you for reading.

[AndersJ]

Best of luck mate - i hope Ward Prowse takes all corners and free kicks, he is SOOOOOOO good :)!

[Brenty92]

Great start mate, Ward-Prowse is a boss! I had him with about 30 assists for Braga not too long ago lol 

[mcandrew003]

Great to see the article inspired you to post a career! The players you picked all look very good, one mistake I made with my career was not picking Maguire enough as now I'm short on quality CB's. 

A decent start, Rashford has turned up to the party. Let's hope the rest of your team does now and it's a successful World Cup campaign.

[BatiGoal]

Goodluck with your little project !

[FuddledFox]

Cheers guys.

I have high hopes for the partnership of Ali and Ward Prowse in the centre of the park. I think a lot of goals will be created from that part of the pitch.

@mcandrew003 I was surprised how good Maguire is in game. Although Gary Cahill still qualifies for selection under my rules, I will be selecting Maguire as much as I can as I think him and Stones will mould into a very good partnership at the back. 

 

[FuddledFox]

2017

This will be a crucial year for me and the team, by mid-November I could be planning a World Cup campaign or out of work and the latest most hated man in England.

A new year brings some new players to bring into the squad.

Ojo

Although England aren’t short of wide players there aren’t a great amount of left footers. Ojo solves that problem and allows me to create more balance to the side if I play 2 wingers or I can player winger on the left and Patrick Roberts as an IF on the right. He gives me more options in the squad and looks a very good player already with plenty of time to develop more. He rewarded my faith in him by scoring in a friendly against Moldova in his first start.

Lewis Cook

England really lacks DMC. The two best options are Dier and Henderson although the latter is much happier in CM. Cook isn’t as good as those 2 but at 20 years old can still develop and is playing regular Premier League football at Bournemouth. Dier has missed a couple of squads since I took over so I included Cook in first squad of the year to see how he would fare.

Kyle Walker-Peters

An injury to Danny Rose meant I was looking for a replacement LB for the qualifiers against Malta and Lithuania. The chooses where Kieran Gibbs, Aaron Cresswell or Walker-Peters. I choose Kyle as I simply felt he was the better player than the other two. He played against Malta as Luke Shaw was struggling for fitness. He came out with a 7 rating which wasn’t bad for his debut. 

Results

This game was all about Rashford. Two very good finishes and a penalty gave him his first England hat trick and 3 valuable points.

Scotland was the big one. Not only are they our Auld rivals but they are our closest rivals for the group. This was the situation going into the game.

 

In the end we had to dig deep to get the result despite Martins red card. Scotland fought for every ball and gave everything and it took a Rashford goal 6 minutes from time to get the 3 points.

 

Slovakia at Wembley was a very straight forward win. Harry Kane got the two goals and Slovakia never threatened except a couple of long range efforts. This result meant we travelled to Slovenia with the chance to secure our place at the World Cup.

 

Nothing is ever that simple for England! Despite dominating the ball we didn’t create enough shots on target and an O.G. from Stones gave Slovenia the win.

 

This was the straight forward win you would expect at home to Malta. This result coupled with Scotland drawing in Slovakia meant a win at home to Lithuania would be enough.

 

It was a tense and nervous night at Wembley. The rain was pouring down but I decided to get wet rather than be the 'wally with the brolly'.

News was coming through from Scotland that they where 4.0 up over Malta. If we couldn’t score, 2 more goals for Scotland would put them top and it would be the playoffs for us

 Danny Welbeck was the hero! In the end Scotland didn’t score any more so 0-0 would have been enough but it was a real relieve to get the win and finish clear in the group.

 

The build up to the World Cup started with 2 friendlies against Albania and Senegal in November.

I used these games to experiment. Not so much with the squad but tactically. I decided to have a little fun in these games and try 2 formations without an out and out ST in the team.

I went with this in the 1-1 draw with Albania. We struggled in midfield and didn’t create enough chances against a team we really should beat.

 

I changed it slightly against Senegal pushing 1 CB into DM. It helped us keep possession better and we came out with a good 3-0 win against a decent side.

 

It’s unlikely I will use either of these formations often. We have a lot of strength in the ST position and although Rashford scored 2 from left IF in the Senegal game it seems a waste not to utilise this talent.

 

Player of the Year

He scored a lot of goals through the season not least the winner against Scotland which proved crucial in the end. He ends the year on 11 goals in 18 caps. Something I need to start thinking about is perhaps moving to 2 up top and getting a partnership going between Rashford and Kane. I will perhaps try this in a friendly pre World Cup but it may have to wait until the new Euro Nations cup which starts in Autumn 2018

The next instalment will be the World Cup 2018 in Russia.

Thank you for reading.

[FuddledFox]

World Cup 2018

 

This is the story of England’s World Cup 2018 in Russia. We are lucky enough to have an exclusive interview with the man who lead the team Mr Fuddled Fox.

Having qualified in November the countries eyes where all focused on the draw in Moscow which took place in the middle of December.

 

In the end England where drawn in Group E. The press where immediately calling it the group of death with 4 teams who would fancy there cahnces of getting to the knockout stages.

FF: We could have got a much easier group that was for sure. In truth, I was excited. To start our campaign against a side like Argentina. Its these games that I got into management for. I felt playing Argentina first was a positive as if we could get a result against our strongest rivals we would already have one foot in the next round. We could never take wins over Switzerland and Japan for granted either so I couldn’t be solely focused on the Argentina game.

 

Preparations got into full swing with two home friendlies against South Korea and Congo. England ran out easy winners in both games 1-0 and 2-0 respectively.

FF: Whats difficult with International management is the lack of games. We went into a huge tournament on the back of four friendlies and two of them where 7 months before the tournament. I decided not to spring any major surprises with my squad for these two games. I did include Antonio from West Ham as his club form made him impossible to ignore. The rest of the squad were players that had performed so well in qualifying.

Early June and the final squad to go to Russia had to be submitted. This meant cutting a provisional list of 30 down to 23.

FF: This had to be the most difficult part of the whole preparation. I had a list of 30 players every one of them capable of performing well at the World Cup. It’s never easy to tell people that there dream has ended and I had to do that with 7 players. The hardest to tell where Raheem Sterling and Jordan Henderson both had performed well through qualifying. In the end it was about having players that could give me as many options tactically as possible.

 

 

The inclusion of Antonio, Drinkwater and Maguire who had suffered relagation with Hull only a month earlier certainly raised some eyebrows.

FF: Maguire was immense for us all through qualifying and was one of the first names on the squad list. The choice between Drinkwater and Henderson was tough. In the end I felt Danny was the more rounded midfielder and could give me options defensively as well as his playmaking and attacking ability. Antonio’s form for West Ham last season really impressed me and I don’t think I had a better crosser of the ball in the whole squad. He is also powerful and dangerous in the air.

 

The Tournament kicked off on the 15^th of June with Russia vs South Korea. England had to wait until the 18^th June to take on Argentina in their first match.

Argentina V England

FF: When the lads went out for the warm up the atmosphere was incredible. England fans filled over half the stadium but even the few thousand Argentinian fans where creating a huge noise. This is a match that means do much to both countries and we didn’t want to let those fans down.

 

 

In truth England did let the fans down especially in the first half. Argentina have one of the best front twos in world football with Dybala and Messi, and it was Messi that gave them the lead after six minutes. England could only manage one shot well off target in that first half.

FF. The 532 we were playing in the first half was working to an extent to nullify Argentina’s attacks, but we needed to create more going forward. I kept the back five but moved Dier into CM and Alli into AMC.

England did create more in the 2^nd half but didn’t get enough chances on target. The defence did their job supremely well after the Messi opener and kept both Messi and Dybala Quite for long periods of the game.

 

FF: It was a good team performance we dug in and defended well but we would definitely need to improve going forward against Switzerland.  

 

England V Switzerland

Crunch time comes quickly in a World Cup. Switzerland had lost their opening game to Japan so the loser of this game would almost certainly be on the plane home after the group stage.

 

England came out the block straight away. Switzerland just couldn’t handle the pace and power of the England side. A lose pass by LB Rodriquez gave Kane the chance to make in 1-0 after 15 minutes. Then 5 minutes later it was 2-0 as Kane headed home from a Ward-Prowse corner. On the stroke of half time Shaqiri was sent off for a two footed tackle. In the second half England were in cruise control and Kane completed his hat trick three minutes into the 2^nd half.

 

 

FF: This was the perfect response to the Argentina game. I asked the lads to go out and express themselves and they did that. I would of liked more goals in second half but then I am the manager and we are never really satisfied.

 

Japan V England

A win for either side would send them through. A draw would send England through on goal difference.

 

 

FF: My biggest worry going into this game was complacency. The players seemed to have the attitude that after the first two games this would be easy.

 

Any notions that this would be a walkover where destroyed when Sasaki nodded home a corner in the 10^th minute. Japan are a well organised team and they were showing this with their strong defence. At half time Japan where heading through.

 FF: At half time, I had to give some of the players some home truths. We were poor and we were heading out of the tournament.

As the second half wore on England where dominating more and more. They had Japan camped on the edge of their box but still the goal wouldn’t come. Japan where blocking every shot. Come the 78^th minute things are looking desperate. Rashford picks the ball up on the left he gets it onto his right foot and puts in the perfect cross straight onto Kanes head. 1-1. The stadium explodes and its more relief than joy. Japan are shoot they have nothing left to give Rashford and then Kane score to give England the 3-1 win.

 

 

FF: When that goal went in from Kane the relief was unbelievable. I think above and beyond anything else that happened in this tournament it will be the moment I will remember the most.

 

Second Round

England would have to play the winners of group F. This turned out to be Wales. They had topped would looked to be a much simpler group than England but couldn’t be under estimated any team with Gareth Bale has a chance.

 

When the team sheets came in there was shock throughout the press. Gareth Bale on the Bench! Had he fallen out with the manager? Was he injured? Nobody seemed to know.

 

FF: Bale on the bench was all the ammunition I needed. They think they can beat us without needing there best player! They are taking the P**s out of us lads.

 

Whatever Fox said in his pre-match team talk it worked. Rashford hammered one home from 20yards out in the 4^th minute. Nerves where settled. England win a corner 6^th minute of the game. Ward-Prowse puts in a beautiful in swinger which is meet by Antonio at the back post 2-0.

In the 2^nd half Bale come on but the damage is done England are rampant and Wales just can’t cope. Harry Kane makes it 3-0 with a tap in on the 57^th minute. Oxlade Chamberlain comes on and hits the post almost immediately. In the end it finishes 3-0 but could have been 5or6.

 

 

FF: I still don’t know why Bale didn’t start and I don’t really care. We were by far the better team and even when he came on he didn’t have any impact on the way we went about our business.

 

Quarter Finals

 

 

England V Croatia

FF: We knew Croatia would be a tough game. They have a lot of talented and technical players and we would need to nullify these before we could think about winning the match.

England started exactly how they finished the Wales game. On the front foot. It took 31 minutes for the break through to come Kane firing home from the edge of the area. Croatia where struggling to create any chances whilst England kept getting shots on goal. A clumsy challenge by Vida gave Kane the chance to score from the spot. A chance he took. Croatia’s best chance came a few minutes later. Kalinic broke the offside trap and was through on goal. Butland alert as ever was out and did brilliantly to smother the ball at Kallinic’s feet.

 

FF: What a performance from the lads. To go into a World Cup Quarter Final and dominate the match from start to finish really was something special.

 

Semi Final

Italy V England

Brazil V Argentina

 

FF: Italy would be a huge test. They have some awesome attacking players with the likes of Belotti, Bonaventura and Candreva, but this is Italy and you know they will be just as good at the back.

 

 

 

 

The country was going crazy, the flags were out everywhere. England in a World Cup Semi Final for the first time since 1990 and the country would come to a halt to watch the match.

It was Italy that started the better and one of those awesome attacking player Bonaventura especially. First he got onto Marchisios through ball to tuck home past Butland on 25 minutes and then a screamer from 20 yards into the top corner made it 2-0 after 42 minutes. Butland also need a good save to deny Belotti from scoring when the Torino striker was 1on1. The dream was dying. Owners of Italian cars were hiding them quick before the inevitable drunk imbecile go on a vandalism spree at full time.  

FF: The dressing room was like a morgue at half time. This wasn’t a time for hairdryers and throwing tea cups I had to build them back up. What we really need was an early goal to give us a boost and something to make Italy worry. With this in mind I told the lads to attack from the off.

This policy paid off when Rashford finished a clever defence splitting pass from Alli. Italy started to look nervous. Alli then hit the post in the 74^th minute would this just be one of those days for England. No, only a minute later Alli again found the killer pass for Rashford to fire home 2-2 and extra time. Everyone could have been saved extra time if Sirigu hadn’t been equal to a Rashford shoot in the 91^st minute.

This was going to penalties it had to be and we all knew who would win. The 1^st half of ET when by in a blur of nothing happening. Into the 2^nd half. Rashford in the left channel on his weaker foot absolutely no danger. Except he crosses, it’s a good cross, Alli meets it with a volley….YEEES!!! 3-2 and England are into their first world cup final since 1966.

FF: When the final whistle went I just couldn’t believe it. What a comeback! That feeling of joy lasted all of 10 minutes as soon as we where of the pitch it was back to business. How will we win the World Cup final.

 

The Final

England v Brazil

England would take on Brazil the greatest footballing nation on earth in the final.

FF: This is what you dream of as a kid England v Brazil World cup Final. Except in your dreams you are playing. I would have to make do with managing and coming up with a plan to stop Neymar.

 

The stage was set. 80,000 in the stadium to see who would be crowned world champions. Would it be Brazil’s 6^th title or England’s 2^nd.

England despite missing John Stones through suspension started the brighter. It took them only 4 minutes to take the lead Rashford firing home from just inside the D. The next chance fell to England as well Ward-Prowse forcing an excellent save from the Brazil ‘keeper. England had started so well but could they keep it up and how long until Brazil’s attacking players started to get into the game. The answer was 22 minutes. Neymar picks the ball up Just inside England’s half and starts running with it he beats 2 men but the ball breaks free at the 3^rd. The England defence has been pulled out out shape by the run and Douglas Costa picks up the lose ball and fires it past Butland 1-1. Brazil are getting more and more of the ball now and England’s defence is creaking. A poor Danny Rose clearance goes straight to Neymar who controls then smashes it into the net to make it 2-1. Into the 2^nd half and the game is starting to slow down after a frantic 1^st half. The chances just aren’t coming for England and they had to wait until the 90^th minute for a clear cut chance. It came to Rashford on the edge of the box with no real pressure goal at his mercy….. and he fired wide. That was it Brazil won their 6^th world cup and the England dream was over.

 

 

FF: The pain of that day will take a long time to fade, but it is mixed with pride. We were never expected to make the final maybe quarters at best we also put in some amazing performances the Wales and Croatia games stand out and of course the comeback against Italy. We had some stand out performers Kane and Rashford with the goals. Ward-Prowse creating from the midfield as well.

 

 

 

 

The country had gone football mad. It was the kind of scenes not seen since Italia 90 and Euro 96. The English public had got back there love back for their football team.

FF: When I took over and made the decision to leave out some big names and older players a lot of questions were asked in the press. I think this young team proved those doubters wrong.

We knew the folks back home would be excited but we didn’t realise the scale. When the plane landed at Luton and we were greeted by 1000s of fans that was the moment it hit home what we had achieved. I remember the open top bus parade though London the streets where lined with fans there must have been 100s of thousands out that day. I turned to Marcus Rashford and said ‘just imagine the reaction when we bring the trophy home’.

 

[FuddledFox]

Autumn 2018

After the excitement but ultimate disappointment of our World Cup campaign we didn't have long until a new tournament started in the shape of the European Nations Cup. All the national teams in Europe are involved split into Divisions. We found ourselves in Division A which is the top division. Each division is then split into 4 groups of 3 teams. The top team from each group goes into the Semi finals which along with the final take place the following June. I didn't want to finish bottom of the group as this would mean relegation down to Division B.

We where placed in group 3 with a powerful Spain side and local neighbours Wales who we knocked out of the World Cup.

England v Spain

This wasn't the start I had planned. Spain really dominated this game and could of won by more. Already we faced a tough task to get through the group.

 

Wales v England

This was more like it! We looked back to our best even if Wales made us work hard for the 3 points. 

Spain v England

Spain had suffered a surprise defeat to Wales in their previous game which had really opened the group up. We put in a battling performance to get this 1-0 win. The defence was awesome to limit Spain to mostly long shots and Roberts took the best chance we had. This set up a our final match against Wales at Wembley knowing if we won we would go through to the Semi Finals.

England v Wales

 

This match was a real struggle and only a Rashford goal in injury time saved us from losing to the noisy neighbours. This left the group looking like this with just Spain v Wales left to play.

Wales would need a 6-0 win to go through so I was confident that Rushford's 91st minute equaliser had won us the group.  

 

In the end we didn't need to worry as Spain ran out easy winners.

Debutants

We welcomed 3 new faces into the squad for our final game of the year a 3-0 win against the USA.

All 3 gave a good account of themselves in the game. Lookman scored the opening goal and Lascelles and Johnstone who played the 2nd half kept a clean sheet. 

Player of the year

This year I gave the award to Harry Kane. Rashford was close to retaining the trophy from last year but Kane's goals in the World Cup swayed my decision.

 

 Sorry for the delay after the World Cup but I have been busy. With European Championship qualifying and the chance of a trophy in European Nations Cup 2019 looks like it will be an exciting year.

Thank you for reading.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[FuddledFox]

Thanks @Risheek 2019 is going to be a big year with a realistic chance for some silverware. Something you can't say very often with England.

[BatiGoal]

Had missed the earlier update on the WC final loss. Shame. You're leading the team to new heights tho so kiu!

[FuddledFox]

2019

In June we had the chance of some silverware in the shape of the European Nations Cup. Although this is not a major competition and you could even say its just a bunch of glorified friendlies I really wanted to win this. I was sure that the experience of lifting a trophy would benefit the players going in to future tournaments.

Germany v England Semi Final

We travelled to Germany to take them on in the semi final. England have a little history with Germany in semi finals (Italia 90 and Euro 96) and so I was determined to banish some ghosts and get a win over them.

 

Spoiler

What a way to win it! We dominated this game and I was a little worried as we approached 90mins that we could be looking at a penalty shootout against the Germans again. I need not worry Harry Kane was the hero with an angled finish past the German 'keeper.

That set up an away trip to Portugal to play the defending European Champions.

Spoiler

This was a much more even game than in Germany and both teams of of won it. Luckily I have a selection of top strikers at my disposal and this time it was Rsahford with the 9th minute winner. 

Not the biggest tournament in the World but a trophy is a trophy and it was better in our hands than Ronaldo's 

 

European Championship Qualifers

I really like this new international format, Far less meaningless friendlies and the qualifiers all done in one calender year works well I think.

We where drawn in what looked like a pretty easy group. With the top two qualifying.

Spoiler

We won every game in the group.

I took the opportunity to use a new tactic through the Qualifiers which I hope will be more attacking in nature and seemed to work against these teams. I wanted to take advantage of the abundance of good strikers available to me. I have not only Rashford and Kane but also Callum Wilson and Tammy Abraham who are both emerging as important goalscorers for me.

 

Against Germany and Portugal I went with my tried and tested 41221 with a winger and inside forward combination out wide as I find this is very solid against good teams. I will use the 343 in some friendlies before the Euros before deciding if I will go with it at the tournament. 

New and Old Players

With the start of a new tournament cycle the following players will no longer be considered for selection due to my self imposed age limit.

• Gary Cahill
• Adam Lallana
• Joe Hart

We did welcome some new and exciting talent into the squad this year though.

Debut Vs Bosnia @ Home. I have high hopes for Tammy after scoring 5 goals in his first 5 caps this year.

Debut Vs Bosnia @ Home. Nathan has made a positive start to life in the England team and I expect him to feature more next year and could find himself on the plane to the Euros.

Debut Vs Albania @home. Joe is a versatile defender who is perfect if we want to swap from 3 to 4 at the back during a game.

Debut Vs Georgia Away. Jordan has moved from Crystal Palace to Spurs and gone from strength to strength. He also scored on his debut.

Player of the Year

Harry has been ever present since I took over. He was immense against Germany and Portugal and fully deserves this award. 

Thank you for reading.

[Ashez]

I've just caught up on this and it was a great read, KIu mate :)!

[FuddledFox]

36 minutes ago, Ashez said:

I've just caught up on this and it was a great read, KIu mate :)!

Thank you. Hoping to have euro 2020 written up very soon.

[BatiGoal]

I've used Rashford in my Man Utd save as an IF on the left flank and he does really well scoring and assisting, in case you're looking for alternative roles / formations.

Doing great, kiu!

[FuddledFox]

2 minutes ago, BatiGoal said:

I've used Rashford in my Man Utd save as an IF on the left flank and he does really well scoring and assisting, in case you're looking for alternative roles / formations.

Doing great, kiu!

I have used Rashford as an IF a couple of times as well. He is such a beast he just seems to score from up front and out wide 

[FuddledFox]

European Championships 2020

I would of loved to have done something similar to my World Cup write up but I just haven't had time. Sorry.

I had high hopes going into this tournament. We still had the European Nations League trophy in the cabinet and we went in as the highest ranked European nation and third best nation in the world.

Spoiler

The Squad

Josh Sims was probably the biggest surprise but I needed another left footed midfielder along  with Ojo. I look a little light in defence but Gomez can cover right the way across the back line and Dier can play CB and RB if needed.

The Group Stage

Not the toughest teams we could of faced at this stage. We had qualified ahead of Slovakia and finished above Wales in the Euro League. Ireland would be tricky as they have a history of getting good results against England in Tournaments

Vs Slovakia

We got of to the best possible start with this comfortable win over the Slovaks. 

 

Vs Ireland

We had the best of this game. Harry Kane had our best chance but could only hit the post. Saying that Simon Cox should of won it for Ireland near the end but he put his shot wide when unmarked in the box.

Vs Wales

Wales edged the first half and could of gone in ahead. Bale made life hard for them with a reckless challenge on Henderson seconds before half time and in the 2nd half we took control. We left it late to get the winner with Henderson smashing one in from 25 yards in the 89th minute.

This result meant we topped the group with the Welsh going through as runners up.

 

Spoiler

Second Round Vs Poland

Another unconvincing performance by the lads. We aren't creating enough chances or getting enough shots on target at the moment. It took a stunning 30 yard strike from Rashford to separate the two teams and its England who go through to the Quarter Finals.

Quarter Final Vs Italy

This was a repeat of the 2018 World Cup Semi Final where we came back from 2-0 down at HT to win 3-2 in ET.

We had been using the 3-4-3 I introduced in the last write up for the first games in this tournament. I decided to go with my 4-1-2-2-1 for the these later rounds as it has got me good results against stronger teams.

 

Spoiler

 

This time it was us that where 2-0 up at HT. Walker Peters being sent off made life difficult for us. Dier came on to play right back in place of Henderson with us going with a 4-2-2-1 in the 2nd half. In the end Italy didn't threaten to much and it was a comfortable win.

Semi Final Vs France

In the other semi Spain played Portugal with Portugal running out 3-2 winners.

Spoiler

We had to take on France with  a much depleted squad.

• Kyle Walker-Peters and Danny Drinkwater where both suspended.
• Eric Dier was out with a damaged shoulder for a month
• Jordan Mutch was also out with a damaged shoulder for 3 weeks. I don't know what they have both been doing to get injured shoulders!

I would love to say it was the suspension and injuries that caused this result but in truth we just didn't show up. Griezman stole the show with 2 goals to win the game for the French. We thought we had got back into it with 5 minutes to go but Wilson was a fraction offside and the goal was disallowed.

Final: France V Portugal 

A repeat of the 2016 final saw Portugal retain the European title.

 

So more tournament heart break for my England team. We didn't perform well enough in this tournament to win it. So I have some work to do if we are going to perform at the 2022 World Cup.

Thank you for reading.