England vs Norway friendly

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Green, Parker, Gerrard and Carroll all start according to Hodgson.

Parkers health must have improved.

Let's see here. The second string defence and goalkeeper all looked assured, Norway didn't have a real chance all night so its pleasing we have that depth. Parker did well at holding the midfield and so did Barry when he came on Gerrard tried a few too many 'hollywood' balls for my liking. On the wings we didn't look effective, not one of Downing, Milner or Walcott got a decent cross in. Carroll did ok, sometimes he ran a little too deep but he did hold the ball up well. Young was our best player by far and a good finish for the goal.

For next Saturday I hope we give the Ox a least a full half as I really feel we should start him against France. We should also be looking to give Defoe and Welbeck game time and, hopefully, stick a few past the Belgians for a morale boosting 3 or 4 nil win although they do have a few good players in their team - Kompany, Fellaini and Lukaku are all recognisable names.

Looking at other games today, Holland lost 2-1 to Bulgaria at home! It wasn't exactly a weak team for the Dutch - Heitinga, De Jong, Van der Vaart, Snjeider and Van Persie all started. The Swiss embarrassed the Germans 5-3 in Basel and it wasn't a fully weakened lineup for the Germans - Ozil, Podolski and Klose all started. Spain though, swept to a 2 nil victory over Serbia.

The only team that should get encouragement from the Germany, Portugal and Holland results is Denmark.

I have a feeling it was intentional in this game not to go chasing the ball as at no point in the game was their any urgent closing down.

Same old England, start brightly, go one nil up and then sit back deeper and deeper as the game goes on.

Worried about the right back position. I'm not sure Glen Johnson or Phil Jones are the answer? Micah Richards would have been a much more solid option.

No doubt Gerrard will get a great write up in the media with Andy Townsend already mentioning how England suffered after Gerrard went off... Yawn! I counted FIVE times Gerrard played 'Hollywood balls' to no-one in the first 30 mins. No wonder England can't keep the ball.

Disappointed that England play so deep, especially when the Walcott came on. When Walcott plays for Arsenal he plays in a front three and high up the pitch. This means he can runs onto balls in the final third.

When Walcott plays for England, he ends up wide of a midfield four or five and when England break he is 70-80 yards from the goals.

I would have preferred Walcott to come on for Carroll and offer a different option up front or for England to have changed to a 4-3-3 with Young and Walcott either side of Carroll.

Too often (has been the probably with England for the past few years) Carroll ended up isolated. I just hope Hodgson doesn't feel the urge to play Rooney up front on his own to accommodate Gerrard behind him and two holding midfielders. For me you have to pick between Rooney or Gerrard in that number 10 role.

Duty281 wrote:Let's see here. The second string defence and goalkeeper all looked assured, Norway didn't have a real chance all night so its pleasing we have that depth. Parker did well at holding the midfield and so did Barry when he came on Gerrard tried a few too many 'hollywood' balls for my liking. On the wings we didn't look effective, not one of Downing, Milner or Walcott got a decent cross in. Carroll did ok, sometimes he ran a little too deep but he did hold the ball up well. Young was our best player by far and a good finish for the goal.

For next Saturday I hope we give the Ox a least a full half as I really feel we should start him against France. We should also be looking to give Defoe and Welbeck game time and, hopefully, stick a few past the Belgians for a morale boosting 3 or 4 nil win although they do have a few good players in their team - Kompany, Fellaini and Lukaku are all recognisable names.

Looking at other games today, Holland lost 2-1 to Bulgaria at home! It wasn't exactly a weak team for the Dutch - Heitinga, De Jong, Van der Vaart, Snjeider and Van Persie all started. The Swiss embarrassed the Germans 5-3 in Basel and it wasn't a fully weakened lineup for the Germans - Ozil, Podolski and Klose all started. Spain though, swept to a 2 nil victory over Serbia.

Nueur, badstuver, lahm, shiewn, muller and gomez all missing

(Passing stats from 2010 World Cup)

Frank Lampard
Caps 90 Goals 23
Pass completion rate:- 78%
Short passes:- 81%
Medium passes:- 83%
Long passes:- 49%
Cross completion rate:- 75%

Steven Gerrard
Caps 91 Goals 19
Pass completion rate:- 64%
Short passes:- 65%
Medium passes:- 70%
Long passes:- 45%
Cross completion rate:- 19%

cherriesfan wrote:

Duty281 wrote:Let's see here. The second string defence and goalkeeper all looked assured, Norway didn't have a real chance all night so its pleasing we have that depth. Parker did well at holding the midfield and so did Barry when he came on Gerrard tried a few too many 'hollywood' balls for my liking. On the wings we didn't look effective, not one of Downing, Milner or Walcott got a decent cross in. Carroll did ok, sometimes he ran a little too deep but he did hold the ball up well. Young was our best player by far and a good finish for the goal.

For next Saturday I hope we give the Ox a least a full half as I really feel we should start him against France. We should also be looking to give Defoe and Welbeck game time and, hopefully, stick a few past the Belgians for a morale boosting 3 or 4 nil win although they do have a few good players in their team - Kompany, Fellaini and Lukaku are all recognisable names.

Looking at other games today, Holland lost 2-1 to Bulgaria at home! It wasn't exactly a weak team for the Dutch - Heitinga, De Jong, Van der Vaart, Snjeider and Van Persie all started. The Swiss embarrassed the Germans 5-3 in Basel and it wasn't a fully weakened lineup for the Germans - Ozil, Podolski and Klose all started. Spain though, swept to a 2 nil victory over Serbia.

Nueur, badstuver, lahm, shiewn, muller and gomez all missing

look i dont take much notice of friendly results, however you need a squad in cup comps,

Two good bits of news I hear when I woke up. Firstly, Barry may be out of Euro 2012 - he looked very slow last night and that was only Norway! Secondly, USA humped Scotland 5-1, well done USA.

They looked solid enough. Didn't really expect much after 3 days total with his squad, and half of it missing.

Carroll and Young had some decent moments, Downing had some good crosses.

Ultimately not a lot you can take from it, but the team that plays France will look quite a bit different.

Barry and Parker injured.

Gerrard should have been sent off really, he's such a brainless player when the team isn't dominating, clumsy plank no wonder he hasnt ever done much in the league!

Downing and Parker are terrible players, never worthy to even make the Faroe Islands national teams, but apparently ARE good enough for the FA??

I won't be supporting these players in the Euros thats for sure, we pick the less talented players who are paid more and fail as usual!

are you on acid?

Why should Gerrard have been sent off?

Did you not see his horrid "tackle" attempt? That was Shawcross-esq!

You mean the one in the first half where he got the ball and the Norwegian chap had to go off injured? Perfectly good challenge, hard but fair.

I would have said he had studs up, lucky to get away with it in my opinion, at least in the modern game.

He tackled with the side of his foot.

The only thing wrong with it was that he jumped slightly, but he was first to the ball.

Blimey, just read all the negative crap on the BBC blog. What do some expect? It's a friendly, a glorified training game in essence. Only 4, maybe 5 of that team will be starting against the French on June 11.

Parker
Carroll
Young
Gerrard

I imagine will start.

Possibly:

Downing
Milner
Jones

Although I hope not.

Duty281 wrote:Blimey, just read all the negative crap on the BBC blog. What do some expect? It's a friendly, a glorified training game in essence. Only 4, maybe 5 of that team will be starting against the French on June 11.

I watched 20 minutes of the game and what struck me was the aimless and "hollywood" passing a lot of the English midfielders make Gerrard/Barry mainly. Not good enough for a very top side unless you have an amazing defence. Ireland are similar but the way the play can actually work when they don't have the ball!

thomond what are you talking about?

are you saying that ireland are similar to england - but it works for ireland?

Pretty much, Ireland also give away possession but they are more organised and incredibly defensive. So it works for them.

Yeah, it is a bit weird but Ireland seem to struggle creatively so we seem to do better without the ball. With Richard "The Iron Curtain" Dunne on the pitch though I suppose it's not surprising.

Thomond dont get carried away pal- england are by far the better defensive team.

Duty281 wrote:Why should Gerrard have been sent off?

Because Josiah is a dope and a WUM - have you not seen his posts before?

Perfectly good tackle, the fact some cry-babies whinge about it being bad is part of what's poor and boring about modern football. Too tailored to whinging cheating Latin flair players. From memory his tackle wasn't high, took the ball cleanly, was one footed, didn't have his studs up and came from the front not the behind.

Seems like my prematch assessment was 50% correct at least, it was a bore-fest just a 1-0 not 0-0 borefest!

Good to see Ashley score though, think he doesn't get quite the credit he deserves.

mystiroakey wrote:Thomond dont get carried away pal- england are by far the better defensive team.

Probably are a bit, but not a lot. England conceded 5, Ireland 7 in qualifying. Ireland had Russia and Armenia in their group, England had Montenegro/Switzerland. I would say Ireland had a tougher group. England are not that much better defensively than Ireland. I wouldn't even think they are that much better a team. England might win by a goal or two.

England are one of the best defensive teams out there. and allways have been even through our really bad spells.

Good luck to both anyway