Rooney looks like the landlord from Early DoorsOriginally Posted by IainR
Rooney looks like the landlord from Early Doors
Absolutely Iain.
If you look at how Man U are set up, they are built around the front of the team. They are set up for the front 4 to create, and it's usually Young, Rooney, Welbeck, Valencia but with Nani, and Hernandez able to come in and slot straight in if need be.
As you say they played the first part of the season with Anderson and Cleverly behind them and they were flying. They then played with Scholes and Carrick behind them.
Hodgson clearly was affected by the loss of Wilshire, but he only has himself to blame for not taking Carrick and Cleverly and I would have been on my knees to Scholes had I been in his shoes.
As soon as you saw Milner as the right midfielder, you knew that Young was being asked to do the same job on the left. For Man U he is a player focused 80% on attack, regularly pressing the opposition in their own half.
For England he looked like 80% defence and when not in possession he had to get back in to that line of four camped deep in our own half.
Hodgson set up the team to be solid and hopefully nick a goal like against Ukraine. That negativity was our undoing.
I think we have the players to do better, but I'm not sure Hodgson will set up a team to attack and play with tempo.
We did that in spurts - for the first 30 mins against France, when we went behind against Sweden and for around 20 minutes after Italy hit the post yesterday. That seems to have been despite the system perhaps when adrenaline kicked in.
I got the impression quite early in the game, that England had more than one eye on the penalty shoot-out. I'm surprised Roy didn't have Mr. Creosote on the bench to bring on as a replacement goalie just before the end of extra time.
How come Ronaldo didn't take a penalty
They messed up the order, he chose to (or was asked to) take the final penalty but by then it was too late! :thumbup:How come Ronaldo didn't take a penalty
Same reason Spain had Fabregas going after centre backs...
Surely your best penalty taker only goes 5th if he's too scared to take one of the first 4. Either that or he wanted the 'glory' pen.
Ronaldo's main skill in this match seemed to be in lying on the grass and raising his arm to the referee - oh, and shooting the ball well over the net. He wasn't the only one who lay on the grass - funny how they hide their face when they do this, so we cannot see their expression, which would reveal that they are doing a Murray.How come Ronaldo didn't take a penalty
Despite all the yellow cards/diving/getting blow over by a butterfly, I enjoyed it as a game.
I always enjoy a penalty shoot out - concentrated tension/excitement, and a test of skill. And you know you will get an answer one way or the other in the next few minutes. The expression on Ronaldo's face at the finish made the 90 minutes plus 30 minutes of falling over almost worthwhile.
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