da cassino online： Results like this can be anomalies, but to downplay an England victory that ended Spain’s incredible 38-game undefeated streak at home as a mere freak occurrence would be to ignore the obvious progress the Three Lions have made under Gareth Southgate and particularly since the start of the World Cup, not to mention the manner in which this current Spain team is still caught in the transition between two generations.
da leao： Victory in Betis vindicated and underlined an England World Cup campaign which lacked exactly that kind of headline moment, a win against opposition deemed equal or superior to the Three Lions, a shrewdly efficient and pragmatic performance against one of the world’s best. It was unquestionably an accommodating route to the semi-final, and when England got there they found themselves ill-equipped to counter-act a team of Croatia’s intelligence, experience and overall calibre.
Spain may not be the Spain of 2010 or 2012, but this is still a highly-talented team blessed with a mix of all-time greats, top-class players and overtly offensive intentions. To beat them on the road is a massive moment for this England team; validation of all the hard work, proof the World Cup run was no fortuitous fluke and perhaps most importantly of all, further evidence that this current Three Lions crop has no reason to be shackled by the disappointments of the past in the same way the Golden Generation always seemingly were.
But for Southgate too, it’s a seminal event during his tenure in charge of the Three Lions. He’s as much a part of the development journey as the likes of John Stones, Marcus Rashford and Jesse Lingard – players who have unequivocally improved with his guidance and endorsement – and has been learning about elite level international football by the game as well. 3-1-4-2 was an inspired tactical quip but has proved a poor fit for top-quality sides who have the technical talent to dominate midfield, and after the first international break of the season it already felt like it had become something of a dogma.
Southgate though, showed his awareness and openness to adapting against Croatia, selecting his first non-back-three starting XI for a calendar year, and 4-3-3 proved an even smarter setup to counteract Spain. When England lost 2-1 at Wembley last month, full-backs Marcos Alonso and Dani Carvajal had the most touches of any players on the pitch and accordingly played the biggest hand in Spain taking a foothold in the game.
But with wingers Raheem Sterling and Marcus Rashford marking tightly this time as part of a wider forward line, both centre-backs and Sergio Busquets saw more of the ball in bogged down central areas.
But even after 4-3-3 provided the basis for a much-improved performance versus England’s World Cup nemeses and a potentially crucial point in the context of survival in the Nations League’s top tier, there were still questions to pose upon Southgate. While the use of 3-1-4-2 at the World Cup and the subsequent reversion back to a four-man defence has demonstrated Southgate’s ability to make the right changes between matches, his in-game management and chiefly his use of substitutions have left much more to be desired.
Those questions were posed by us at Football FanCast, after Southgate elected to use just one substitute against Croatia which changed neither the shape nor the game-plan of the England side despite heading towards a scoreless draw. It highlighted the lack of ambition, awareness and inventiveness Southgate’s substitutions have often shown, and his failure to change the direction of matches in games.
During World Cup encounters, England very rarely deviated from the format of their 3-1-4-2, the vast majority of Southgate’s substitutions being like-for-like, and before Monday’s victory, England had rather tellingly scored just once in their previous ten games after the gaffer had made his first substitution.
That run now spans to eleven encounters, but England’s victory owed much to how Southgate continuously modified the structure of his team to reflect the altering challenges and changing dynamics of a heavyweight encounter the Three Lions surprisingly ran away with in the first half. After the interval, it was already clear Southgate had sought to amend the mentality of his side, to push it a few yards deeper and demand the wide players to operate more as part of the midfield than the support acts to Harry Kane. They stayed goal-side, and rarely gambled on space to develop for counter-attacks like in the first half.
The first England substitution of the evening too, made the change in tone even more obvious. By bringing on Manchester City’s Kyle Walker for Chelsea’s Ross Barlkey, Southgate had switched what had become a 4-5-1 into a 5-4-1. It allowed Spain to dominate the ball – England eventually finishing up with just 27% possession – but it also put a near-impenetrable wall in front of the hosts and gave them different obstacles to overcome as their legs became more tired.
The full-backs could get up the pitch but were never afforded the space to make an impact and the midfielders could get onto the ball but found the path to any targets further forward cut out by two rows of England players. It wasn’t pretty, but it was exactly what England needed to do to take all three points and Southgate deserves every respect for achieving something that hasn’t often been seen from himself or for that matter, many England managers – beating elite opposition not only with fantastic football, but also astute instruction from the dugout.
For not only England’s players but also Southgate, victory in Betis was a breakthrough moment.
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