The Big Shiny World Cup thread

[Harry Genshaw]

^ A conspiracy too far for me, that Mar.

What France did, that we were slow to adapt to, they realised the ref was letting lots of physical stuff go. They were getting stuck into the tackle while our lads were moaning to the ref.

England usually lose when they're up against quality opposition and in the past there seems to have been some psychological barrier or mental weakness that has prevented us going further. Last night didn't feel like that to me. We more than matched them and hopefully that bodes well for how we approach such matches in the future.

[Mar]

^ A conspiracy too far for me, that Mar.

Fully agree. I would've thought refereeing allocations would've possibly taken that into account though. Like I said I don't think it matters too much and you'd expect the refs to have a high standard but it does make me think about the allocations and the effect of previous matches on their impartiality. As much as they'll try to be impartial it's likely to be hard, even subconsciously to remain impartial given past history.

[Worthy4England]

It's a tough argument. That never stops. The England fella refereeing Brazil. Was he subconsciously thinking "theoretically easier for England in a final if Brazil go out"

I'm reckoning it was just bad, rather than biased...

[BWFC_Insane]

Incompetence for sure. We got two penalties the ref and the var official were both just not very good rather than corrupt.

There is some sort of ethereal issue that you can’t put your finger on where in these big games France or our opponents look like Mourinho Chelsea circa 2005 and we look like a mid table premiership side where even if we outplay the opposition we just don’t have that ‘winning factor’. You can’t put your finger on it. It’s not describable. But I wasn’t massively emotionally invested in the World Cup and therefore could watch relatively dispassionately and even though we outplayed France at no point did I seriously think we’d win. When you are emotionally wrapped up in it your judgement can be clouded one way or another.

But for me there is something you can’t put your finger on about England where we just don’t seem set up in some way to win these big games. No matter how we play.

[boltonboris]

I thought we were the better team and a couple of obvious VAR decisions went against us.

My concern was that when the scores were level, France were the better side. At 0-0 then again at 1-1 - They could just turn it on like a switch and when they did, we struggled to contain them.

When they got ahead, they sat in and let us play and we should have capitalised, but didn't.

[BWFC_Insane]

Can anyone name a manager who would be more likely to get England over the line in these games than Southgate? I can think of a few but they are unlikely appointments. I think that 'winning factor' we lack needs a manager who has spent their career winning stuff and knows how to get teams over the line. But such managers risk upsetting the group or bringing a different energy to England that makes he team less cohesive. We all know that someone like Tuchel or Mourinho or Mancini have that winning edge. They are just managers who you feel can take close and make it 'actual'. I doubt any of those would be considered though and all would possibly cause issues to varying degrees.

So then its would Eddie Howe take the England job? Unlikely. Would he be any more likely to see England beat the big guns when it counts? Not sure to be honest.

Would Graham Potter? I'm very much in the same camp. What's he won? What suggests he would do a better job?

Instilling that X Factor probably comes from an unusual place and someone we don't expect. But I'm struggling to see who. And I suspect Southgate wants out now but FA will try and persuade him to stay for fear of what is out there....

[TANGODANCER]

To keep a sense of reality I often refer back to history (although it's actually geography) and look at an Atlas and wonder how a country so tiny (us) has made such an impact in world affairs of any description (including sport) over time. As far back as Athelstan (895-939 AD) the first King of all England (although he was a bit behind Alfred as the first English king) we've been making a noise far louder than we ought to. Being English we automatically assume sovereignty over all, although we were actually a good millennium or two behind the East in the grand scheme of things.

Point being, although the world and its relations all speak English, we're still small fry in the list and don't need to kick our own asses as much as we do. Proportionally we should be pretty proud.

[Worthy4England]

I dunno. I don't think I'd want Mourinho from anywhere other than about 2004 vintage, I think he's often underperformed when he hasn't had the largest "resource pool" in the league available to him (and sometimes when he has). You should win things if you're manager of Real Madrid or Chelsea in 2004.

As to Howe and Potter, difficult to tell at the moment - what would we have expected them to win, given what they had until this season? When I look at the Club's they're managing (pre whatever riches Newcastle now do/don't have) - I wouldn't have had any of their teams down for winning much of anything to be fair.

Whoever we get, when Southgate goes, will have their work cut out, like Sven, Robson, Venables, McClaren, etc. had prior...

[BWFC_Insane]

I dunno. I don't think I'd want Mourinho from anywhere other than about 2004 vintage, I think he's often underperformed when he hasn't had the largest "resource pool" in the league available to him (and sometimes when he has). You should win things if you're manager of Real Madrid or Chelsea in 2004.

As to Howe and Potter, difficult to tell at the moment - what would we have expected them to win, given what they had until this season? When I look at the Club's they're managing (pre whatever riches Newcastle now do/don't have) - I wouldn't have had any of their teams down for winning much of anything to be fair.

Whoever we get, when Southgate goes, will have their work cut out, like Sven, Robson, Venables, McClaren, etc. had prior...

Depends how you want to look at it. Chelsea had trouble winning anything even with money before Jose. I'd not necessarily want him now its just he has a winning habit, he knows how to win. He wins things more or less wherever he goes. Even now at Roma...mickey mouse tournament but he still won it. And they'd won nowt in a decade....

There are relatively few managers with that winning habit, that x factor. And my point is that is really the only place you can say maybe southgate lacks. So if we are to replace him that's got to be the main factor to look at. Getting over the line in the biggest of games. And I'm sort of talking myself into this but what manager has the best record for taking clubs over the line where those before could not?

[Worthy4England]

I'm struggling to think of a manager who's spent a lifetime winning stuff who we could a) get or b) want.

Chelsea were nearly bankrupt in 2003 when Abramovich took over. Ranieri spent big in the one season he had plenty of money but only managed 2nd and a CL Semi-final, but few clubs go from poor team to good team in 1 season (as evidenced by City and likely Newcastle). Mourinho was in 12 months after they got "wads" and he managed it with a lot of signings Ranieri made...Roma have had over half a billion pumped in since August 2020, he's helped them spend it.

Is Ranieri's achievement with Leicester better than anything Mourinho has achieved since Porto? Possibly - but I wouldn't want him either.

I think we'd struggle to get a Pep, Klopp etc. type as has been discussed on here previously, so I'm a bit at a loss.

[BWFC_Insane]

I'm struggling to think of a manager who's spent a lifetime winning stuff who we could a) get or b) want.

Chelsea were nearly bankrupt in 2003 when Abramovich took over. Ranieri spent big in the one season he had plenty of money but only managed 2nd and a CL Semi-final, but few clubs go from poor team to good team in 1 season (as evidenced by City and likely Newcastle). Mourinho was in 12 months after they got "wads" and he managed it with a lot of signings Ranieri made...Roma have had over half a billion pumped in since August 2020, he's helped them spend it.

Is Ranieri's achievement with Leicester better than anything Mourinho has achieved since Porto? Possibly - but I wouldn't want him either.

I think we'd struggle to get a Pep, Klopp etc. type as has been discussed on here previously, so I'm a bit at a loss.

I mean he won Inter's first champions league since 1965 (and they ain't won it since).

He's won every European title. He's the best example of someone who has won in just about every part of Europe and in a multitude of situations.

He has issues. Big issues. But if Southgate just doesn't quite have the 'x factor' to get us over the line, and in the absence of likely attracting who are the top managers right now - I'd probably rather take someone who wins and makes teams win over a long career. But international football is a funny old game its hard to know who the right man is. Nobody thought it was Southgate. But it was.

[Prufrock]

This "get you over the line" stuff is massively over-hyped nonsense, especially in knock out cup competitions.

It's reverse engineered confirmation bias, the equivalent of that Derren Brown thing where he found someone who was a gambling genius because they'd won 8 races in a row and then he revealed he'd got about 5000 people to play it and odds were one person would get all 8.

We play that France game 10 times we qualify 4 or 5. Only 1 team can win it. They have a shot that goes through Bellingham's legs, and a header straight at Pickford that deflects off Maguire. We miss a penalty. It happens.

I think you can make a case on mentality against Croatia and Italy, but not this time. Plenty of managers have it (including quite possibly now, Southgate) but there's not much "magic" to winning things beyond getting your team to play well and being lucky. You can only control the former.

[BWFC_Insane]

This "get you over the line" stuff is massively over-hyped nonsense, especially in knock out cup competitions.

It's reverse engineered confirmation bias, the equivalent of that Derren Brown thing where he found someone who was a gambling genius because they'd won 8 races in a row and then he revealed he'd got about 5000 people to play it and odds were one person would get all 8.

We play that France game 10 times we qualify 4 or 5. Only 1 team can win it. They have a shot that goes through Bellingham's legs, and a header straight at Pickford that deflects off Maguire. We miss a penalty. It happens.

I think you can make a case on mentality against Croatia and Italy, but not this time. Plenty of managers have it (including quite possibly now, Southgate) but there's not much "magic" to winning things beyond getting your team to play well and being lucky. You can only control the former.

Fundamentally disagree with that. Some managers are winners. And consistently so. Some aren’t. And there is something that differentiates beyond their ability to manage and coach. They build environments where players get over the line in big games. I don’t believe this is luck or whatever. Really strongly don’t believe it’s luck. There is something intangible but I fully believe it’s there.

[Worthy4England]

I think there's often something very tangible. Money.

[Prufrock]

Building an environment where players get over the line in big games is obviously part of good management but I'm afraid the rest strays into mysticism and post ex facto reasoning.

There is nothing special about it, no ephemeral quality they transmit from manager to player that provides that moment of inspiration like in Hollywood.

Big games have to won and so we remember the moments afterwards and project a narrative backwards onto it.

Take last season, suddenly the narrative is that Pep and Man City don't have the mentality to get over the line. Not that in a knock out tournament of the best teams in Europe even the best team only has a 20% or so chance of winning it in any year, and so it's hardly a suprise if they don't win it over 4-5 years. No, suddenly they don't have the je ne sais quoi. But Pep won it twice in 3 years. Maybe he just had more of that winning knack than their opponents led both times by...Alex Ferguson. He must have been a loser then?

Or take Mourinho, the ultimate winner, he couldn't win the CL at Chelsea, but largely the same group of players did win it under Roberto Di Matteo who has since gone on to have a glittering career...getting sacked by West Brom never to be seen again.

Mourinho did win the league title, taking over from a man who was seen not to have that winning quality, Claudio Ranieri. He surely can't have had this magic ability to get it over the line?

Of course managers play a part in allowing players to play well in the big games, but there's no magic attribute that some have that others don't. It's a hugely complicated web of individual players personalities, form, chance, the opposition. Anything more concrete than that is like trying to guess to the number what Zac Crawley's next score will be.

[TANGODANCER]

Fundamentally disagree with that. Some managers are winners. And consistently so. Some aren’t.

Football is no different than anything else in life. That's a stone-cold fact that applies to all sport. It's all a game of chance and a matter of time.. Main criteria; nothing (no one) lasts forever and "The Special One" is a shining example. Luck is just an hourglass and the sands of time are ever on the move.

“Tis all a Chequer-board of nights and days
Where Destiny with men for Pieces plays:
Hither and thither moves, and mates,and slays,
And one by one back in the closet lays.”.......................Omar Khayyam.

[Bruce Rioja]

^^

"The more I practice, the luckier I get".

Gary Player, on his way to winning nine major championships and a shitload more on the Seniors Tour

[BWFC_Insane]

Building an environment where players get over the line in big games is obviously part of good management but I'm afraid the rest strays into mysticism and post ex facto reasoning.

There is nothing special about it, no ephemeral quality they transmit from manager to player that provides that moment of inspiration like in Hollywood.

Big games have to won and so we remember the moments afterwards and project a narrative backwards onto it.

Take last season, suddenly the narrative is that Pep and Man City don't have the mentality to get over the line. Not that in a knock out tournament of the best teams in Europe even the best team only has a 20% or so chance of winning it in any year, and so it's hardly a suprise if they don't win it over 4-5 years. No, suddenly they don't have the je ne sais quoi. But Pep won it twice in 3 years. Maybe he just had more of that winning knack than their opponents led both times by...Alex Ferguson. He must have been a loser then?

Or take Mourinho, the ultimate winner, he couldn't win the CL at Chelsea, but largely the same group of players did win it under Roberto Di Matteo who has since gone on to have a glittering career...getting sacked by West Brom never to be seen again.

Mourinho did win the league title, taking over from a man who was seen not to have that winning quality, Claudio Ranieri. He surely can't have had this magic ability to get it over the line?

Of course managers play a part in allowing players to play well in the big games, but there's no magic attribute that some have that others don't. It's a hugely complicated web of individual players personalities, form, chance, the opposition. Anything more concrete than that is like trying to guess to the number what Zac Crawley's next score will be.

You can cite individual situations and of course there isn’t a magic manager who can ensure their team wins every massive game. It’s about averages.

Do I think Graham Potter will win as much as Mourinho? No. And I don’t think he would if given equal opportunity.

The stuff about Pep is a nonsense invented largely by a scouse loving media. He knows how to get teams fo perform in big games. It’s never going to be 100% and you’d have to hope that big game isn’t at Anfield…

Some managers do really well but can’t seem to get teams over the line. On a consistent basis, others just seem to do it.

[Hoboh]

Poor old Croatia, played well but were useless in the last quarter, Argentina, the opposite.

[Worthy4England]

Poor old Croatia, played well but were useless in the last quarter, Argentina, the opposite.

Bit unfortunate that! And a bit Boltonesque...