A night of many mistakes

Thanks to a Harry Kane 85th minute winner against Croatia last November in a Nations League group game, England had the chance to win a trophy in Portugal this summer.

Unfortunately it wasn’t to be as England were beaten in another semi-final last night. This time in Guimarares, Portugal by a Holland side that is much improved under Ronald Koeman.

England do still get to play another game in Portugal in two days time, however they’d much rather be playing Cristiano Ronaldo’s Portuguese team in the final, than Switzerland in a third-place play-off game.

First-Half

When I first saw England’s line-up last night, I was worried with the lack of game time that quite a few players hadn’t had recently, the likes of Stones, Delph and to a point Barkley.

Clearly Southgate had decided to rest all seven players that were involved in the recent Champions League Final by not starting any of them. Unlike Koeman himself who had both Wijnaldum and van Dijk in his starting line-up.

Holland started the better as well, but in the opening half hour they still struggled to create any real clear cut chances in what was quite an open game. Then the game came alive when Ajax defender Matthijs de Ligt made a massive mistake, it wouldn’t be the last and it became the theme of the night.

With de Ligt miscontrolling a short pass back to him, Marcus Rashford pounced to nick the ball off him inside the penalty box  and de Ligt caught him. Penalty given and a yellow card for the Dutch centre-half. Rashford stepped up to take it himself and although it seemed to take him a while to take it, he calmly sent Jasper Cillessen the wrong way. 1-0 England.

The Dutch did not panic though, in fact they became stronger after that whereas England seemed to sit back, or was it just because they couldn’t seem to get around de Jong and de Roon who were controlling the game from midfield?

Fabian Delph did have a half-decent chance from outside the area, but unfortunately it fell onto his unfavoured right-foot and he hit his shot into the ground and straight into the arms of Cillessen.

Confidence is a great thing in football, but last night England’s defenders seemed over confident at times when playing out from the back. Stones in particular and he was fortunate to get away with losing the ball inside his own box on the stroke of half-time. It would be something he wouldn’t learn from on the night.

Second-Half

Kane came on for an injured Rashford at the start of the second-half and although he tried to make an impact and get his team going, it was still the Dutch that were controlling the game. As England seemed to be getting deeper and deeper as the Holland players patiently built up the pressure and you just had a feeling a goal was coming.

It should have come to England too, against the run of play Chilwell got down the left flank, he pulled it back for Delph who took a touch and whipped in a brilliant cross. Jadon Sancho met it six yards out after making a great run into the box, but he guided his header straight at Cillessen when it looked easier to nod it into either corner. Big chance gone.

Memphis Depay then had a good effort saved by Pickford who continued to keep England’s back line on their toes all night. However, it was 19 year-old Barcelona target de Ligt who made up for his first-half mistake, when he powered in a header from a corner after easily losing his marker John Stones in the penalty area.

As the game went on, it looked like extra-time was inevitable but then a huge moment in the 83rd minute when Jesse Lingard scored. It was a brilliant goal too, started by the heavily criticised Stones, who brought the ball out from the back once again and found a great ball out wide to Chilwell.

The Leicester full-back bombed down his left flank and then found Sterling with a pass inside. Sterling flicked it off to Jordan Henderson who then slotted a brilliant ball through to Lingard who finished with a first time shot. Goal. England fans celebrated everywhere.

VAR was checked, goal disallowed for offside, it literally must have been inches. Cruel, but they are the fine margins that VAR has been brought in for even if you agree or disagree.

As I said, the theme of the night was individual mistakes and this time it was Harry Maguire in the fourth minute of injury time as he messed up trying to see the ball out for a goal kick. From the moment he got caught, England’s defence was all over the place and Lyon striker Depay should have scored and finished the game there and then.

Extra-Time

Stones will obviously get a lot of stick for the various errors he made, but not long into extra-time he also made a superb headed clearance to deny Depay again who surely would have scored otherwise.

It wasn’t long after that though that Stones made a huge error when he lost the ball turning on the edge of his own area. Depay got his foot in and pinched it off him, Pickford made an absolutely outstanding save, but the rebound came out and as Promes shot, it hit Kyle Walker as he went in for the tackle and the ball span over Pickford and into the net.

Mistakes happen, I get that and it was a massive error by Stones. However, my issue is with England not attacking when they should have and by that I mean not risking a forward pass to try and score.

If you watch back about ten seconds before the goal, Barkley picks the ball up inside his own half, Sterling makes a brilliant run down the middle of the park (pictured above) and the pass is on for him. Barkley should be looking to play that 25 yard pass through the heart of the opposition to create a golden chance to score.

If it doesn’t come off, so what, we’ve lost possession in their half. Instead, the pass goes backwards to Mcguire, who in turn passes backwards to Stones and we concede a goal. That has to be a team mentality thing and something for Southgate to work on, players, especially creative midfield players should be looking for those passes all the time.

After that, heads went down, more mistakes were made and we eventually lost 3-1. I’m not going to be too critical of certain individuals, the mentality going forward if England do want to achieve anything has to be to lose as a team, not as individuals. As honestly, every player made mistakes at some point last night, some were just more costly than others.

Learn from those mistakes and cut out the errors, but more importantly go forward as a squad and learn to believe and trust your teammates even more. We’ve overachieved massively in the past year compared to where we were at.

Maybe expectation is too high, I don’t know, but we were in another semi-final when the likes of Germany, Italy and Spain weren’t. Lets keep believing in Gareth Southgate and these set of England lads.

Match Highlights