General Premier League Thread 2023-24 Mod Note in op 27/6/23 And 21/05/24

I don't get the asterisking goal totals for penalties. Its a skill in its own way.

There's more time to overthink, less for instinct. No momentum to follow through on, you need to generate that power yourself. All the attention is on the taker. A strong mentality is needed. You could be up against a keeper who's beens studying your technique and history.

Its definitely not as straightforward as some people make it out to be. Even the penalty takers with the best success rates have missed a few.

Any keeper worth its salt saves the first goal and then it’s a different game potentially

That's as embarrassing as it gets. It's literally something you'd see in a primary school lunchtime kick about. Not a good look for Poch either does he have any control over these players?

Modern footballers, eh!

To be fair, the way goal bonuses go at footy clubs there days, scoring that could have been worth 50k extra this week to one of them.

Gallagher is the captain. He did grab the ball and hand it to Palmer to be fair to him.

he has a wealth of attacking options, but defensively England look quite slow and I'm not sure a Rice/Bellingham midfield would provide enough cover against the likes of France or Spain. I'm not sure who else he can play in there though, Henderson is surely finished at the top level.

It’s still a shot at goal where something like 77% of them are scored (and often not of the players own creation)

Looks great on paper but I'd have serious doubts about it in reality.

England wasted their last golden generation by trying to fit names onto a team sheet.

The midfield needs to be Rice, Mainoo and Bellingham.

If they don't balance the middle correctly it won't matter who's on the pitch

Why would you pull Bellingham back deeper when he's been so good further up the pitch for Real this season?

Bellingham is the man they need to build around in the midfield. Rice and Mainoo seem to be the best pairing on form to do that.

Gallagher will be good backup

Dele said it best last night. Where were the Chelsea players queuing up when they had a last minute penalty to draw with City a while back

Bellingham is wasted back deeper, he can do it well true, but comfortably his best is as a 10.

Mainoo/Gallagher should be partnering Rice.

I've seen nothing in Manioo's game since he broke into the 1st team at UTD to suggest he wouldn't be ready.

He came on for England a few weeks ago and looked very comfortable. One of their better players actually and looked to give them better balance in their midfield straight away.

It's simple for me - they have no outstanding options in his position in the team. They can shoehorn a player into that role (Bellingham) or they can play a poorer player in that position because he has more experience (Gallagher). Or they can play the best option (Mainoo).

He's part of a Manchester United midfield that doesn't seem to exist when they don't have possession so that would have to be a worry to any coach.

It's not shoehorning someone in who's played there the majority of his career. Bellingham has been doing great things as the main central attacking threat but the idea that he and another attack minded player (think Maddison would suit this too) couldn't play either side of Rice is a bit reductive.

These guys are miles above Mainoo who has been as likely to set up an opposition goal as one for his own team in recent weeks and struggles to keep up with the pace of the game at the moment. Great on the ball, yes, but a lot of developing to do.

Mainoo is in no way ready for a starting place in the England set up and from a purely selfish United supporter perspective, I hope he doesn't feature at all for them.

Ward-Prowse seems the obvious experienced head beside Rice.

Than they should be pairing JWP or someone of that ilk with Rice. He's a good experienced player who's a very good midfield player and has a wand of a foot.

Mainoo is clearly a gifted midfielder, but he's just so young, so I'd worry about him a bit structurally in a team where that position is very important to the defensive shape. Would have no worries for him on the ball, but out of possession, he's not exactly gotten to get much good experience working in a properly functioning midfield on the defensive side. It's a lot of pressure on the lad.

Ward-Prowse has the experience and discipline where you know what you're going to get out of possession, and is still a plenty good footballer. Stones is a great shout, though their defence might become a bit weaker without him if Southgate sticks with his other faves there like Maguire over more mobile lads like Tomori, Colwill etc.

Here's a comparison matrix of the players mentioned above and how their stats compare together.

That's Arsenal's Rice above but if you ask Rice to do a job like his West Ham days and be more defensively minded it's more interesting.

So in this one I've put Rice in his West Ham defensive mold, Bellingham in his Dortmund all rounder 8 role and Maddison in his 10 role to attack but also as someone who likes to press hard and try win possession early.

I'd also think with Kane, Foden, Saka etc you aren't as reliant on Bellingham for goals so you don't "need" him to be in the box as much.

Surely going into a tournament you'd want to play players in roles they have mostly played this season and not something they haven't been doing for 12+ months

You want to capitalize on their form as you are really only looking at a 4/5 week period. International sides don't have 5-10 games to play themselves into form or a team shape.

They mostly need to keep it simple and get the best players into their best positions. Supplementing them with complimentary players.

It's a very different situation to club football due to the limited time

England reached the last Euro final with Calvin Phillips starting in midfield. Mainoo is more than good enough ffs

Kalvin Phillips 3 years ago was a very decent player.

Open your other eye there, would ya? 90% of the football comments in Soccer on boards, are about the English leagues. If you have an issue with supporting an English club, but having to curl up into a ball because the English national side is referenced, well, hmmm. Naturally, I don't support England, but I feel they are just a Gareth Southgate away from winning the Euros this summer. If you feel this warrants a separate thread, launch one, but I can see how people would mention it in here.