To ask why the England team (the men) keep falling at the final hurdle, (well virtually at the final hurdle,) at the football World Cup ... and The Euros too?

[GorgeousSpringtime]

Not an England-team bashing thread, but why, oh WHY do they - the men - keep falling at the final hurdle (well, virtually the final hurdle,) every time at the football (soccer) World Cup - and the Euro Cup too...?

They do so well, and get so far, and then BANG they're out. Nearly always in the top 8, or top 4, (and the top 2, in the World Cup once, and a couple of times in the Euros I think,) but never the winner. (Not since 1966 anyway!)

Is it nerves? Is it that they're so anxious to win that they keep making silly mistakes? Are they just not quite good enough? WHAT IS IT? Why do they keep getting so close, but just never manage to get the win?!

As I said, I am not bashing them, and they did well, and I am proud of them, but I just get so frustrated that they can't quite ever get the win!

!

I also agree with some posters that some of the footballers are paid ridiculously high salaries. I know some people give this reason and that reason why it's OK that they get so much, but people are still allowed to think they're overpaid!

When I used to go to football matches with my dad and brother late 1970s/early 1980s, the tickets were between £2.00 and £4.00. Basically £12 to £23 in today's money. And it was Liverpool, and Wolves, and Birmingham City, and Manchester United we saw who were playing, not the local five-a-side teams. Try getting a ticket for £12 now for a football match for a premier league team..

The super high salaries that some footballers get HAS to be contributing to the high ticket prices that some fans pay now!

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To be fair, it's not as if all the players had the banner.
I think they're likeable because they showed tenacity, grit, never gave up, and basically went for the goal instead of playing it safe.

At the end of the day, they gave their fans something to be happy about, England did not.

It must be a British thing to think winners have to be nice.

Yes. I appreciate that. Indeed Baddiel has eloquently explained why himself but its a bit like Johnny Speight and Ali Garnett.
Speight meant Garnett to be a figure of fun but people agreed with Garnett.

It's obvious that what Baddiel intended has in the long-term been predictably taken the wrong way.

Disgusting.

Another reason to support the women’s game! I paid £13 to watch Man City women play man United women last season.

But the issue is, the ticket prices are high but they still sell tickets. If it meant they didn’t sell tickets, they’d lower the price. What it does mean is that football is increasingly, at the top level, a sport for people who are more well off.

Solution is to support a League One team like I do. Less glory but the tickets aren’t badly priced!

They're just not good enough to win. It's not hard to know.

What do you mean? Lots of players waved the raggy bed sheet displaying fake claims. England players would not have done that.

No they don't have to be nice per se, just play fairly and less of the fouling. Be proud sportsmen not little shits.

Yet they got to the semis so clearly win some games.

Yeah. But not good enough to win the tournament. It's not rocket science

They were good enough. The manager's tactics cost them the match. We beat Mexico in ridiculous heat and played out our skin in a stadium where Mexico never lose.

No offence, but you really do have some very odd takes.

The team as a whole includes management etc. they didn't play well enough on the day so they lost. That's how it works.

Have you not learnt that two things can be true at once. It’s an important skill in critical thinking.

I think the Argies have systematically cheated in this tournament. I haven’t seen all of their matches but the off the ball stuff like just barging into our players like Bellingham and Kane with no ball near them in order to rile them up and lose their concentration is absolutely calculated. Also the rolling around is an unfortunate part of football but they do it on an industrial scale, which I find really obnoxious and isn’t what you’d hope to see with great champions. Their game against Egypt was another case in point where they were extremely lucky to go through and the officiating was a big part of enabling this.

Messi is not some hero he is a tax dodger who only went to the US from Spain because he was sulking that the case went against him. When you are a multi, multi millionaire there’s no excuse for tax dodging.

Having said all that from a playing perspective they completely deserved to beat England. We weren’t outfought but we were outthought and ultimately outplayed. Largely because the manager’s tactics completely played into the Argentine hands. But fair enough from a footballing point of view they deserved that place in the final. But class? Do me a favour.

Oh and the football is coming home song for the ultimate time is not about thinking you’re the best it’s the total opposite.

It's up to the referee to make decisions about what is fair or not.

I don't know what else to say.
Argentina are the current World champions.
They're the better team.

I accept that Tuchel's decisions were ludicrous and that it may not be entirely the team's fault this time that they lost this time, though.

Yes but there’s a difference between not being good enough to win and not deserving to win on the day. It’s indisputable that we weren’t good enough on the day. But less so that we couldn’t have won that match with different tactics.

However I think Spain was brilliant in the semis against France so I don’t think we would beat them whatever tactics they and we employ. I really hope the Argentinians don’t win through fouling and getting the rub of the green from the officials. That would taint the whole competition. Whoever wins I hope it’s the best not the sneakiest team.

That's not how sports work

?

Seeing the posts from players it is sad. Still feeling it today. But mostly just wondering what would have happened if Tuchel hadn’t made that decision.

Yes I agree. There’s a good chance we could have won. His tactics after the goal didn’t just neutralise our threat they actively played into the Argentinian team’s hands giving them a huge amount of space that Messi was able to exploit.

Oh and the football is coming home song for the ultimate time is not about thinking you’re the best it’s the total opposite.

We're coming to the end of the WC so it's a moot point now.

But honestly I wish we could have had your quote as a 'sticky' on top of all football threads these past few weeks!

So many people have clearly never listened to the words of that song, and think it's all about arrogance and jingoism, when as you say it's the total opposite. Dashed hopes, nostalgia for the past and wistful thoughts of what 'was then and could be again' (but probably won't...)

Now there is extensive video, VAR, all angles of the pitch covered there could be a retrospective appraisal by VAR panels and a either rematch ordered or awarded to opposition in the light of cheating, nasty, unsportsmanlike behaviour. Retrospective cards or bans as well. If they knew that barging players off the ball was going to cost them the match they'd be less inclined to do it.

It appears it's you who doesn't know how sport works. You clearly aren't familiar with tactics in football. The players have to play in positions the manager sets. If the manager takes off strikers and parks the bus with 30 minutes to go, a team is hampered in their strike force. England had an impossible task of holding back Argentina. Tuchel massively screwed up.

Agree!

And if the individuals who carried that tatty bed sheet crap, feel so strongly about the Falklands, lets see them wave it around after finishing a game of domestic football, cos plenty (7?) of the Argentinian side play for clubs in the Premier League. ah, no, didn't think so...

They will be 'punished' by the clubs' fans. They've FAFA.