English Premier League threads [Merged] | PUNT ROAD END | Richmond Tigers Forum
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English Premier League threads [Merged]

Legends of 2017

Finally!!!!!!!!!!!
Mar 24, 2005
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Melbourne
Please take this as tongue in cheek.....................will the Italian's have time after the final to get to Japan for the Olympic diving competition:help:))
As someone with italian ancestry I have to say no. They’ll still be rolling around on the ground like they’ve been shot :mhihi
 
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AngryAnt

Tiger Legend
Nov 25, 2004
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Engerland make it through to the final thanks to a very soft penalty, although to be fair the Danes were pretty tired at the end of 90 and England were the better team overall.

Raheem must have been channeling his inner Italian to win that pen, it was soooo soft. It's at 7:20 in this vid.


Italy to win it :cool:
 
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mrposhman

Tiger Legend
Oct 6, 2013
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I'm stoked. Sure we rode our luck with the penalty but were by far the better team across the game. Pretty even 1st half but we were dominant after that. If not for Schmechial we'd have won the game well before we did.

The penalty was soft but I felt the foul on Kane (bizarrely given as a free to the Danes) seemed a far more likely penalty in the 2nd half, though it may just have been outside the penalty box. Its ironic for me though having been on the wrong side of defeats relating to penalties that we now win our way through to a penalty with a dodgy one, seems like it was written in a novel haha.

We stand a great chance against the Italians IMO. Whatever happens it should be a good game, both teams like to play a similar way, fast and direct. Looking forward to it.
 

AngryAnt

Tiger Legend
Nov 25, 2004
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I'm stoked. Sure we rode our luck with the penalty but were by far the better team across the game. Pretty even 1st half but we were dominant after that. If not for Schmechial we'd have won the game well before we did.

The penalty was soft but I felt the foul on Kane (bizarrely given as a free to the Danes) seemed a far more likely penalty in the 2nd half, though it may just have been outside the penalty box. Its ironic for me though having been on the wrong side of defeats relating to penalties that we now win our way through to a penalty with a dodgy one, seems like it was written in a novel haha.

We stand a great chance against the Italians IMO. Whatever happens it should be a good game, both teams like to play a similar way, fast and direct. Looking forward to it.
Agree Schmeichel had a great game and that name is not easy to spell.

Kane's one was correctly a free to the defender, who got his foot to the ball first then Kane kicked him in the back of the leg before going down theatrically, channelling his inner Italian with aplomb.

Should be a great final, Italy a team in transition but playing good attacking football and they still have their wily dark defensive arts going as well.
 

TigerForce

Tiger Legend
Apr 26, 2004
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Bit disappointing that this Euro 2021 final is only shown on Optus Sport. Can't find any replay on a Foxtel channel (BEin, Sky, ESPN) either including SBS.
 

mrposhman

Tiger Legend
Oct 6, 2013
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Poor form from the England crowd.

"England fined for use of laser pointer, booing of Denmark national anthem in Euro 2020 at Wembley"​



The laser pointer was really poor form, but I do find it strange that England get isolated for booing during a national anthem, but any time you play in Eastern Europe (even in Italy), throughout the National Anthem there is whistling and booing and no one else is called out on it. Not saying anyone should do it (I don't, I respect peoples national anthems) but it comes down to the hypocrisy over how one country is treated versus all the others. Even go back to the Hungary v Germany game, was the German national anthem treated with respect, not at all but nothing given to the Hungarian FA over that. I don't mind the fine, but surely if they start dishing these out then they need to be consistent, but this is UEFA who have essentially indicated racism is fine with the amounts that they fine countries who's fans actively engage in monkey chants at football games.
 
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AngryAnt

Tiger Legend
Nov 25, 2004
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Italy beat England on penalties after missing one themselves.

Bright start by England, great play and goal from Luke Shaw to score in the second minute. But in the second half Italy held the ball and turned the screw tighter and tighter. The goal came and England were done.
 
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Ian4

BIN MAN!
May 6, 2004
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Italy beat England on penalties after missing one themselves.

Bright start by England, great play and goal from Luke Shaw to score in the second minute. But in the second half Italy held the ball and turned the screw tighter and tighter. The goal came and England were done.

how can you save 2 penalties and still lose? Rashford is a joke. And why would a coach hand a 19 year old the 5th penalty?

Its been one of those weekends unfortunately (excluding Ash Barty).

I’m also shattered for Harry Kane. He’s certain to leave Spurs now.
 

AngryAnt

Tiger Legend
Nov 25, 2004
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how can you save 2 penalties and still lose? Rashford is a joke. And why would a coach hand a 19 year old the 5th penalty?

Its been one of those weekends unfortunately (excluding Ash Barty).

I’m also shattered for Harry Kane. He’s certain to leave Spurs now.

Harry Kane had a bad tournament.
 
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mrposhman

Tiger Legend
Oct 6, 2013
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how can you save 2 penalties and still lose? Rashford is a joke. And why would a coach hand a 19 year old the 5th penalty?

Its been one of those weekends unfortunately (excluding Ash Barty).

I’m also shattered for Harry Kane. He’s certain to leave Spurs now.

I feel so flat today. As soon as extra time started I had this sick feeling in my gut that penalties were coming again. I'm man enough to admit that there were some tears at the end.

We've had a great tournament but bar the 1st 20 mins Southgate got everything wrong. It was clear at half time that Italy were on top of the 3-4-3 formation and our wing backs were sinking deeper and deeper, dragging our wide players in Mount and Sterling deeper. I was calling for a change back to 4-3-3 at half time as all we were doing was inviting pressure as we were defending so deep in our half. Low and behold they get the goal and we then change formation and the formation forces us to defend further up the pitch which played back into our hands. It was very even after that but Southgate waited way too long to make the change, not saying it would have stopped the goal but it could have as we would have ended up playing the game more in their half, the first 25-30 mins of the 2nd half was played almost exclusively in our defensive half.

I also much prefer Mount in a central position, I don't think he impacts the game enough wide.

The 2 subs that came on to take penalties was clearly a bad decision in the end, they were awful penalties though. I'm much more of the belief that a penalty should be about you, not about 2nd guessing the goalkeeper, both of them were focused on trying to wrong foot the keeper instead of just finding the corner nice and hard, or if in doubt drill it down the middle. I couldn't believe it though when I saw Saka walking up for the last one, the rest of the team are complete jibs for leaving that responsibility for the youngest player on the pitch.

Bloody deja vu again. Gee I hate penalties with a passion.
 
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AngryAnt

Tiger Legend
Nov 25, 2004
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I feel so flat today. As soon as extra time started I had this sick feeling in my gut that penalties were coming again. I'm man enough to admit that there were some tears at the end.

We've had a great tournament but bar the 1st 20 mins Southgate got everything wrong. It was clear at half time that Italy were on top of the 3-4-3 formation and our wing backs were sinking deeper and deeper, dragging our wide players in Mount and Sterling deeper. I was calling for a change back to 4-3-3 at half time as all we were doing was inviting pressure as we were defending so deep in our half. Low and behold they get the goal and we then change formation and the formation forces us to defend further up the pitch which played back into our hands. It was very even after that but Southgate waited way too long to make the change, not saying it would have stopped the goal but it could have as we would have ended up playing the game more in their half, the first 25-30 mins of the 2nd half was played almost exclusively in our defensive half.

I also much prefer Mount in a central position, I don't think he impacts the game enough wide.

The 2 subs that came on to take penalties was clearly a bad decision in the end, they were awful penalties though. I'm much more of the belief that a penalty should be about you, not about 2nd guessing the goalkeeper, both of them were focused on trying to wrong foot the keeper instead of just finding the corner nice and hard, or if in doubt drill it down the middle. I couldn't believe it though when I saw Saka walking up for the last one, the rest of the team are complete jibs for leaving that responsibility for the youngest player on the pitch.

Bloody deja vu again. Gee I hate penalties with a passion.

Good analysis Posh. England did have a great tournament, wing backs did great, defence was solid, Pickford is a great keeper.

On Kane, he's a great striker no doubt but it was the classic thing of just not fitting quite into the system. I feel that maybe a Rashford/Sterling partnership might have worked better, the Italian centrebacks are old and wily, but old. But hey that system got them into the final and they didn't concede a goal until the final, so Southgate wasn't going to change it.

Agree that penalties to finish a final or knockout game suck.
 

Baloo

Delisted Free Agent
Nov 8, 2005
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Enjoyed that final. England lucky to make it to penalties. Italy controlled most of the match and play. England losing on penalties in finals is now a given.

Some very good saves from both keepers in the penalties. There was only one shot that wasn't on target. Letting Saka take the 5th was criminal. 19yo FFS
 

mrposhman

Tiger Legend
Oct 6, 2013
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Good analysis Posh. England did have a great tournament, wing backs did great, defence was solid, Pickford is a great keeper.

On Kane, he's a great striker no doubt but it was the classic thing of just not fitting quite into the system. I feel that maybe a Rashford/Sterling partnership might have worked better, the Italian centrebacks are old and wily, but old. But hey that system got them into the final and they didn't concede a goal until the final, so Southgate wasn't going to change it.

Agree that penalties to finish a final or knockout game suck.

Thing is we used 2 systems through the tournament. I didn't mind Kane playing in that formation BUT its predicated on keeping our wide forwards far enough up the pitch. Kane then drops deep and plays provider. He's done that several times and was also very good at it in the 1st 20 mins of the game, but as soon as the wing backs started dropping deep, it sucked our wide forwards deeper and then Kane was either completely isolated or had to also drop deep to try and get the ball which then meant Italy could squeeze us even more. I mean there were times we had our entire team in our defensive 3rd of the pitch in the 2nd half.

We needed that circuit breaker of adding the extra midfielder far earlier than we did as we were just inviting Italy closer and closer to goal.

I did say to my daughter once both centre halves had been booked, I'd like to see Sancho thrown through the middle and use his pace to run at them knowing that they'd potentially bring him down and get a 2nd yellow or alternatively be reluctant to challenge and his pace could then get him in behind but I think they wanted to keep Kane on in case it did go to pens so Southgate went the easy route there.
 
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