• 25 Jun 2024, 10:42 p.m.

    Certainly he could be either the best English Palmer since Carlton or the best English Cole since Cheryl.

  • 25 Jun 2024, 10:51 p.m.

    Just start by admitting your topknot boyfriend is a bagoshite. We can then start a discussion

  • 25 Jun 2024, 10:54 p.m.

    Perfectly good enough for the nottinum full of funs. And better club sides. Not a starter in this England squad.

    If you want to fix the press, you need to fix where it starts. Not in the midfield when they are already running.

  • 25 Jun 2024, 11:03 p.m.

    This is pretty much what I would have said if Tricky hadn't beaten me to it. Gallagher good for Forest for running and tackling and fouling. Not good for England because he doesn't know what he is supposed to be doing and he is not a creative.

    Wharton on the other hand might very well be it. (Not that he would get a game mind you...).

    In the next round it should be rice and Bellingham in the centre with Foden or Palmer as the 10. Both Foden and Palmer play.

    Simples.

    Chicago: Former winning coach.

  • 25 Jun 2024, 11:15 p.m.

    Yes but do we have any?

    Chicago: Asking the question.

  • 26 Jun 2024, 6:04 a.m.

    It should and will be Mainoo and Rice for the next game. Whether and how to accommodate Palmer is the tougher question.

  • 26 Jun 2024, 8:03 a.m.

    One of England's current problems is that Bellingham, Foden and Kane all want to play in similar positions. Chucking Palmer into that mix (although he looked decentish wide right) seems to compound that problem.

    Unless Bellingham can play deeper with Rice, Southgate needs to pick two of JB, PF and HK and replace one with someone who'll stretch play more (Watkins, Toney or Gordon probably). Basically, we're back to the traditional England issue of needing to sacrifice a bit of quality for a better balanced team.

  • 26 Jun 2024, 8:05 a.m.

    I don't watch them enough but my son tells me Palmer plays on right for Chelsea (I thought he was middle). So choice is him or Saka.

  • 26 Jun 2024, 8:08 a.m.

    I am beginning to think it might not be coming home.

  • 26 Jun 2024, 8:32 a.m.

    Whoscored says he played there twice: www.whoscored.com/Players/395692/Show/Cole-Palmer

    Certainly when I saw them (like against us) he played centrally as a 10. If you dropped Saka for Palmer, you make the team slower.

  • 26 Jun 2024, 9:02 a.m.

    Palmer can play well right, and when I've seen him do it, he holds the position and plays it well. He's more direct than Saka. He won't slow us down.

    There's a degree to which 'so and so can't play there', 'they can't play together' becomes self defeating. They start to believe it.

    It's largely crap.

    Balance the attributes you need, give the players clear instructions and roles, tell them what you want them to do. If they fail to do it through intent, hook them, fuck them off, and get another.

    Far too much whiny nambypambyism these days.

    Clough and Taylor turned a louche striker, into a player of the season centre half. It's largely about attributes and attitude.

  • 26 Jun 2024, 9:55 a.m.

    Don't think I wrote that, true as it may be.

  • 26 Jun 2024, 10:17 a.m.

    Apologies....fat fingers on the phone edited the wrong post. Corrected.

  • 26 Jun 2024, 11:49 a.m.

    Well it’s the old Gerrard/Lampard thing. I am far from an expert, but I managed to figure out that if two world class central midfielders can’t play together then at least one of them* isn’t world class.

    There is some onus on the coach to set out and police what the players should be doing, obviously. Fabio Capello must have been tuned it to what was wrong with those two so maybe he was only ever phoning it in and didn’t care for the fuss that would come of dropping one of them**. Southgate, perhaps, doesn’t have a better idea than picking the shiniest 11 and hoping it clicks. He’s a follower, not a leader.

    * Gerrard, obviously
    ** Gerrard, obviously