Quarter-final vibe, reliance on Harry Kane, and other things we got wrong about England | OneFootball

England are in the World Cup semi-finals. Didn’t expect that, did we? Thought they’d go out in the quarter-final, didn’t we?

Because if in doubt, going out in the quarter-finals is about the safest of England World Cup projections and predictions.

It is, as often as not, what England do.

But not this time. This time they’ve gone further. So here’s that and nine other things about this England we got wrong.

Quarter-final vibe

Yeah, it just felt like a very last-eightish England squad.

Neither the p*ss-easy cruise through qualification nor largely cack friendly results about which Thomas Tuchel visibly could not give the shiniest of sh*tes offered compelling evidence of how this squad would cope in tournament conditions.

So we kind of just fell back on our default ‘quarter-final, maybe?’ position. England famously reach quite large numbers of World Cup quarter-finals, but historically few semi-finals. The metaphorical line between a good tournament and a bad tournament for the Three Lions has thus generally existed somewhere between the two rounds.

Troy Deeney will still be miserable because he insists upon it, but the worst-case scenario now for England is a semi-final defeat to the defending champions having reached the last four in a tournament staged outside Europe for the very first time.

Like it or not, this is now going to be at least England’s second best ever stab at a men’s World Cup. We didn’t see that coming when we saw the defenders in that squad.

Over-reliance on Harry Kane

This is the other really significant thing. And if you’d told us six weeks ago that Harry Kane would score six goals (and counting) in a tournament that simultaneously proved England are not too reliant on Harry Kane, we’d have been baffled.

We’re not going to say we ever went full Craig Hope or anything. Never do that, obviously. We never wanted Jude Bellingham anywhere other than front and centre of this squad and never really thought he should be anything other than a certain starter if fit. We didn’t particularly care if he was a divisive soloist who had committed the cardinal sin of not treating the English football press with sufficient deference. We thought he was neat.

But we really didn’t think he was going to be ‘six goals at a World Cup from midfield’ good. He’s also consistently delivered excellent media interviews, with his latest after the Norway win coming with the added bonus of showing precisely why he has generally been reluctant to do so.

The shift from ‘But do we rely too much on Kane?’ to ‘But do we rely too much on Kane and Bellingham?’ is a subtle but vital one. England now have two undoubted, undeniable global superstars who are clearly relishing the presence of the other and who the rest of the squad are happy to play for and around. England have rarely had one such player.

Mentality

The key point that both Tuchel and Bellingham made in their media-confected ‘clash’ encouraged by a weirdly sh*t-stirring Gabriel Clarke after the Norway win was the mentality and togetherness shown to get over the line.

It was the one thing ultimately missing even from Sir Gareth’s teams. Yes, England have not (yet) gone further than his teams, but they have had a tougher route and tougher conditions to overcome along the way. The Azteca would have swallowed up lesser players and a lesser team and, dare we say it, a lesser manager.

And the heat and stress of Miami felt like precisely the sort of game Southgate’s brave boys would have fought hard but ultimately lost to shrewder, cannier opponents. At points it felt alarmingly Croatia 2018 and sickeningly Italy 2021. Those were, like this, games that represented a huge opportunity against sides that were very good but not better than England.

Unlike those games, when control was lost and things seemed to be slipping inexorably away, subs came on to make a decisive change for the better.

Twice now at this tournament England have come from behind to win a knockout game, as well as staging that ludicrous 10-man rearguard against Mexico. That is not the England way. Before the last fortnight, England hadn’t won a World Cup knockout game from behind since the 1990 quarter-final against Cameroon. They hadn’t won a World Cup knockout game after conceding the first goal since the 1966 final.

This team is built different after all.

Djed Spence

We were not as animated as some about the final few decisions at the fringes of Tuchel’s squad. In general we remain of the view that England appear to be uniquely prone to desperate panic about the identity of players 25 and 26 in the squad when the reality is they are unlikely to be that important.

The difference this time is that they have been both eye-catching and also important. We raised eyebrows along with everyone else at the presence of Djed Spence in the final 26. A stop-start season with a historically bad Spurs team didn’t scream for his inclusion even before Liam Delap rearranged his jawbone in the final week of the season.

A fully-fit Spence was a bold call; one who would have to play the whole tournament in a protective plastic beard another altogether.

But he has been a revelation. His versatility has been of huge value, while the pace that was dismissed as his only asset has been vital. And even all that shouting Tuchel has been aiming in his direction to urge an instinctively defence-orientated player into the occasional attacking foray has started to bear fruit.

The really mad thing is that he’s not even been the best Spurs full-back at the tournament, Pedro Porro having for some reason turned into prime Cafu over recent weeks.

The really mad thing is that he’s not even England’s number one cult hero from the tournament, because that’s…

Big Dan Burn

What was the point, so the argument went, in taking Dan Burn to the World Cup? When was Tuchel ever likely to use him? Wouldn’t it make more sense to take Harry Maguire and Harry Maguire’s tournament experience and Harry Maguire’s enormous head with its infamous ability to draw set-pieces towards it at both ends due to its powerful gravitational force?

Tuchel knew, it turns out. Tuchel has constantly told us he was building this squad differently. That he was prioritising the collective good over the individual talent. Those who listened mainly used it as a way to hope that he might leave that bolshy prick Bellingham at home, because a lot of people just hate fun.

But what he actually meant was specific players for specific jobs and specific ways of playing. He didn’t want another centre-back who could come in and start games because he already had those (even if them being not a particularly convincing crop is in fact one of the things we were all right about). He wanted a man who could come on and bellow THOU SHALT NOT PASS in thick Geordie at times of high stress when closing games out.

Dan Burn putting his head in the way of Raul Jimenez’s overhead kick is right up there for us with Eric Dier’s infamous reducer on Sergio Ramos for iconic England moments. The fact Burn’s header from the edge of his area ended up clearing the halfway line is nutty. The fact it was only one of two such headed clearances for the big man in those manic closing stages nuttier still. Even at altitude that’s crazy.

Then even the mere sight of Burn being readied for action for the closing stages of extra-time against Norway was enough to make Erling Haaland pack it all in. Burn once again stuck his head on absolutely everything Norway could throw at him, laughing all the way.

Anthony Gordon

A fair way into this tournament we were still waiting to be convinced, but Gordon is another player displaying a profoundly un-English major tournament trait: getting better and better as the tournament gets pointier and pointier.

At the Azteca and in Miami he has had his two best games for England. That is a very, very good sign for a player.

But it’s not just that Gordon is now playing really well. It’s the fact that even if he weren’t, Tuchel was still right. We can all agree, we assume, that Bukayo Saka and Marcus Rashford were pretty safe and solid and uncomplicated selections in the squad. But Gordon and Noni Madueke being selected over Jarrod Bowen or Cole Palmer or Phil Foden did raise eyebrows.

Even though Madueke has struggled to match Gordon’s input and impact, those calls have been proved entirely right.

Madueke lacks end product, and that’s undeniably maddening at times. But what both he and Gordon have consistently done is make the pitch as wide as possible. Madueke’s first instinct is always to chop back in on that left foot, but he has shown willingness to go outside his full-back, and even when he does cut inside he has been doing it from very wide indeed.

The reason Tuchel has prioritised wide players with pace who largely stay wide is clear; it’s not just for their ability to influence the game, but for the space and freedom they provide England’s star men Bellingham and Kane.

It’s no coincidence that those two are flourishing so spectacularly in a team built specifically to do so. Your Maduekes and especially your Gordons emphasise and illuminate the strengths of England’s best players. Players like Foden or Palmer, gifted as they are, simply would not afford Kane and Bellingham the same literal and figurative space to shine.

Anthony Barry

This one was from after the tournament started, sure, but oh how wrong we were. During the Croatia game, which now seems approximately several decades ago, we were convinced a star had been born in assistant coach Barry after he came out for what we assumed was going to be a platitude-heavy, cliché-led, softball, contract-fulfilling half-time interview.

Instead he launched a coruscating attack on England’s performance, clearly and concisely highlighting and explaining all the things wrong with it. The best part about that was that England hadn’t even been that bad.

They have certainly been far worse in subsequent first halves against weaker opposition than Croatia. Three times in a row, in fact, against Ghana, Panama and DR Congo.

Yet Barry has been entirely and disappointingly nerfed. We don’t know if someone had a word in his shell-like after Croatia – and lord knows the Tuchel-Bellingham nonsense this week has shown that large swathes of the media can’t be trusted with honest feelings bluntly expressed – but he has not said one interesting thing since that barnstorming start.

All he does now is talk about verticality at breakneck speed. It’s low-key been one of the tournament’s biggest falls from grace for one of the opening week’s breakout stars.

Jordan Henderson

We’ll hold our (working) hands up, we absolutely didn’t expect him to jump over an advertising hoarding and smash his wrist to bits while celebrating victory at the Azteca in a game where he also got himself booked without actually playing. Even at altitude, it seems foolish for any regular-sized human to simply assume they’ll be able to easily jump over something because Big Dan Burn has just done so. Big Dan Burn’s nickname is not ironic.

What we absolutely did predict and expect was for Jordan Henderson to turn up to England’s next game with a comical full-arm cast and full kit and boots. Absolutely love that for him. We still half-expect to see him take a penalty in the inevitable shoot-out against Argentina, coming on in the 120th minute alongside Ivan Toney who everyone has forgotten is even in the squad at all.

Kobbie Mainoo

Kind of thought he’d get a kick, if we’re honest, especially when Declan Rice was so bedevilled with the wild sh*ts that he couldn’t even take corners properly anymore.

Jordan Pickford

For the first time since establishing himself as England’s No.1 at his first major tournament in 2018, Pickford is giving us the willies a little bit.

England are approaching the end of an unprecedented decade of major tournament consistency having failed to reach the semi-final at only of the last five, and even then going out narrowly to France in the last eight. Pickford has been a massive part of all of it.

But this tournament has provided a serious challenge to the previously rock-solid consensus that he has Never Let England Down. Perhaps because he sits behind the least convincing defence of his England career, Pickford has cut a jittery and nervous figure at times.

He’s been at fault for the opening goal in two of England’s three knockout games thus far, and that feels sub-optimal. He did also throw in an all-timer of a performance against Mexico, including a particularly memorable ‘Gordon Banks for the TikTok generation’ early save to deny Raul Jimenez.

Without that, who knows what might have happened. But he was wobbly again against Norway. We’ve very much enjoyed these years of not having to worry at all about England’s goalkeeper, but it does feel like that time might be coming to an end.

Not at this tournament. Let’s not go mad. Pickford clearly and correctly extends his England World Cup appearance record here for as long as the chance of football coming home remains alive.

But after this World Cup? For the first time in a long time, there’s a conversation to be had.