Mid-Lite Pain in Georgia
One of Gareth Southgate’s best lines as a player was when he said that for the half-time team talk in the 2002 World Cup quarter-final loss to Brazil, we needed Winston Churchill but instead got Iain Duncan Smith.
Well, last night, England needed Thomas Tuchel, and instead got Gareth Southgate.
That’s no slight on Southgate by the way. Far from it. I thought he transformed the national team but, as most agreed, he seemed to have taken it as far as he could by 2024. The margins were razor thin; something was required that would just get England and it’s talented squad that one step further and onto the winner’s podium.
That’s not easy either. No individual or team has a divine right to be a champion.
But Tuchel – and I like the bloke; I wasn’t one who didn’t want him to be manager just because he was German – was supposed to make that difference. He was supposed to be the man who had the courage of his convictions and tactical nous to get this team of nearly men to the next level. We’d witnessed quarter-final and semi-final – and even final – despair where it seemed that a small tweak here and there to the – dare I say it? – mentality, and approach was all that was missing.
But here’s the thing. The problem, according to almost everyone, was that England had been a little too cautious and refused to play with the handbrake off. After taking early leads against Croatia in 2018, and Italy in 2021, we just didn’t – or maybe couldn’t – put the game to bed. We had dropped deep and tried to soak up pressure, and wily opponents had found a way back into the game, then used that momentum to beat us by the end. It felt as if we didn’t have the confidence in ourselves to get more goals; instead gambling that we could hold on by parking the bus until the final whistle.
Which all sounds incredibly familiar after what just happened in Atlanta.
Embarrassment
Going into this World Cup third in FIFA’s rankings, it was our attacking options that we’d pinned our hopes on. We’d got Harry Kane at the peak of his goalscoring powers, Jude’s emergence as a world-class number 10, and enough options in wide areas to make other nations jealous. We could even afford to leave Cole Palmer at home, such was the embarrassment of riches in forward areas.
Yet, with twenty minutes of normal time remaining and a goal to the good, our head coach decided that the surest way to stay that way was to drop deep, bring on countless defenders, let Argentina flood the midfield and, well, hope for the best.
My auntie, a massive football fan but not someone employed by the FA for millions of pounds per year, said ‘we aren’t going to try to defend this early are we?’ as we sat watching the agony unfold. But, inexplicably, we were.
As the substitutions reduced us to a 7-2-1 formation that would have made the EA PlayStation game crash, it began to dawn on us that Tuchel had bet the farm on a clean sheet. Kane and Bellingham looked shot, Anderson was asked to hold down the midfield by himself so it came down to the three full backs and four centre halves to keep the reigning world champions and GOAT out. What could possibly go wrong?
My auntie – knowing best - called it yet again. ‘If they score one’ she said, ‘they’ll score another.’
There was a certain inevitability about both. It’s one thing to keep Mexico at bay, or Norway without Haaland, but the Argentinians need no invitation to pile on the pressure and can do so with a lot more guile and know-how than most. They had already come from two goals down to defeat Egypt when all looked lost. The North Africans defended too little at the end of that game; England defended far too much.
The ‘crosses in’ almost came off immediately. Pickford was being over-worked but we got lucky a few times so then Messi and Co switched to ‘shots in’ and the goal that had been coming for what seemed like the moment we scored, finally hit our net. It wasn’t just an equaliser. It was the beginning of the end. If nothing else, the XI on the field was completely ill-equipped for added time, never mind extra time.
The Case For The Defence
Major re-organisation was needed. A time machine that could have taken Tuchel back to a few seconds before he introduced an entire defence to add to the one we already had on the pitch would have been even better. As it was, Argentina only needed one more chance
Spence, probably England’s SPOM(!), should have cleared the ball and Messi into the stands of the Atlanta Stadium but only poked it to an area where the 39-year-old genius could gather it and his thoughts. A feint that threw two players and a cross into the middle was sublime, but England had four centre backs in the six-yard box, yet the ball still ended up in the goal.
The desperate final few seconds, when Ivan Toney and Dan Burn formed a less than effective forward partnership and England’s final masterplan was Pickford lofting balls into the mixer, summed it up. Despite everything; the ‘winner’ for a manager, the vast array of talented attacking players and Wonderwall, they’d hit a wall. They’d all run out of ideas. And long before the final whistle if truth be told.
Now, we were the only team this century to lead in a World Cup semi-final and lose. Twice.
We might be a transformed team, but as far as results go, we were no further forward in 2026 than we were in 2018. Unless we win the ‘Bronze Final’ on Saturday, but don’t even get me started on that.
The One That Got Away
Of course, that’s a little unfair. We’ve had successive Euros finals under Sir Gareth, and Tuchel or the next manager is going to get a go at the next one on home soil, so the sixty-two years of hurt might come to an end sooner than we think.
But the Holy Grail – the World Cup – remains elusive. With 64 teams (probably) and the around-the-world-in-40-days that the 2030 tournament offers, we might come to think that ‘the one’ might have just passed us by.
And the anger I’m feeling today isn’t actually about last night’s capitulation. As bad as it was. For me, it’s because of this.
Four weeks ago we kicked off in our first game under a roof against Croatia and absolutely murdered them during a second half onslaught. We conceded two first half goals, sure, and were clinging on at times but it didn’t matter because we scored four and could have scored at least four more. Even though it feels like a lifetime ago, I sat watching us pour forward at the start of and then late in the second half, cutting through a very good but ageing team with a 40-year-old maestro with ease, the wide players (starters and finishers) shredding their markers and Kane and Bellingham on fire in front of goal.
I was brimming with optimism. If we played like that, I thought at the time, no team would stay with us. Definitely not a Brazil, Germany or Argentina; maybe not even a France or Spain.
But we never did play like that again. Not once. We had moments, of course, but that performance against Croatia was never repeated. We peaked right at the start. All the promise of courage and playing with abandon was there, but it was a mere fleeting snapshot of what might have been.
As our World Cup came to an end, it felt like something I’d either imagined or dreamt.
Why it was confined to one game is anyone’s guess. Had we continued to play like that, who knows what would have happened? My personal feeling is the enforced Mexican stand-off with ten men in the Azteca – as great a night as that was – actually worked against us because it convinced Tuchel that we could defend a lead in any circumstances.
Of course, it might have ended badly had we thrown caution to the wind instead but say that we had still got to the semi-final. If we’d attacked Argentina in the same way we played in that first game, would we be sitting here today surrounded by what might have beens?
Whoever is in charge for Euro 2028 has two years to work that out. Gareth Southgate won’t but he could have a wry smile on his face this morning. Thomas Tuchel might decide that he can’t risk another dent in his reputation by failing again.
That job has just become infinitely harder for anyone and everyone. It’s literally win or bust.
Iain Duncan Smith need not apply.
But it’s also probably too late to get Churchill now.
