Today's Football - 2023/2024 Season

[Billy Dean]

And even then, if we assume penalties are something of a lottery, the "golden generation" lost twice on penalties, whereas Venables obviously won against Spain before losing against Germany (also, it should be noted, because of Southgate).

There is a fair bit of luck involved in who is regarded as "great" and who isn't.

Yes and you can reverse that too. In 96 England were outplayed by Spain who had a good goal wrongly chalked off for offside. On another day we go out and Venables is considered a failure. In 1990 England scraped past Belgium and Cameroon in extra time. Against Belgium in the last 16 Enzo Scifo smacked a blame off the post that would've most likely seen us knocked out

 

[Billy Dean]

2016 we had a fat wheezing Rooney, Adam Lallana, Gary Cahill and a joke of a goalkeeper in Joe Hart. Not Bellingham, Foden, Saka and the plethora of bench options we’ve had for the past 4 years. Southgate would not have done anything with that squad. I think if you gave Hodgson the Euro 2021 and World Cup 2022 squads and the same tournament draws there’s no way he does any worse than Southgate did.

Our squad in 2018 was not great either. Closer in quality to 2016 than 2021 and 2022. Obviously without a Time Machine you can't know, but I would bet with Southgate we would've won our group in 2016 or beaten Iceland in the next round

 

[MikeH72]

Our squad in 2018 was not great either. Closer in quality to 2016 than 2021 and 2022. Obviously without a Time Machine you can't know, but I would bet with Southgate we would've won our group in 2016 or beaten Iceland in the next round

It wasn’t, but the tournament draw was an absolute joke. The only serious opposition we played was Belgium twice and Croatia, and we lost every single one of those games.

What about Southgate makes you think he’d have navigated that 2016 tournament any better? His superior tactical know-how? His bravery? His subs and in-game management?

 

[Billy Dean]

It wasn’t, but the tournament draw was an absolute joke. The only serious opposition we played was Belgium twice and Croatia, and we lost every single one of those games.

What about Southgate makes you think he’d have navigated that 2016 tournament any better? His superior tactical know-how? His bravery? His subs and in-game management?

We drew with awful Russian and Slovakian sides in the group stage. Under Southgate we probably win one of those games and win the group. Both of those teams were worse than the Swedish side we knocked out in 2018. I think apart from Scotland in 2021 his record against clearly inferior sides has been quite good. He’s struggled less with them than lots of our previous managers IMO

 

[MikeH72]

We drew with awful Russian and Slovakian sides in the group stage. Under Southgate we probably win one of those games and win the group. Both of those teams were worse than the Swedish side we knocked out in 2018. I think apart from Scotland in 2021 his record against clearly inferior sides has been quite good. He’s struggled less with them than lots of our previous managers IMO

We’ve drawn against terrible teams in the last two tournaments with far better players.

Yeah his record should be good against inferior sides with the quality of players he has at his disposal. I’ve seen nothing at all from Southgate to suggest he could work with the crap we had in 2016 personally.

 

[DualityNSNO]

We drew with awful Russian and Slovakian sides in the group stage. Under Southgate we probably win one of those games and win the group. Both of those teams were worse than the Swedish side we knocked out in 2018. I think apart from Scotland in 2021 his record against clearly inferior sides has been quite good. He’s struggled less with them than lots of our previous managers IMO

But he also has the utter cheat code of prime Harry Kane fit and firing for most of those lesser games, and even then it's been a few hiccup/draws when teams know how to deal with him properly or he has a slightly off-night - Hungary did do the double over England too, relegation from the nations league highest tier ( lol ), etc. Shame England can't play Malta 20 times a year to have a 200-0 goal difference.

At any rate, the guy keeps playing Maguire for some reason so he deserves all the misfortune this could bring him, really.

 

[Billy Dean]

But he also has the utter cheat code of prime Harry Kane fit and firing for most of those lesser games, and even then it's been a few hiccup/draws when teams know how to deal with him properly or he has a slightly off-night - Hungary did do the double over England too, relegation from the nations league highest tier ( lol ), etc. Shame England can't play Malta 20 times a year to have a 200-0 goal difference.

At any rate, the guy keeps playing Maguire for some reason so he deserves all the misfortune this could bring him, really.

That Hungarian team is much better than the two I mentioned

 

[Billy Dean]

We’ve drawn against terrible teams in the last two tournaments with far better players.

Yeah his record should be good against inferior sides with the quality of players he has at his disposal. I’ve seen nothing at all from Southgate to suggest he could work with the crap we had in 2016 personally.

I think you’re giving Hodgson way too much credit here. It was his choice to play Rooney in midfield. It was by no means necessary. It was hardly a vintage squad but easily good enough to beat those Slovakia, Russia and Iceland sides. It was horrendous stuff from Hodgson. It didn’t need managerial genius to get a bit more out of them

 

[DualityNSNO]

That Hungarian team is much better than the two I mentioned

It is, but it's not like it was the only bad result or two in that timespan, or poor performance (as for some matches the sheer quality of players like Kane etc. can drag the team over the line) - a lot of shaky scores/play for no reason, sometimes being absolutely dire with the ball going forward, which is shocking for a team of this quality.

As you say, Hodgson could've done more and he doesn't pick himself, but Southgate is exactly the same, just has individually stronger players - Hendo doesn't need to play, Maguire, Dunk, etc., yet here we are. He's just Roy Hodgson with a vest lol

 

[MikeH72]

I think you’re giving Hodgson way too much credit here. It was his choice to play Rooney in midfield. It was by no means necessary. It was hardly a vintage squad but easily good enough to beat those Slovakia, Russia and Iceland sides. It was horrendous stuff from Hodgson. It didn’t need managerial genius to get a bit more out of them

I’m not trying to make a case for Hodgson, I think he was a terrible England manager. But I think Southgate is a terrible manager too and there needs to be context applied every time someone wades in with the “he’s our best manager since 66” claptrap.

 

[MikeH72]

That Hungarian team is much better than the two I mentioned

That Russia team that’s so awful got to the quarters in the 2018 World Cup and only lost to Croatia on pens.

 

[YoboCopter]

We will soon see how good he is when he goes back into club football

 

[MikeH72]

We will soon see how good he is when he goes back into club football

We certainly will.

 

[Billy Dean]

I’m not trying to make a case for Hodgson, I think he was a terrible England manager. But I think Southgate is a terrible manager too and there needs to be context applied every time someone wades in with the “he’s our best manager since 66” claptrap.

Who would you say is the best since Ramsey? Personally I would say Southgate. I mean best in terms of results rather than in terms of managerial ability. But I can accept an argument for Venables too considering we knocked a decent team out and had the Holland game in the group and he wasn’t given the chance to continue after that

 

[MikeH72]

Who would you say is the best since Ramsey? Personally I would say Southgate. I mean best in terms of results rather than in terms of managerial ability. But I can accept an argument for Venables too considering we knocked a decent team out and had the Holland game in the group and he wasn’t given the chance to continue after that

Again, his results should be better than everyone else’s because he’s had A. a mostly better team and B. ludicrously fortunate tournament draws. He also had the benefit of a home tournament in 2021 which only one other manager has had since 66. There are too many variables to be comparing him to other England managers imo.