World Cup 2026

[Mito Man]

Messi after retiring from international football can spend his free time starring in Bollywood films…

[duncs500]

Every time we play a big game and take the lead, it's always the same. Stop playing, invite pressure. I know it's not easy, but we just seem mentally weak.

Maybe we were just saved a complete humiliation on Sunday mind you.

[Simon]

Every time we play a big game and take the lead, it's always the same. Stop playing, invite pressure. I know it's not easy, but we just seem mentally weak.

Completely agree. It's always the same. 'Oh we're ahead, we can take the foot off the gas now'

Best form of defence is attack. Should've kept pushing them hard for 2-0, not jumping on the backfoot.

[Gavster]

It was painful to watch when England pulled back, it was just a numbers game watching Argentina line up shots, it was so inevitable they’d score.

[Simon]

Send in HMS Conqueror and finish the job.

[duncs500]

Completely agree. It's always the same. 'Oh we're ahead, we can take the foot off the gas now'

I'm not sure it was a lack of effort, it's about having the stones to get on the ball and keep control of the game when it might be the biggest moment of a player's career. We just don't have the mentality to do that, and it's not any one player, I can only assume that it's either a weakness in the English psyche or that the weight of historical failure just makes the hope of success too heavy to carry.

[GG.]

I think to be fair to them its partly the Argentinian team stop fucking about fouling everyone so much and trying to get people sent off and actually start playing football once they're behind. The England team then being in full defensive mode is really just survival I think.

[Matty]

I mean, we've still got 3rd place to play for on Saturday! No idea why...but...3rd place!

(Even though I suspect we'll get embarrassed by France).

[duncs500]

I went down a small AI rabbit hole, fact of the day: since FIFA world rankings were created in 1993 England have never won a knockout game at a major tournament against a team ranked higher than us.

We don't have the mentality, simple as that.

[GG.]

Fair point!

[DeskJockey]

There were tears in my house. DJLets 1 & 2 took it hard.#3 was fast asleep.

[ZedLeg]

This is why I don’t gamble

Yeah, I could really see it being a France England final tbh

[Gavster]

Yet again we managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

[dinny_g]

Another 4 year cycle, same problem, same result.

It wasn't so much the dropping off part - I mean England were never going to hold out for 40 to 45 minutes against a team like Argentina. It's parking the bus and then NOT parking the bus properly. The front "5" just stat back and allowed Argentina time and space to craft an attack instead of closing down, hassling, putting on pressure.

I'm sure this was a deliberate tactic, given to the players by Tuchel but at this stage, given the past 60 bloody years, I'd expect leaders of the like of Jane, Rice and Bellingham to have the courage to say "no lads, I know what the manager has told us to do but it's not going to work - we're doing this"
but that will never happen.

Before the game I said that even if England lose, that Tuchel is the right man for the next Euros - learn from his many mistakes and do it better next time but given the manner of the defeat, I think he has to go because he won't have the fan support and it's just delaying the inevitable.

Edit - and no matter the result, and it's not sour grapes, the Las Malvinas banner was shameful...

[Gavster]

It was interesting reading pundits comments about the south American perspective, saying how Argentina feared how fast our forwards can run down the pitch and find space, which is where our goal came from. And that's the very thing we stopped doing once we'd scored, we retreated and allowed Argentina to find their flow with inevitable consequences.

I don't mind England losing, that's all part of the game in sport. The problem is how we lose, we appear to hand victory away, unlike in any other sport, and it's so infuriating. If we'd continued attacking Argentina for the second half (like we did in the last 10 minutes) then it easily could have been a very different result. Maybe we need to get Ted Lasso or Dave Brailsford in to manage them next

[Simon]

So much correctness in here.

[unzippy]

we appear to hand victory away, unlike in any other sport

Well, we manage it pretty well in the cricket

[duncs500]

I'm sure this was a deliberate tactic, given to the players by Tuchel but at this stage, given the past 60 bloody years, I'd expect leaders of the like of Jane, Rice and Bellingham to have the courage to say "no lads, I know what the manager has told us to do but it's not going to work - we're doing this"
but that will never happen.

I don't think that was the messaging from Tuchel, I think the players did it automatically. Post match interviews seem to back that up (from both Tuchel and the players).

I think Tuchel realised we were retreating into our shell and decided that at least if we go back into our shell he would rather it was a solid shell.

However, I think he had an opportunity with his substitutions to send a message which might have changed the narrative. If he'd replaced the wingers with fresh wingers, the players might have thought "ok, we're going for this" and snapped out of their backward step. Instead the nature of the substitutions indicated to the players that we were going to try to hold on (whether he wanted us to continue play like that after the subs were made is unclear).

[duncs500]

The problem is, it's easy to sit here now and say that he should have made aggressive substitutions and seized the game. I'm sure people will say now that they don't mind losing but we've got to have a go etc.

However, if he'd have gone aggressive there's a pretty good chance the players would have still stayed in their shell, we'd have lost, and everyone would have said that he should have put defensive players on.

So he would have been criticised either way.

I think it's down to the fear in the players, and I'm not sure how we change that.

[Mito Man]

It went to shit way before Tuchel did anything. England scored the goal, then had another attack soon after, then tried to park the bus and then it was probably another 15 minutes of England desperately holding on before some substitutions were made. So it seems to be some deep psychological issue going on.