Tonight's Football

[TANGODANCER]

Fulham currently self imploding after being in a brilliant position

Absolute madness. No idea why he handballed it. But he did. And it’s a red and a penalty. Mitrovic will get a long ban. Mind Fernandes did the same at Anfield and nowt happened.

I think it came at him rather than he tried to deliberately handball it. That should have been clear cut. The rest was cup-tie madness. Hands on a referee is Hara Kiri in any language..

[LeverEnd]

Fulham currently self imploding after being in a brilliant position

Absolute madness. No idea why he handballed it. But he did. And it’s a red and a penalty. Mitrovic will get a long ban. Mind Fernandes did the same at Anfield and nowt happened.

Hardly the same but should've been punished I agree. Just caught up with this. Mitrovic, what a dick! Deserved everything he gets.
When these things happen I remember Ashley Barnes tripping the ref at ours. Hilariously stupid.

[LeverEnd]

Fulham currently self imploding after being in a brilliant position

Absolute madness. No idea why he handballed it. But he did. And it’s a red and a penalty. Mitrovic will get a long ban. Mind Fernandes did the same at Anfield and nowt happened.

I think it came at him rather than he tried to deliberately handball it. That should have been clear cut. The rest was cup-tie madness. Hands on a referee is Hara Kiri in any language..

Yes he knew he'd done it but it was instinctive. Have some sympathy after his gut busting run to get back, sheer desperation. Definite red though.

[Prufrock]

Fulham currently self imploding after being in a brilliant position

Absolute madness. No idea why he handballed it. But he did. And it’s a red and a penalty. Mitrovic will get a long ban. Mind Fernandes did the same at Anfield and nowt happened.

The Fernandes one just baffled me. Now they will have to come down hard on Mitrovic, rightly, but it's clearly also inconsistent.

[Worthy4England]

Good first half England.
Well done Harry K on being England's top scorer.
Grealish needs to try standing up a bit instead of trying to milk every slight contact and give his head a wobble at that miss...

[knobpolisher]

Two for Dion vs San Marino, Connor Bradley getting good words also. Just keep fit and out of bother. By the way Grealish is bobbins.

[Worthy4England]

Clung on second half. Good three points in the end.

[TANGODANCER]

Clung on second half. Good three points in the end.

To be honest we were awful second half. . I love beating Italy, a rare event,, but we played at times like eleven (ten)men who had never played football, never mind met. Certainly a welcome result, but we were like hens with a prowling fox outside the coop. I have no sympathy for Italy, least of all their card-waving manager but their goalie only touched the ball about four times second half, and none of them were to save shots. They were all over us.

Some serious revision due. Plaudits to Harry Kane, England's M.O.T.M for me.

Oh, and that Grealish miss that should have wrapped it up 3-0 at the break... Ah, well...

[Prufrock]

Na na na na na na na na na na na...

[Worthy4England]

Na na na na na na na na na na na...

This is a difficult one without any punctuation. I thought it was Na na na, Na na na) - but then I ran out of nana's...

[boltonboris]

Great 3 points, which ultimately are all that matters. Circumstances meant that a few players had to stay on longer than necessary, such as Phillips and Grealish played himself onto the bench.

As an apology, I'd expect Foden to get 80+ mins on Sunday night

First half Bellingham, Kane, Rice and Saka were almost unplayable - Kane's 29, but the other 3.. Wow. They have the world at their feet

For anybody who is interested, England v North Macedonia is on at Old Trafford on Monday 19th June - Tickets are on sale now

£30 adults & £20 kids in the Stretford End

[boltonboris]

Oh and Shaw.. Daft tackle so soon after a booking

[Worthy4England]

Clung on second half. Good three points in the end.

To be honest we were awful second half. . I love beating Italy, a rare event,, but we played at times like eleven (ten)men who had never played football, never mind met. Certainly a welcome result, but we were like hens with a prowling fox outside the coop. I have no sympathy for Italy, least of all their card-waving manager but their goalie only touched the ball about four times second half, and none of them were to save shots. They were all over us.

Some serious revision due. Plaudits to Harry Kane, England's M.O.T.M for me.

Oh, and that Grealish miss that should have wrapped it up 3-0 at the break... Ah, well...

Aye - not many places we can go where the last win was before I was born - 1961 last time we won away in Italy.

Agree we were well beaten second half. So in context, I'll take the points

[Worthy4England]

Great 3 points, which ultimately are all that matters. Circumstances meant that a few players had to stay on longer than necessary, such as Phillips and Grealish played himself onto the bench.

As an apology, I'd expect Foden to get 80+ mins on Sunday night

First half Bellingham, Kane, Rice and Saka were almost unplayable - Kane's 29, but the other 3.. Wow. They have the world at their feet

For anybody who is interested, England v North Macedonia is on at Old Trafford on Monday 19th June - Tickets are on sale now

£30 adults & £20 kids in the Stretford End

Yeah to those you mentioned first half. I kept looking at Bellingham and muttering "19?" but Rice, Kane played triff, too. Saka, I thought played well, but ran into a few dead ends...

[TANGODANCER]

Oh and Shaw.. Daft tackle so soon after a booking

Second tackle/card on it's own was to be somewhat expected given the nature of the game, but as you say, Shaw was less than sensible for the time-wasting card. I wasn't too thrilled with some of the ref's decisions given the seriousness of the results in this comp.

Jack Grealish was the real villain last night for me with that miss. Sounds daft maybe, but I'd like to try him in a more defensive midfield role, maybe box-to-box.. He's capable of getting the ball and doing something positive with it, something we were well short of last night.

[boltonboris]

Oh and Shaw.. Daft tackle so soon after a booking

Second tackle/card on it's own was to be somewhat expected given the nature of the game, but as you say, Shaw was less than sensible for the time-wasting card. I wasn't too thrilled with some of the ref's decisions given the seriousness of the results in this comp.

Jack Grealish was the real villain last night for me with that miss. Sounds daft maybe, but I'd like to try him in a more defensive midfield role, maybe box-to-box.. He's capable of getting the ball and doing something positive with it, something we were well short of last night.

Agree that Grealish is a central midfielder, but he's not as good as Bellingham and can't do the things Rice can do -

He's not fast enough to play on the wing

[Worthy4England]

Oh and Shaw.. Daft tackle so soon after a booking

Second tackle/card on it's own was to be somewhat expected given the nature of the game, but as you say, Shaw was less than sensible for the time-wasting card. I wasn't too thrilled with some of the ref's decisions given the seriousness of the results in this comp.

Jack Grealish was the real villain last night for me with that miss. Sounds daft maybe, but I'd like to try him in a more defensive midfield role, maybe box-to-box.. He's capable of getting the ball and doing something positive with it, something we were well short of last night.

Agree that Grealish is a central midfielder, but he's not as good as Bellingham and can't do the things Rice can do -

He's not fast enough to play on the wing

There was one attack, Grealish had a tug on his shirt on the edge of their box. He'd broken out of it and stopped, awaiting the foul. Not given. 20s later, they're on the edge of our box, with us scrambling to get back. This really frustrates. I haven't moved on from my previous view that he's overrated vs what he actually does...

[BWFC_Insane]

Oh and Shaw.. Daft tackle so soon after a booking

Second tackle/card on it's own was to be somewhat expected given the nature of the game, but as you say, Shaw was less than sensible for the time-wasting card. I wasn't too thrilled with some of the ref's decisions given the seriousness of the results in this comp.

Jack Grealish was the real villain last night for me with that miss. Sounds daft maybe, but I'd like to try him in a more defensive midfield role, maybe box-to-box.. He's capable of getting the ball and doing something positive with it, something we were well short of last night.

Agree that Grealish is a central midfielder, but he's not as good as Bellingham and can't do the things Rice can do -

He's not fast enough to play on the wing

There was one attack, Grealish had a tug on his shirt on the edge of their box. He'd broken out of it and stopped, awaiting the foul. Not given. 20s later, they're on the edge of our box, with us scrambling to get back. This really frustrates. I haven't moved on from my previous view that he's overrated vs what he actually does...

Grealish has always been massively overrated. I mean when I said this around the time he moved to City I got pilloried for it on here. But he's simply not that good. A good mid table premiership player who for a Villa or whatever will do well. But a top level player - not for me. Never has been.

[boltonboris]

Oh and Shaw.. Daft tackle so soon after a booking

Second tackle/card on it's own was to be somewhat expected given the nature of the game, but as you say, Shaw was less than sensible for the time-wasting card. I wasn't too thrilled with some of the ref's decisions given the seriousness of the results in this comp.

Jack Grealish was the real villain last night for me with that miss. Sounds daft maybe, but I'd like to try him in a more defensive midfield role, maybe box-to-box.. He's capable of getting the ball and doing something positive with it, something we were well short of last night.

Agree that Grealish is a central midfielder, but he's not as good as Bellingham and can't do the things Rice can do -

He's not fast enough to play on the wing

There was one attack, Grealish had a tug on his shirt on the edge of their box. He'd broken out of it and stopped, awaiting the foul. Not given. 20s later, they're on the edge of our box, with us scrambling to get back. This really frustrates. I haven't moved on from my previous view that he's overrated vs what he actually does...

Yes. My biggest bug bear. His game is just trying to win freekicks. It's his priority

[TANGODANCER]

Grealish has always been massively overrated. I mean when I said this around the time he moved to City I got pilloried for it on here. But he's simply not that good. A good mid table premiership player who for a Villa or whatever will do well. But a top level player - not for me. Never has been.

Can't agree with that. Grealish is a very decent footballer who just needs sensible usage. For me, he isn't a ninety minute man but an impact sub capable of winning games. He needs to be more a team man than an icon if only someone can convince him. Last night he was a footballer having a bad night rather than a bad footballer.