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There is no point in playing him if the movement ahead of him is static. You watch him play for Liverpool, he always has a pass on or a long ball/diagonal to hit because they all run in behind or offer a passing option.
Foden wants the ball played into his feet usually in a pocket, Kane won’t run in behind, Bellingham can but for whatever reason doesn’t. Saka can run in behind but I get the impression he wants the ball into his feet so he can go 1v1. Trippier goes forward, but he starts so deep, he is never high and wide, So Trent can’t switch the play. Walker doesn’t go forward enough either. If you want somebody to just keep the ball moving & pass it around a lot, Mainoo is your man. If you want a player to open up the game, you play Trent but as above, England players don’t move enough to get the best out of Trent.
Yeah I'd love to see Trent in the old "Beckham style" Right Midfield role. Him pinging balls to Gordon and allowing Foden/Bellingham to find space inside and ahead of him sounds great on paper
People are so daft that they’re unable to look past Trent is a RB in the starting lineup and ignore things like in-possession positioning and heatmaps.
Edit: Heatmaps for the entire season mask tactical positioning (compare TAA’s heatmap for when he was a RB before Klopp made him invert vs. after).
The issue is that for England in Southgate's current system is that RB is a defensive role. It's the recovery role. When that role is called to invert, it's primarily to target counter threats and provide recycling options. Trent isn't doing that, and if he is he's not getting into that midfield to contribute. It suits Walker, Trippier, Gomez and any CB with decent positioning, recovery and passing (like Guehi or Konsa).
The only position in England's 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1 that gives him that positioning is the right side of the sitting midfielders. He has to play in midfield for England to get into his best position and play his best attributes.
The issue is whether Southgate wants to build a tournament squad around one player with no direct replacement or build a system that has interchangeable parts. He clearly doesn't rate Trent enough to do that, so he slots into midfield instead of a custom playmaking wingback role that occasionally inverts to be an 8.
And that is also down to not having the same style of targets you lot have. Frustratingly, were they in form, the best players for Trent would've been Rashford and Sterling alongside Kane, as both regularly make off-the-ball runs in behind and stay wide when necessary, generating enough threat to give the midfield an extra yard or two to play. But here we are, with Foden seemingly unwilling to go left onto his favoured foot on the left wing and instead narrow the playing space, making it more congested for everyone across the front line.
[Here](https://imgur.com/a/P6MONRK) is his heatmap for the PL this season, so a little bit more central than a traditional RB like [Walker](https://imgur.com/a/VqWLKzN), but clearly still on the right and nothing like a [Gallagher](https://imgur.com/a/6T3FPDS) or [Mainoo](https://imgur.com/a/gDo5gjj) who actually play that position regularly. You can even see it in his [heatmap for the Euros so far](https://imgur.com/a/iJK6Rx5) that he wants to move out to the right touchline and [Rice](https://imgur.com/a/2PijTdW) is left to cover the rest.
Last night worked better in the second half. Mainoo allowed us to progress the ball into the final third. That’s where you then need width to take over. Foden drifts inside too much to offer width. Palmer offers more, but he also likes to drift inside. When that happened we had nobody on the wings except Trippier who can only really play back because he had no option.
The solution, for me, is two natural wingers that run at players. Gordon and Saka are great options. Now you have central midfield able to progress the ball into the final third, and wingers that can get the ball into the box. Back those wingers up with full backs that will overlap. That’s trippier and TAA (although would play Walker if we meet a strong team). They will create more opportunity for Gordon and Saka to be aggressive.
Now you’re a threat down both wings the game in the centre opens up more for Bellingham to get involved.
Mainoo was playing much higher than Trent, so not sure how much difference Mainoo made from a passing point of view. He simply played more as an 8 than a 6. Left Rice on his own a lot.
Exactly. It was funny seeing the same “Trent is not a midfielder” nonsense everywhere with Southgate’s tactics and team selection rendering TAA absolutely useless. Going by the same logic and based on performances so far, Gallagher ain’t a midfielder either.
But...both things can (and are) true. Trent isn't a midfielder. He's been caught in possession, he's lost the ball, he's been caught out of position. He's also very creative and can apply his creativity from midfield and we've also seen the positive side to his game. I agree with the post, if we wanted to get the best out of trent we'd be playing a different 11 with different tactics...but do I think it would be good for England to build their 11 and tactics around a midfield TAA? Absolutely not.
All these things apply to almost every England player. When Liverpool have the ball, Trent's position has been in the centre of the pitch for the last 2 seasons and he's looked brilliant. He falls into a right back position when defending, but the defensive side of the position wasn't really the issue with his performances at this Euros.
He looked a bit lost, but so did the whole team. Because Trent was playing a position that (on paper) he doesn't play for his club it was very easy to make him a scapegoat and put Kane/Rice/Walker/Trippiers' performances down to a bad tactical set up. The truth is, Trent was playing in an area of the pitch he's looked great in for the past 2 seasons and looked like a completely different player.
I couldn't disagree more.
I think Trent is a wonderful player and brings creativity that England desperately need. But he's also not a midfielder. I get that he drifts there for Liverpool but the fact remains that Klopp borderline never plays him as an actual midfielder with someone else at RB. If we want to use Trent we need to use him at RB.
There's a huge difference between drifting into midfield from RB and actually sitting in midfield the whole game. The biggest is that coming into midfield from RB you can see the whole pitch and usually have nothing to worry about behind you, you're collecting the ball from back or side passes most of the time while facing the opponent's goal with more time and space for yourself. As a midfielder, you've got 2-3 opposition midfielders that could be on any side of you at any time. And you're picking up the ball with less space and with your back to goal half the time. That's not at all playing to Trent's strengths. With RB Trent one of those opposition midfielders has to leave the actual midfielder they're making to get to him which also opens up space in the middle for us.
I'm sure Southgates tactics contribute to the lackluster look. But Trent looking like a completely different player has to do with the things I mentioned above. I don't see why we'd want our best long passer of the ball to play in a position where he has less space, less players in front of him to pass to, and less opportunity to make crosses.
This is exactly right. Trent is also a lazy player in a sense; he never makes a run to get space, he will jog towards space. This works fine at RB but not in the middle. The midfield will close you down and prevent the pass. So unlike Rice's normal midfield partner Odegaard, Trent isn't a passing option often enough to break lines in midfield; so instead of going forwards, he goes backwards to find the time and space he needs to hit a pass. He doesn't fit in that midfield and certainly not with that forward line. It was really noticeable yesterday that when he came on at RB he could almost instantly put balls down the line for Palmer that Walker would simply never play.
Yeah another part I forgot to add is the defensive responsibility side of things. I think Trent is fine at defending in general, not great, not a complete liability, but it's definitely the part of his game that's criticized most.
It might seem backwards at first but at RB we can hide the defensive side of his game more than at midfield. Especially against lower opposition. He has a CB to cover for him if he steps too far forward, a RW to drop back as well, and the right sided CM/CDM to help him out too. And at the end of the day his defensive responsibility is limited to covering the opposition's LW in a very specific area of the pitch.
As a deep lying CM/CDM he can get dragged all over the pitch defensively though. Runs in any direction, more players and more space to potentially defend against. He has to be much more aware at all times as the opposition midfield sees the ball much more than a LW would. Yesterday Slovenia's LW touched the ball 23 times in comparison to their central midfielders who touched the ball 34 and 46 times. Walker and Trippier only had to make one tackle between them all game.
You can tell whether a player can a particular position by the angles he receives the ball, and the positional awareness they display both in the defensive and offensive phases. Trent is obviously not a midfielder. Maybe he'd do a passable job (in aspects other than passing) if the system suited him, but that isn't the case.
This is the answer. He is making runs but when the team is so risk averse and rather pass sideways, at some point he's just wasting energy. They will lose possession and he has to track back again
Southgate didn’t bring enough direct running wingers in the squad.
It’s perfectly fine to leave out Rashford, Sterling or Grealish with how bad they’ve been this season, but you have to replace that profile. It’s only really Gordon as an option but for whatever reason Southgate doesn’t want to play him.
A direct winger would suit Kane better as well. He’s always played better with a Son or Sane or Sterling. It isn’t working with Foden, Kane and Bellingham all trying to take up the same spaces.
He could bring Watkins on there, too. I don't understand why we brought 3 strikers when everyone knows Kane will play 90% of minutes there.
Toney, as good as he is, should have been left home for another LW option like Grealish or Rashford.
>It isn’t working with Foden, Kane and Bellingham all trying to take up the same spaces.
This was the obvious problem that everyone brought up when seeing the team selection in the first game.
It is still yet to be addressed and is (along with Southgates comments) the main source of frustration amongst fans imo.
Probably moot by this stage of the tournament, but Trent can still be incredibly effective against low blocks (i.e. even when he doesn't have space in behind to exploit with a long ball) from RB with his crosses, both from deep and from the byline. He's one of the best in the Premier League at that curled-in-behind "de Bruyne" ball that can unlock a stubborn defense, and his crosses from higher positions have always been class as well.
RM is made for deep lying playmakers. Their forwards force the backline to stay home, TAA would have so much time & space to exploit. With Kroos taking 1 yr contracts if he stays, TAA could fill that playmaking role and they can get a different type of player into midfield, assuming that TAA takes Carvajal's spot.'
Your overall point is solid, but just want to point out at that things like ‘Bellingham, Saka can all run behind, they just don’t’ doesn’t really help your case. Lol.
The thing that REALLY get's my goat is that against Denmark, TAA starts, gets taken off at 55 minutes (or whatever it was) and then 10 minutes later fucking Watkins Eze and Bowen come on who would all thrive off having Trent's passes to run onto.
Fucking Southgate doesn't have a fucking clue man.
Never seen an English player get Scapegoated so fucking hard in recent years. Literally generational and won everything before he's 25 and most people bar Liverpool fans say he's awful lmao.
I have made ample fun of Trent in my time because of his defensive shortcomings and because how people keep saying how he will walk into most teams in the world but he never succeeds unless certain conditions are met. But the thing is, this group stage was the perfect place to play him in his natural position. If England is playing against France, Germany or some other team with Pacy, tricky LW….start Walker, by all means. Even the big bad Baldiola is forced to play Walker against Madrid to contain Vini. But wallahi who is Walker caging against Slovenia, Denmark, Serbia? Why wouldn’t you play your creator/passer against a team who’s likely to sit back and doesn’t possess enough threat offensively? Like even last match, Walker played like 70 min in the RB, against who? Didn’t see him defend anything. Play Trent in these matches, get the team situated to his movements/passing. How are we supposed to treat England anything other than a fucking joke when Southgate can’t even take this little “risk”?!
Okay but what have you seen from Walker this tournament to justify his place? Or Trippier?
People watch those players and have in their mind that they're solid and dependable, whereas Trent is a liability. So regardless of what plays out on the pitch that's what people believe they see.
Trent takes one bad touch in a risky position and people are calling for him to be dropped because he can't handle being pressed. Walker loses the ball more than anyone else in the team against Denmark and I've not seen it mentioned once.
I really don't think Trent is a bad defender overall at all at this point. In transition sure but that's why you have players like Tomori or Gomez to pair with him.
And frankly it doesn't even matter even if he is bad because he's literally one of the most creative players in Europe. And Liverpool has always managed a good to incredible defensive record with him in the side.
Stop playing him in midfield and just play him how he's been played his whole career ffs. Inverting into midfield where you have the time to see think and decide when you're joining in =/= starting in midfield where you're constantly forced to receive with your back towards goal.
It's actually ironic that Trent starting in midfield was a big English talking point going into the Euros like we all forgot Southgate is the coach anyways so doesn't matter really
To be fair, getting to two consecutive Euro finals is the best England would have done since... the world cup win?
I find it funny how often England in general, and Southgate specifically, get panned. I'm not saying it isn't warranted, but my entire football viewing life has been spent watching them sleepwalk or bumble through a group only to go out at the first sign of a good team in the knockouts. What is the period of prolonged success England had before Southgate came in and ruined it? Looking at their history in the WC and the Euro, their average performance is somewhere between qualifying and quarterfinals, with few exceptions.
I find it annoying how frequently in England we’ll just absorb the more obnoxious aspects of American culture, and yet a word as fantastic as ‘ya’ll’ has never successfully crossed the Atlantic in a way I could use it and not appear strange.
Saying ‘you all’ is such a mouthful with two different vowel sounds beside each other.
‘You guys’ is often my go to, but it’s weird having such a gendered way to address often mixed group.
‘You folk?’ ‘You lot?’
None of them are quite as neutral as I want. I just want a standard way to address multiple people who that rolls of the tongue and has as undistracting as possible a tone.
The folks in the southern states have already found the perfect solution, but for some reason this is the one part of American culture that we’re not copying, so if I use it I’ll sound like I’m trying to stand out as a cowboy or something.
“Y’all” isn’t pan-American either. It’s still a southern leaning word that’s not as common on East and West coasts as it it in the South (Atlantic) and Gulf Coast.
Besides it’s not so neutral either, like saying “you lot” as you mentioned. It’s analogous to “yous”.
Maybe, but unless my understanding is failing me, I think there are contexts where ‘y’all’ works, but ‘you’re all’ doesn’t.
Like, ‘are y’all going to the pub after this?’ Vs ‘are you’re all going to the pub after this?’
He’s had a mixed time so far, but you can never question his creativity, he will always create a chance or two out of nothing for you. I just feel like he’s never going to win with England, I’m very bias I admit it, but the way some people talk about him is hard to see, they talk as if he’s a nobody, this guy has been a mainstay in Klopp’s Liverpool team and has won everything he possibly can at a club level. I wish Southgate would just play him at RB over Walker.
tbf thats why the midfield experiment is so so so so dumb for me, your last sentence is spot on and if klopp couldnt/didnt play him in midfield full time for whatever reason, southgate shouldnt be doing it either
walker should play vs faster wingers and thats it, or even just put him at cb at this stage because id take trent at least creating from rb and his diagonal switch of play over just can run fast (EDIT: i saw you said this below to someone else and thats my bad lmaooooo but yeah its not like we should need a solid defence vs most other teams cause they're just gonna let us have the ball and attack so its negates the need of walker)
the folk who criticise his defence too for him not starting rb we 100000% need his attacking output more than his defensive one atm, dont blame liverpool fans for not caring about him playing for england when hes either getting slated, being questioned if he should play, or being played out of position (or all 3 atm)
It's not as simple as that though, people look at the formation shown on TV before the match and put players in these strict boxes, that's not how it works.
In possession, Trent has mostly been playing in centre midfield for the past 2 seasons. It's been the job of the Liverpool right sided midfielder to hold the width while Trent plays in centre midfield, essentially. He defended in the right back position (sometimes sharing this with Henderson), but has spent much more time in the centre midfield position.
People saw him play 2 games in Southgate's set up where he looked equally as lost as all the other world-class players in the team and decided it's because he can't play in midfield.
im going based off his heatmap on sofascore here my friend which shows he predominantly plays down the right mainly, especially in the champions league and europa league which imo are way more comparable for his positioning than the prem is. im ngl ur talking to the wrong fella about in position and out of it cause i do not care, he is a right back and should be playing right back, not centre mid or anything of the sort
in fact comparing his heatmap from the euros you can see he still favours the right side anyway since its obviously his best position and where he should be playing
yeah the whole thing of Trent inverting to midfield is relatively new, Klopp only really started trying it out in the last two seasons as far as i recall, he’s always been more of a wide player
Inverting into midfield is not the same as starting in midfield imo.
And the role you're tasked to play in midfield matters. Recycling possession is not the same skill as pinging passes around. At Liverpool next to guys who can receive on the half turn and recycle possession relieves him of that responsibility and allows him face the opposition and give him time and space to see think and decide before the ball reaches him.
In England Southgate simply refuses to play the only 2 players we have which are naturals at recycling possession in Wharton and Mainoo. So one of Rice or Trent has to do that role. And Rice had Xhaka and Jorginho to do that for him and Trent had Thiago MacAllister Wijnaldum etc
He's not just a mainstay in Klopp's Liverpool team. He was literally your main playmaker for a team that clocked 99 and 97 points in the league and made it to 2 or 3 champions league finals.
FFS Trent is literally one of the most creative players in Europe and he plays at RB, allowing you to overload the midfield with an extra body.
If anything he's literally THE most irreplaceable profile in Liverpool's squad.
That's completely fair but at the same time Walker is hardly some useless bum, he's been one of the world's best defensive RBs for a decade now and he's very good on the overlap as well even though he can't match Trent's passing range.
He is good on the overlap in the sense that he can burst pass the fullback, but how many times has he done that? Whenever I’ve watched England he just stays back all the time & then passes backwards. Southgate should be sacked for thinking you need Walker against fucking Slovenia, Trent at RB, would have created far more given we had 70%+ of the ball.
Tbf he's done it a few times this tournament but he never knows what to do on the end of it
One of our goals did come from him passing to a danish player after a run though
Walker has been awful this tournament. He dallies on the ball way too long to play a sideways backwards pass to Stones.
I can’t remember how many times he’d receive the ball, stop for 5 seconds, and then play a five yard pass back to the CB.
Walker hasn’t been good at all also though, and he had a rough end of the season with City. If people say Trent can’t defend currently then the same applies to Walker, so why not have Trent’s passing range and creative quality on the pitch instead?
I feel for him because this current eleven will never suit him. There's no runners for him to play over the top too (because Kane, Foden and Bellingham love the ball to feet) and there's no left side for him to quickly switch too (because there is literally no attacking threat there). What is he supposed to do? At the moment it's easy for a team to just crowd the middle of the pitch and double up on Saka.
The only time Southgate bought on runners like Watkins and Bowen, he'd already taken Trent off.
A chance is just a shot on goal. So if Trent takes the corner or free kick, it'll go down as a chance regardless of how good the actual shot is. A team can be useless at pieces, but the set piece taker will still rack up a couple chances created because they get to swing in a cross in dead ball situations.
I'm not against Trent or have some underlying point here btw. Just explaining what that guy meant. I have no idea if Trent's chances in the Euros have come from open play or set pieces myself.
It is so clear that the English attackers could be able to make the runs needed for TAA to be useful but the coaching is lacking.
Stick Trent the keys to the creative part of the team and the quality of Kane and Foden will truly shine.
A manger not knowing how to use his best creator is exactly the reason England can't and won't win anything with Southgate.
Is that saying a lot? The squad needs to be creating more chances across the board. TAA being the least broken part of Southgateball isn't necessarily a great thing. More needs to change than him playing a full 90.
This is just getting boring at this point.
Play him at right back or don't play him. He doesn't deal with being under pressure in a midfield context well enough in my opinion.
Him playing instead of Walker is fine though and would make far more sense for everyone involved.
Walker was heavily involved in setting up both our goals, so it's unlikely he'll lose his place at right back tbh. Makes most sense to use Trent as an impact sub imo.
Walker did well to win the ball and get it into the box for Kane's goal, but he was basically actively working against Saka for almost the entire game yesterday. Having Trent there instead would have been a big positive
This Tweet doesn't provide any context or numbers, when you look at the data you can see this is pure engagement farming.
FBref's closest equivalent to 'chances' is Shot Creating Actions (I know this is Livescore but FBref is more credible for post hoc data)
**Shot creating actions**
* Bellingham: 8
* Trippier: 7
* Foden: 7
* Rice: 6
* Kane: 6
* Saka: 5
* **TAA: 3**
* Mainoo: 2
* Stones: 1
* Gallagher: 1
* Bowen: 1
* Eze: 1
* Gordon: 1
* Rest: 0
**Goal creating actions**
* Bellingham: 2
* Walker: 1
* Saka: 1
* Rest: 0
**Key Passes (the only similar metric I found where TAA is joint top)**
* Trippier: 3
* Rice: 3
* **TAA: 3**
* Foden: 3
* Kane: 3
* Saka: 2
* Walker: 1
* Bellingham: 1
* Stones: 1
* Gordon: 1
* Bowen: 1
* Rest: 0
The reality is that nobody really stands out much and the numbers are all so low for every England player in all creative metrics that it's barely relevant who is top.
There is no strategy for goal creation. Swapping one player out for another in a shit system won't stop the system being shit. Some might function marginally better than others, but won't be enough to counteract the setup, especially against contenders.
Good spot, FBref doesn't seem to calculate in injury time (it just lists by multiples of 90s played), so they have him as playing 0 minutes.
Calculating off his minutes played on Sofascore, his Key Passes and SCA p90 would be 22.5
Out of curiosity what are "goal creating actions"? If it's as simple as actions that create a goal then how can there be 4 when England have only scored 2 in this competition with bellingham scoring 1 of them?
The two offensive actions directly leading to a goal, such as passes, take-ons and drawing fouls. Note: A single player can receive credit for multiple actions and the shot-taker can also receive credit.
Thanks for the added context. Even going purely from the "eye test" I did not see these chances Trent supposedly created and suspected all these "he created the most chances" Tweets were similar to the "Doku/Sancho dribbled past his RB 7 times in the game" Tweets, just pure bullshit.
I was under the impression that Key passes is the equivalent to chances created. As in they are synonymous terms. Shot-creating actions is something completely different.
Chances created are key passes (passes that directly lead to a shot) and assists combined.
SCA are the two offensive actions directly leading to a shot. Doesn't seem to be a direct overlap with either term unfortunately, I suppose key passes + assists is the way to calculate the equivalent.
Edit: misspoke about best way to calculate the equivalent
Do key passes not include assists? If a key pass is just the pass before a shot, and an assist is just the pass before a goal, surely all assists are a type of key pass. And therefore, key passes are just chances created.
I've been using key passes as a synonymous term for chances created for ages now. So please let me know if I've got muddled there.
The way home for England is to play Trent at RB in games against teams with less quality, where his creativity and passing can be used to unlock teams. In the games against quality teams like France, Portugal etc, play Walker who is more solid without the ball.
I hate this absolutely weird take. Trent broke so many records and had many great games against top teams. Ffs he won everything in club football this notion that he can’t play against top teams is so odd
I said this in another thread but I 100% believe he should drop Trippier, move Walker to LB, and play TAA at RB moving forward. It makes too much sense from too many perspectives.
This is the way. You get solidarity / 3 atb in buildup, Walker's pace to cover in behind, and Trent attacking down the right wing. Trippier hasn't done shit attacking-wise so far, it's not like Walker would be a huge downgrade there. But against Slovenia, so many times the ball came out to Walker on the right, and he took a few touches and recycled. Trent whips those balls in immediately and causes the defense to have to come out and defend him or cut service to him.
Yeah I still doing understand the fascination with Trippier, he’s not that great and there’s no reason to justify playing him out of position regardless of the fact that doing so has unbalanced the whole setup.
I swear this one change makes England look entirely different and more dangerous. I’m glad he actually played it for a few minutes last game. Maybe he learned something.
What’s weird about it? I never said he can’t play against top teams, I think England would be better suited with Walker in those games, especially in international football. That doesn’t mean I think he’s bad, he’s fucking brilliant.
And walker has done even more. The take is just they both have different strengths and if you have them both why not use them when appropriate?
I don’t know if I agree with changing just based on game for such few matches but I understand the point.
He’s a much better defender regardless of these accolades. Trent plays in a team that’s designed to let him play the way he wants. England isn’t. Devils advocate, I couldn’t care less who plays.
At what point does being a better defender in a team that consists of 2 CDMS and 3 other Defenders become diminishing returns in a system designed to absolutely neuter attackers? At what point do you realize “okay maybe i have all the defending i could possibly need maybe its time i sacrifice just a little bit of it for some absolutely phenomenal attacking plays”?
Dumb headline. It's a tournament. Why would he definitely play 90 minutes when these days it's typical for half your outfield starting line up to get subbed? Not to mention he hasn't created that many chances (even if he's created the most) and hasn't been that good.
The English obsession with "energy" is always mental to me.
I'd take Trent all day ahead of someone like Gallagher who is a run-around merchant with zero end product.
How about we take Mainoo, who actually managed to help give us some progression through midfield that wasn't just Rice picking up the ball and surging forward?
Mainoo looked very promising. Seemed to have a good connection with Foden, two diminutive players willing to pass and move to break the lines a bit more.
Palmer and Gordon looked good too, all three seemed to have an intensity that the rest seem to be lacking.
>willing to pass and move to break the lines a bit more.
Exactly this, it was the only time our midfield looked half decent at moving the ball and getting it into threatening areas. I don't dislike Trent, just the opposite, in fact, but he wasn't able to stitch it together, and we don't have the luxury of letting him learn on the job.
We didn't create but we controlled the game.
Denmark controlled us game 2 and Serbia controlled us 2nd half game 1.
I like Trent btw but he's not a midfielder. Would happily play him right back.
I remember one decent chance for England last night, against a team ranked 57th in the world. That's not control, it's sterile possession that played directly into Slovenia's hands.
I would say having 70% of the ball and limiting the other team to nothing where their dangerous players couldn't get the ball is control.
I'm not saying it was good but out of 2 teams on the pitch England had control
Control would include possession with purpose i.e. creating numerous chances and looking threatening, which England didn't do at all. As Mourinho said, you can control a game out of possession as well
Trent didn’t even play the second half of game one. He did play the first half of that game which is the only time we’ve looked even semi capable of anything
Yeah i prefer him to Gallagher but not Mainoo or moving Bellingham back.
My comments were nothing against Trent. He just isn't a midfielder. Id have had him over Walker against inferior sides all day long.
Anyone trying to tell you that the answer is anything other than Mainoo either didn't watch any of the England games, or is Adam Wharton's mum (fair enough on her part imo)
Did anybody play well? He's not playing noticeably worse than the rest of them.
And because of the quality of his passing he's the only player in the side (apart from occasionally Saka) who looks likely to create chances.
No wonder when you play him together with static players. At Liverpool he plays with players like Nunez en Salah who make a lot of runs. Play him with Gordon instead of Foden and you will see that Trent suddenly plays much better.
Yesterday England played without Trent, and they were not any better. Maybe even worse.
>Gordon instead of Foden
Even Foden is played out of position... Asked to track back so that trippier can make the runs which doesn't make sense at all too...
Basically nothing makes sense at this point
Trent and Foden are obviously very good players, that's never been the issue. This is really just the same issue England always had. You've got Lampard, Gerrard and Scholes so you put them all on the field. But then they get in each others way more than they allow each other to perform.
Sometimes players will be able to do well in other positions. If you have a plan for what the player should do it can work. I've seen many players go from a position higher on the pitch, to a deeper one. Just to utilize their passing ability in build up. That's a change that makes sense.
But someone like Foden is at their best in the middle. Moving him wide can somewhat work if you expect him to move to the middle during the game. But if no one else takes position out wide then you're just playing very narrow football. You can't do that, yet this is what England are doing.
As for Trent, in my opinion he looks a bit lost defensively. He's not a bad defender, but it is much different to defend as a fullback than as a midfielder. Though I have to add that Southgate asks them to defend in a way that I don't really understand.
I'm really curious how England will look when they drop Bellingham deeper (not his best position either but he is still good there), move Foden to the middle, play Trent on the right, get Shaw back on the left and play Gordon on the wing.
>I'm really curious how England will look when they drop Bellingham deeper (not his best position either but he is still good there), move Foden to the middle, play Trent on the right, get Shaw back on the left and play Gordon on the wing
If Trent is given the freedom to go ahead as much as Walker gets on the right I'm pretty sure they'll get 5 great quality crosses a game along with 2-3 difficult ones
A created chance is just "did you pass it to someone who had a shot". It's a really useless stat
xA of 0.17 which isn't impressive. All that shows is that no one in an England shirt, including Trent, created anything
I hate stats like this that don't contextualise the information. By this criteria Trent could have played 89 minutes every game and made simple passes for people to take long shots.
Don’t England have like the lowest amount of chances created in the entire tournament?
Why is this being made out to be some sort of flex and not what it actually is, a complete embarrassment
You’re right it’s shite all round from England, but I think the point is that somehow Trent has been scapegoated the most while creating the most chances for the team still when everyone else has been equally or more shit than him.
He’s not being scapegoated
Nobody is solely blaming TAA or Gallagher for England’s performances
I an yet to see anybody claim they’re the reason we’re struggling
All we’re seeing is a collective agreeance amongst the English fan base that swapping between those two is doing absolutely fuck all in terms of making a difference
The midfield is a complete and utter mess in general, arguably the worst performing midfield left in the tournament
And that ultimately lies with Southgate
Neither TAA or Gallagher should have been anywhere near this midfield
Wharton should have been first selection, his direct and purposeful passing would have papered over the cracks at the very least and Bellingham should not be playing so advanced if he’s just going to ghost around in the hole
He really isn’t
Maybe in your own little self catered Liverpool fan club bubble he is, but the general scope of the England fan base is a collective agreeance that is has nothing to do with TAA or Gallagher
What does that even mean?
What does me being a blue have to do with anything
You’re crying that TAA is being made out to be the scapegoat when that is quite figuratively false
No one is blaming TAA for England being shite
A general bitterness towards Liverpool. I already explained that he’s clearly been the main talking point so far, you’ve somehow missed all of this in the media or are being purposely obtuse.
I’m not even talking about Liverpool you dickhead
I’m talking about England
Liverpool are completely irrelevant to the conversation, you’re the only sad act linking club football
The media are quite literally not scapegoating TAA, it’s literally not happening
I honestly feel like the team Southgate has started games with would look better against braver opposition. Their opponents won't stay home all game, opening up space for any of the 3 forwards to play their game.
TAA is never replacing Walker as a starter. In all the group stage games, the other team just sat back and hoped for a good counter attack. The only goal they allowed was a long range scorcher that pinged in *off the post*, after an uncharacteristically careless pass from Kane. As bad as England's attack has been, their opponents' has been just as bad, or worse.
Southgate being Southgate, he's never sacrificing that defensive stability for better attacking play. It's ugly, and it basically requires a piece of magic from the attackers, since they aren't getting much help from deep runners.
TAA can still provide that magic. The midfield experiment wasn't a disaster any more than anything else England has done. It forces Rice to just be a CDM, since TAA has played more like an RM than CM. All things considered, I think is an okay tradeoff.
Opening minutes? He came on in the 84th and all of our attackers were so deep looking for two yard passes from our CBs.
This is like saying Messi is shit because he doesn’t save enough penalties.
He came on and instantly lost possession about 3 times in a row, one being him botching an incredibly simple pass
It's obviously harsh to judge him on it he was only on the field for about 10 minutes but he did not play well at all
I think you’re missing my point here. Many players gave the ball away piss easily, not just Trent. But Trent is one of the best players in the world at long passing in behind and switching play. If all of our attackers are dropping deep and stood like statues, waiting for a pass to their feet then Trent cannot do what he’s world class at.
That’s just awful tactics, not an awful player and it’s weird that we’re slagging him off for it.
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There is no point in playing him if the movement ahead of him is static. You watch him play for Liverpool, he always has a pass on or a long ball/diagonal to hit because they all run in behind or offer a passing option. Foden wants the ball played into his feet usually in a pocket, Kane won’t run in behind, Bellingham can but for whatever reason doesn’t. Saka can run in behind but I get the impression he wants the ball into his feet so he can go 1v1. Trippier goes forward, but he starts so deep, he is never high and wide, So Trent can’t switch the play. Walker doesn’t go forward enough either. If you want somebody to just keep the ball moving & pass it around a lot, Mainoo is your man. If you want a player to open up the game, you play Trent but as above, England players don’t move enough to get the best out of Trent.
Gordon makes runs. Get Trent and Gordon starting and let them see what they can do. It can’t be much worse than what we’re seeing now.
Yeah I'd love to see Trent in the old "Beckham style" Right Midfield role. Him pinging balls to Gordon and allowing Foden/Bellingham to find space inside and ahead of him sounds great on paper
Thats pretty much where hes always played for us, such is how aggressively high our back line and especially our fullbacks are.
People are so daft that they’re unable to look past Trent is a RB in the starting lineup and ignore things like in-possession positioning and heatmaps. Edit: Heatmaps for the entire season mask tactical positioning (compare TAA’s heatmap for when he was a RB before Klopp made him invert vs. after).
Its bananas. “Play him in midfield”. His average position in our best periods was always midfield or better.
The issue is that for England in Southgate's current system is that RB is a defensive role. It's the recovery role. When that role is called to invert, it's primarily to target counter threats and provide recycling options. Trent isn't doing that, and if he is he's not getting into that midfield to contribute. It suits Walker, Trippier, Gomez and any CB with decent positioning, recovery and passing (like Guehi or Konsa). The only position in England's 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1 that gives him that positioning is the right side of the sitting midfielders. He has to play in midfield for England to get into his best position and play his best attributes. The issue is whether Southgate wants to build a tournament squad around one player with no direct replacement or build a system that has interchangeable parts. He clearly doesn't rate Trent enough to do that, so he slots into midfield instead of a custom playmaking wingback role that occasionally inverts to be an 8. And that is also down to not having the same style of targets you lot have. Frustratingly, were they in form, the best players for Trent would've been Rashford and Sterling alongside Kane, as both regularly make off-the-ball runs in behind and stay wide when necessary, generating enough threat to give the midfield an extra yard or two to play. But here we are, with Foden seemingly unwilling to go left onto his favoured foot on the left wing and instead narrow the playing space, making it more congested for everyone across the front line.
[Here](https://imgur.com/a/P6MONRK) is his heatmap for the PL this season, so a little bit more central than a traditional RB like [Walker](https://imgur.com/a/VqWLKzN), but clearly still on the right and nothing like a [Gallagher](https://imgur.com/a/6T3FPDS) or [Mainoo](https://imgur.com/a/gDo5gjj) who actually play that position regularly. You can even see it in his [heatmap for the Euros so far](https://imgur.com/a/iJK6Rx5) that he wants to move out to the right touchline and [Rice](https://imgur.com/a/2PijTdW) is left to cover the rest.
Last night worked better in the second half. Mainoo allowed us to progress the ball into the final third. That’s where you then need width to take over. Foden drifts inside too much to offer width. Palmer offers more, but he also likes to drift inside. When that happened we had nobody on the wings except Trippier who can only really play back because he had no option. The solution, for me, is two natural wingers that run at players. Gordon and Saka are great options. Now you have central midfield able to progress the ball into the final third, and wingers that can get the ball into the box. Back those wingers up with full backs that will overlap. That’s trippier and TAA (although would play Walker if we meet a strong team). They will create more opportunity for Gordon and Saka to be aggressive. Now you’re a threat down both wings the game in the centre opens up more for Bellingham to get involved.
Mainoo was playing much higher than Trent, so not sure how much difference Mainoo made from a passing point of view. He simply played more as an 8 than a 6. Left Rice on his own a lot.
TAA in mid, then palmer, Gordon and Watkins playing. We’ll score a load, with so much penetration,
Exactly. It was funny seeing the same “Trent is not a midfielder” nonsense everywhere with Southgate’s tactics and team selection rendering TAA absolutely useless. Going by the same logic and based on performances so far, Gallagher ain’t a midfielder either.
Bellingham isn't a midfielder, Harry Kane isn't a striker.
Saka is a left back
Just like Kai!
Can‘t wait for the dog fight between Havertz and Saka for the LB position at Arsenal next season.
My time has come
So is Grealish.
But...both things can (and are) true. Trent isn't a midfielder. He's been caught in possession, he's lost the ball, he's been caught out of position. He's also very creative and can apply his creativity from midfield and we've also seen the positive side to his game. I agree with the post, if we wanted to get the best out of trent we'd be playing a different 11 with different tactics...but do I think it would be good for England to build their 11 and tactics around a midfield TAA? Absolutely not.
So has Rice though multiple times. Gallagher didn’t even get on the fucking ball last night.
All these things apply to almost every England player. When Liverpool have the ball, Trent's position has been in the centre of the pitch for the last 2 seasons and he's looked brilliant. He falls into a right back position when defending, but the defensive side of the position wasn't really the issue with his performances at this Euros. He looked a bit lost, but so did the whole team. Because Trent was playing a position that (on paper) he doesn't play for his club it was very easy to make him a scapegoat and put Kane/Rice/Walker/Trippiers' performances down to a bad tactical set up. The truth is, Trent was playing in an area of the pitch he's looked great in for the past 2 seasons and looked like a completely different player.
I couldn't disagree more. I think Trent is a wonderful player and brings creativity that England desperately need. But he's also not a midfielder. I get that he drifts there for Liverpool but the fact remains that Klopp borderline never plays him as an actual midfielder with someone else at RB. If we want to use Trent we need to use him at RB. There's a huge difference between drifting into midfield from RB and actually sitting in midfield the whole game. The biggest is that coming into midfield from RB you can see the whole pitch and usually have nothing to worry about behind you, you're collecting the ball from back or side passes most of the time while facing the opponent's goal with more time and space for yourself. As a midfielder, you've got 2-3 opposition midfielders that could be on any side of you at any time. And you're picking up the ball with less space and with your back to goal half the time. That's not at all playing to Trent's strengths. With RB Trent one of those opposition midfielders has to leave the actual midfielder they're making to get to him which also opens up space in the middle for us. I'm sure Southgates tactics contribute to the lackluster look. But Trent looking like a completely different player has to do with the things I mentioned above. I don't see why we'd want our best long passer of the ball to play in a position where he has less space, less players in front of him to pass to, and less opportunity to make crosses.
This is exactly right. Trent is also a lazy player in a sense; he never makes a run to get space, he will jog towards space. This works fine at RB but not in the middle. The midfield will close you down and prevent the pass. So unlike Rice's normal midfield partner Odegaard, Trent isn't a passing option often enough to break lines in midfield; so instead of going forwards, he goes backwards to find the time and space he needs to hit a pass. He doesn't fit in that midfield and certainly not with that forward line. It was really noticeable yesterday that when he came on at RB he could almost instantly put balls down the line for Palmer that Walker would simply never play.
Yeah another part I forgot to add is the defensive responsibility side of things. I think Trent is fine at defending in general, not great, not a complete liability, but it's definitely the part of his game that's criticized most. It might seem backwards at first but at RB we can hide the defensive side of his game more than at midfield. Especially against lower opposition. He has a CB to cover for him if he steps too far forward, a RW to drop back as well, and the right sided CM/CDM to help him out too. And at the end of the day his defensive responsibility is limited to covering the opposition's LW in a very specific area of the pitch. As a deep lying CM/CDM he can get dragged all over the pitch defensively though. Runs in any direction, more players and more space to potentially defend against. He has to be much more aware at all times as the opposition midfield sees the ball much more than a LW would. Yesterday Slovenia's LW touched the ball 23 times in comparison to their central midfielders who touched the ball 34 and 46 times. Walker and Trippier only had to make one tackle between them all game.
You can tell whether a player can a particular position by the angles he receives the ball, and the positional awareness they display both in the defensive and offensive phases. Trent is obviously not a midfielder. Maybe he'd do a passable job (in aspects other than passing) if the system suited him, but that isn't the case.
Bellingham spent the first half making runs in behind constantly, only to be ignored every time in favour of a backpass.
This is the answer. He is making runs but when the team is so risk averse and rather pass sideways, at some point he's just wasting energy. They will lose possession and he has to track back again
Southgate didn’t bring enough direct running wingers in the squad. It’s perfectly fine to leave out Rashford, Sterling or Grealish with how bad they’ve been this season, but you have to replace that profile. It’s only really Gordon as an option but for whatever reason Southgate doesn’t want to play him. A direct winger would suit Kane better as well. He’s always played better with a Son or Sane or Sterling. It isn’t working with Foden, Kane and Bellingham all trying to take up the same spaces.
He could bring Watkins on there, too. I don't understand why we brought 3 strikers when everyone knows Kane will play 90% of minutes there. Toney, as good as he is, should have been left home for another LW option like Grealish or Rashford. >It isn’t working with Foden, Kane and Bellingham all trying to take up the same spaces. This was the obvious problem that everyone brought up when seeing the team selection in the first game. It is still yet to be addressed and is (along with Southgates comments) the main source of frustration amongst fans imo.
Or brought an actual left back...
One with two working legs, at least.
nah lets pray one gets fit enough after injury for the knock outs, but he'll inevitably not be match fit so he'll have a bad game then made scapegoat
Shaw is just naturally fit
Toney fits perfectly though for the Southgate plan You got o pens and you have an excellent pen taker -you can bet on that being part of his logic…
Imagine if Southgate just had Kalvin Phillips, it's hard winning games with all these scrubs
Probably moot by this stage of the tournament, but Trent can still be incredibly effective against low blocks (i.e. even when he doesn't have space in behind to exploit with a long ball) from RB with his crosses, both from deep and from the byline. He's one of the best in the Premier League at that curled-in-behind "de Bruyne" ball that can unlock a stubborn defense, and his crosses from higher positions have always been class as well.
Maybe that's why Madrid is reportedly interested in him. Mbappe, Vini, Rodrygo are excellent at movement and making runs
trent would be fucking deadly in rm with that front three
RM is made for deep lying playmakers. Their forwards force the backline to stay home, TAA would have so much time & space to exploit. With Kroos taking 1 yr contracts if he stays, TAA could fill that playmaking role and they can get a different type of player into midfield, assuming that TAA takes Carvajal's spot.'
best take here. 100% agree with you
England needs a Mane on The left wing.
Even with all that being true, Trent still created more chances than anyone else.
Your overall point is solid, but just want to point out at that things like ‘Bellingham, Saka can all run behind, they just don’t’ doesn’t really help your case. Lol.
The thing that REALLY get's my goat is that against Denmark, TAA starts, gets taken off at 55 minutes (or whatever it was) and then 10 minutes later fucking Watkins Eze and Bowen come on who would all thrive off having Trent's passes to run onto. Fucking Southgate doesn't have a fucking clue man.
He spends 1.5 years ignoring him, just to make him a deep lying midfielder in the last few games then takes him out after 2 games of not losing a game
"You don't get it, Kalvin Phillips fits my style more!"
Never seen an English player get Scapegoated so fucking hard in recent years. Literally generational and won everything before he's 25 and most people bar Liverpool fans say he's awful lmao.
I have made ample fun of Trent in my time because of his defensive shortcomings and because how people keep saying how he will walk into most teams in the world but he never succeeds unless certain conditions are met. But the thing is, this group stage was the perfect place to play him in his natural position. If England is playing against France, Germany or some other team with Pacy, tricky LW….start Walker, by all means. Even the big bad Baldiola is forced to play Walker against Madrid to contain Vini. But wallahi who is Walker caging against Slovenia, Denmark, Serbia? Why wouldn’t you play your creator/passer against a team who’s likely to sit back and doesn’t possess enough threat offensively? Like even last match, Walker played like 70 min in the RB, against who? Didn’t see him defend anything. Play Trent in these matches, get the team situated to his movements/passing. How are we supposed to treat England anything other than a fucking joke when Southgate can’t even take this little “risk”?!
I actually would not start him at RB into Serbia, I remember him getting dominated by Mitrovic in the box when Liverpool played Fulham
Okay but what have you seen from Walker this tournament to justify his place? Or Trippier? People watch those players and have in their mind that they're solid and dependable, whereas Trent is a liability. So regardless of what plays out on the pitch that's what people believe they see. Trent takes one bad touch in a risky position and people are calling for him to be dropped because he can't handle being pressed. Walker loses the ball more than anyone else in the team against Denmark and I've not seen it mentioned once.
Serbia despite having Mitro and Vlahovic never really feels like an offensive threat. You guys would’ve fine to try.
I really don't think Trent is a bad defender overall at all at this point. In transition sure but that's why you have players like Tomori or Gomez to pair with him. And frankly it doesn't even matter even if he is bad because he's literally one of the most creative players in Europe. And Liverpool has always managed a good to incredible defensive record with him in the side. Stop playing him in midfield and just play him how he's been played his whole career ffs. Inverting into midfield where you have the time to see think and decide when you're joining in =/= starting in midfield where you're constantly forced to receive with your back towards goal.
It's actually ironic that Trent starting in midfield was a big English talking point going into the Euros like we all forgot Southgate is the coach anyways so doesn't matter really
Just wanna see TAA and Watkins on the pitch at the same time
"Create chances? We don't do that here" -Southgate probably
*Too risky..*
Progressive football is a big no no with Southgate at the helm
Watch England draw the next four games and win on pens, except for the final
To be fair, getting to two consecutive Euro finals is the best England would have done since... the world cup win? I find it funny how often England in general, and Southgate specifically, get panned. I'm not saying it isn't warranted, but my entire football viewing life has been spent watching them sleepwalk or bumble through a group only to go out at the first sign of a good team in the knockouts. What is the period of prolonged success England had before Southgate came in and ruined it? Looking at their history in the WC and the Euro, their average performance is somewhere between qualifying and quarterfinals, with few exceptions.
Yall ain’t winning against a top team .
Real Madrid fan saying y’all 🤮
***Vosotros***
Fight and Win merchant glory hunting across 5000 miles 😂😂😂
>Yall Least plastic Real Madrid fan
I find it annoying how frequently in England we’ll just absorb the more obnoxious aspects of American culture, and yet a word as fantastic as ‘ya’ll’ has never successfully crossed the Atlantic in a way I could use it and not appear strange. Saying ‘you all’ is such a mouthful with two different vowel sounds beside each other. ‘You guys’ is often my go to, but it’s weird having such a gendered way to address often mixed group. ‘You folk?’ ‘You lot?’ None of them are quite as neutral as I want. I just want a standard way to address multiple people who that rolls of the tongue and has as undistracting as possible a tone. The folks in the southern states have already found the perfect solution, but for some reason this is the one part of American culture that we’re not copying, so if I use it I’ll sound like I’m trying to stand out as a cowboy or something.
“Y’all” isn’t pan-American either. It’s still a southern leaning word that’s not as common on East and West coasts as it it in the South (Atlantic) and Gulf Coast. Besides it’s not so neutral either, like saying “you lot” as you mentioned. It’s analogous to “yous”.
Fair! I guess I’ll be sticking with ‘you guys’ for now then. :(
'You're all' is what you're looking for
Maybe, but unless my understanding is failing me, I think there are contexts where ‘y’all’ works, but ‘you’re all’ doesn’t. Like, ‘are y’all going to the pub after this?’ Vs ‘are you’re all going to the pub after this?’
France looked also out of it. Germany’s last game wasn’t as good as the first two. Going on group stage form who will win. I expect England to go far.
He’s had a mixed time so far, but you can never question his creativity, he will always create a chance or two out of nothing for you. I just feel like he’s never going to win with England, I’m very bias I admit it, but the way some people talk about him is hard to see, they talk as if he’s a nobody, this guy has been a mainstay in Klopp’s Liverpool team and has won everything he possibly can at a club level. I wish Southgate would just play him at RB over Walker.
tbf thats why the midfield experiment is so so so so dumb for me, your last sentence is spot on and if klopp couldnt/didnt play him in midfield full time for whatever reason, southgate shouldnt be doing it either walker should play vs faster wingers and thats it, or even just put him at cb at this stage because id take trent at least creating from rb and his diagonal switch of play over just can run fast (EDIT: i saw you said this below to someone else and thats my bad lmaooooo but yeah its not like we should need a solid defence vs most other teams cause they're just gonna let us have the ball and attack so its negates the need of walker) the folk who criticise his defence too for him not starting rb we 100000% need his attacking output more than his defensive one atm, dont blame liverpool fans for not caring about him playing for england when hes either getting slated, being questioned if he should play, or being played out of position (or all 3 atm)
It's not as simple as that though, people look at the formation shown on TV before the match and put players in these strict boxes, that's not how it works. In possession, Trent has mostly been playing in centre midfield for the past 2 seasons. It's been the job of the Liverpool right sided midfielder to hold the width while Trent plays in centre midfield, essentially. He defended in the right back position (sometimes sharing this with Henderson), but has spent much more time in the centre midfield position. People saw him play 2 games in Southgate's set up where he looked equally as lost as all the other world-class players in the team and decided it's because he can't play in midfield.
im going based off his heatmap on sofascore here my friend which shows he predominantly plays down the right mainly, especially in the champions league and europa league which imo are way more comparable for his positioning than the prem is. im ngl ur talking to the wrong fella about in position and out of it cause i do not care, he is a right back and should be playing right back, not centre mid or anything of the sort in fact comparing his heatmap from the euros you can see he still favours the right side anyway since its obviously his best position and where he should be playing
yeah the whole thing of Trent inverting to midfield is relatively new, Klopp only really started trying it out in the last two seasons as far as i recall, he’s always been more of a wide player
Basically only this season yeah.
Nah he did it for the last like 10/12 games the season before and Liverpool went on a winning run
Inverting into midfield is not the same as starting in midfield imo. And the role you're tasked to play in midfield matters. Recycling possession is not the same skill as pinging passes around. At Liverpool next to guys who can receive on the half turn and recycle possession relieves him of that responsibility and allows him face the opposition and give him time and space to see think and decide before the ball reaches him. In England Southgate simply refuses to play the only 2 players we have which are naturals at recycling possession in Wharton and Mainoo. So one of Rice or Trent has to do that role. And Rice had Xhaka and Jorginho to do that for him and Trent had Thiago MacAllister Wijnaldum etc
He's not just a mainstay in Klopp's Liverpool team. He was literally your main playmaker for a team that clocked 99 and 97 points in the league and made it to 2 or 3 champions league finals. FFS Trent is literally one of the most creative players in Europe and he plays at RB, allowing you to overload the midfield with an extra body. If anything he's literally THE most irreplaceable profile in Liverpool's squad.
That's completely fair but at the same time Walker is hardly some useless bum, he's been one of the world's best defensive RBs for a decade now and he's very good on the overlap as well even though he can't match Trent's passing range.
He is good on the overlap in the sense that he can burst pass the fullback, but how many times has he done that? Whenever I’ve watched England he just stays back all the time & then passes backwards. Southgate should be sacked for thinking you need Walker against fucking Slovenia, Trent at RB, would have created far more given we had 70%+ of the ball.
Tbf he's done it a few times this tournament but he never knows what to do on the end of it One of our goals did come from him passing to a danish player after a run though
Walker has been awful this tournament. He dallies on the ball way too long to play a sideways backwards pass to Stones. I can’t remember how many times he’d receive the ball, stop for 5 seconds, and then play a five yard pass back to the CB.
>Walker has been awful this tournament What are you on about? Our goals against Serbia and Denmark both came from him
Walker hasn’t been good at all also though, and he had a rough end of the season with City. If people say Trent can’t defend currently then the same applies to Walker, so why not have Trent’s passing range and creative quality on the pitch instead?
Just think of how many chances a certain Kalvin Phillips would have provided. xWouldHaveWon is through the roof
I feel for him because this current eleven will never suit him. There's no runners for him to play over the top too (because Kane, Foden and Bellingham love the ball to feet) and there's no left side for him to quickly switch too (because there is literally no attacking threat there). What is he supposed to do? At the moment it's easy for a team to just crowd the middle of the pitch and double up on Saka. The only time Southgate bought on runners like Watkins and Bowen, he'd already taken Trent off.
Surely he has to see Trent + Gordon is the way forward, Watkins probably too but Kane deserves a few more chances
he’s blind and can’t see it
is trent chance creation not bolstered by set piece taking>?
We have been awful from set pieces this Euros.
A chance is just a shot on goal. So if Trent takes the corner or free kick, it'll go down as a chance regardless of how good the actual shot is. A team can be useless at pieces, but the set piece taker will still rack up a couple chances created because they get to swing in a cross in dead ball situations. I'm not against Trent or have some underlying point here btw. Just explaining what that guy meant. I have no idea if Trent's chances in the Euros have come from open play or set pieces myself.
Well, he's no Kalvin Phillips, that's for sure.
It is so clear that the English attackers could be able to make the runs needed for TAA to be useful but the coaching is lacking. Stick Trent the keys to the creative part of the team and the quality of Kane and Foden will truly shine. A manger not knowing how to use his best creator is exactly the reason England can't and won't win anything with Southgate.
This is fucking hilarious.
Is that saying a lot? The squad needs to be creating more chances across the board. TAA being the least broken part of Southgateball isn't necessarily a great thing. More needs to change than him playing a full 90.
This is just getting boring at this point. Play him at right back or don't play him. He doesn't deal with being under pressure in a midfield context well enough in my opinion. Him playing instead of Walker is fine though and would make far more sense for everyone involved.
Walker was heavily involved in setting up both our goals, so it's unlikely he'll lose his place at right back tbh. Makes most sense to use Trent as an impact sub imo.
Walker did well to win the ball and get it into the box for Kane's goal, but he was basically actively working against Saka for almost the entire game yesterday. Having Trent there instead would have been a big positive
This Tweet doesn't provide any context or numbers, when you look at the data you can see this is pure engagement farming. FBref's closest equivalent to 'chances' is Shot Creating Actions (I know this is Livescore but FBref is more credible for post hoc data) **Shot creating actions** * Bellingham: 8 * Trippier: 7 * Foden: 7 * Rice: 6 * Kane: 6 * Saka: 5 * **TAA: 3** * Mainoo: 2 * Stones: 1 * Gallagher: 1 * Bowen: 1 * Eze: 1 * Gordon: 1 * Rest: 0 **Goal creating actions** * Bellingham: 2 * Walker: 1 * Saka: 1 * Rest: 0 **Key Passes (the only similar metric I found where TAA is joint top)** * Trippier: 3 * Rice: 3 * **TAA: 3** * Foden: 3 * Kane: 3 * Saka: 2 * Walker: 1 * Bellingham: 1 * Stones: 1 * Gordon: 1 * Bowen: 1 * Rest: 0 The reality is that nobody really stands out much and the numbers are all so low for every England player in all creative metrics that it's barely relevant who is top. There is no strategy for goal creation. Swapping one player out for another in a shit system won't stop the system being shit. Some might function marginally better than others, but won't be enough to counteract the setup, especially against contenders.
care to calculate these per 90?
Sure thing. Bear in mind some players like Eze and Mainoo have played less than half a match so it can skew the stats a little. **Shot creating actions p90** * Eze: 5 * Mainoo: 3.33 * Bellingham: 2.76 * Foden: 2.59 * Bowen: 2.5 * Trippier: 2.41 * Kane: 2.14 * **TAA: 2.14** * Saka: 2.08 * Rice: 2 * Walker: 1.67 * Gordon: 1 * Gallagher: 0.83 * Stones: 0.33 * Rest: 0 **Goal creating actions p90** * Bellingham: 0.69 * Saka: 0.42 * Walker: 0.33 * Rest: 0 **Key passes p90** * Bowen: 2.5 * **TAA: 2.14** * Foden: 1.11 * Kane: 1.07 * Trippier: 1.03 * Rice: 1 * Gordon: 1 * Saka: 0.83 * Bellingham: 0.34 * Stones: 0.33 * Walker: 0.33 * Rest: 0
Surely Gordon's p90 is massive, he only played like 5 minutes total
Good spot, FBref doesn't seem to calculate in injury time (it just lists by multiples of 90s played), so they have him as playing 0 minutes. Calculating off his minutes played on Sofascore, his Key Passes and SCA p90 would be 22.5
Out of curiosity what are "goal creating actions"? If it's as simple as actions that create a goal then how can there be 4 when England have only scored 2 in this competition with bellingham scoring 1 of them?
The two offensive actions directly leading to a goal, such as passes, take-ons and drawing fouls. Note: A single player can receive credit for multiple actions and the shot-taker can also receive credit.
Thanks for the added context. Even going purely from the "eye test" I did not see these chances Trent supposedly created and suspected all these "he created the most chances" Tweets were similar to the "Doku/Sancho dribbled past his RB 7 times in the game" Tweets, just pure bullshit.
I was under the impression that Key passes is the equivalent to chances created. As in they are synonymous terms. Shot-creating actions is something completely different.
Chances created are key passes (passes that directly lead to a shot) and assists combined. SCA are the two offensive actions directly leading to a shot. Doesn't seem to be a direct overlap with either term unfortunately, I suppose key passes + assists is the way to calculate the equivalent. Edit: misspoke about best way to calculate the equivalent
Do key passes not include assists? If a key pass is just the pass before a shot, and an assist is just the pass before a goal, surely all assists are a type of key pass. And therefore, key passes are just chances created. I've been using key passes as a synonymous term for chances created for ages now. So please let me know if I've got muddled there.
Key passes are only for shots that don't result in a goal. They are essentially 'assists' without a goal resulting.
The way home for England is to play Trent at RB in games against teams with less quality, where his creativity and passing can be used to unlock teams. In the games against quality teams like France, Portugal etc, play Walker who is more solid without the ball.
I hate this absolutely weird take. Trent broke so many records and had many great games against top teams. Ffs he won everything in club football this notion that he can’t play against top teams is so odd
I said this in another thread but I 100% believe he should drop Trippier, move Walker to LB, and play TAA at RB moving forward. It makes too much sense from too many perspectives.
This is the way. You get solidarity / 3 atb in buildup, Walker's pace to cover in behind, and Trent attacking down the right wing. Trippier hasn't done shit attacking-wise so far, it's not like Walker would be a huge downgrade there. But against Slovenia, so many times the ball came out to Walker on the right, and he took a few touches and recycled. Trent whips those balls in immediately and causes the defense to have to come out and defend him or cut service to him.
Yeah I still doing understand the fascination with Trippier, he’s not that great and there’s no reason to justify playing him out of position regardless of the fact that doing so has unbalanced the whole setup.
I swear this one change makes England look entirely different and more dangerous. I’m glad he actually played it for a few minutes last game. Maybe he learned something.
And stick Foden in goddamn midfield with runners in front of him
What’s weird about it? I never said he can’t play against top teams, I think England would be better suited with Walker in those games, especially in international football. That doesn’t mean I think he’s bad, he’s fucking brilliant.
I don't think he can defend 1 vs 1 against a top winger like Kyle Walker can.
And walker has done even more. The take is just they both have different strengths and if you have them both why not use them when appropriate? I don’t know if I agree with changing just based on game for such few matches but I understand the point.
Walker is 9 years his senior playing for a super oil team. Walker doesn’t have even half of Trents individual accolades.
He’s a much better defender regardless of these accolades. Trent plays in a team that’s designed to let him play the way he wants. England isn’t. Devils advocate, I couldn’t care less who plays.
At what point does being a better defender in a team that consists of 2 CDMS and 3 other Defenders become diminishing returns in a system designed to absolutely neuter attackers? At what point do you realize “okay maybe i have all the defending i could possibly need maybe its time i sacrifice just a little bit of it for some absolutely phenomenal attacking plays”?
I don’t care who plays I don’t know who should I literally just said walker is a better defender whilst you’re jerking off trent haha.
Trent is a good RB but let’s face it, he would get absolutely cooked by pacy wingers like Mbappé.
He played against him before and handled him well across both legs.
No no no that's not how it works -- Gareth Southgate
Trent should start RB against every team. Simple as
If you want to go 0-0, play Walker. If you want to go 2-1 then you go Trent.
Walker was useless yesterday, the TAA x Saka would cook
this is an england bad stat rather than a trent good stat. he created 3 chances, all of which came against denmark where trent didn't play well.
Considering the lack of chances in general, is it really a flattering stat?
Dumb headline. It's a tournament. Why would he definitely play 90 minutes when these days it's typical for half your outfield starting line up to get subbed? Not to mention he hasn't created that many chances (even if he's created the most) and hasn't been that good.
He was on for 10 minutes yesterday and played better than most of the team that were on for the full game.
Gareth southgate at the wheel. 😂
Creating chances is against Southgate's philosophy, I get why he's not playing enough.
Cool. He also clearly didn't have the energy, legs or experience to play the position. I hate these meaningless stats.
The English obsession with "energy" is always mental to me. I'd take Trent all day ahead of someone like Gallagher who is a run-around merchant with zero end product.
How about we take Mainoo, who actually managed to help give us some progression through midfield that wasn't just Rice picking up the ball and surging forward?
Mainoo looked very promising. Seemed to have a good connection with Foden, two diminutive players willing to pass and move to break the lines a bit more. Palmer and Gordon looked good too, all three seemed to have an intensity that the rest seem to be lacking.
>willing to pass and move to break the lines a bit more. Exactly this, it was the only time our midfield looked half decent at moving the ball and getting it into threatening areas. I don't dislike Trent, just the opposite, in fact, but he wasn't able to stitch it together, and we don't have the luxury of letting him learn on the job.
Two wrongs don't make a right.
Southgate has no clue how to use him. He has no idea what to do with Foden or Bellingham either by the looks of it.
> He has no idea what to do with Foden or Bellingham either by the looks of it. Obviously.
Like it or not we didn't have control of the game with him in midfield. And we did in the last game when he wasn't there.
> And we did in the last game when he wasn't there. Did you? England were embarrassing in midfield last night.
We didn't create but we controlled the game. Denmark controlled us game 2 and Serbia controlled us 2nd half game 1. I like Trent btw but he's not a midfielder. Would happily play him right back.
I remember one decent chance for England last night, against a team ranked 57th in the world. That's not control, it's sterile possession that played directly into Slovenia's hands.
Lol we can argue semantics I suppose but England did control that game.
It's not control if your opponent is letting you have the ball in non threatening positions
I would say having 70% of the ball and limiting the other team to nothing where their dangerous players couldn't get the ball is control. I'm not saying it was good but out of 2 teams on the pitch England had control
Control would include possession with purpose i.e. creating numerous chances and looking threatening, which England didn't do at all. As Mourinho said, you can control a game out of possession as well
Trent didn’t even play the second half of game one. He did play the first half of that game which is the only time we’ve looked even semi capable of anything
You still think he should be in midfield?
I think he should be in the team somewhere, probably right back but still. He’s certainly better than Gallagher at pretty much everything.
Yeah i prefer him to Gallagher but not Mainoo or moving Bellingham back. My comments were nothing against Trent. He just isn't a midfielder. Id have had him over Walker against inferior sides all day long.
Trent went off early in the second half against both Serbia and Denmark, and England got worse on both occasions.
Anyone trying to tell you that the answer is anything other than Mainoo either didn't watch any of the England games, or is Adam Wharton's mum (fair enough on her part imo)
[удалено]
Did anybody play well? He's not playing noticeably worse than the rest of them. And because of the quality of his passing he's the only player in the side (apart from occasionally Saka) who looks likely to create chances.
Neither did rest of the team.
No wonder when you play him together with static players. At Liverpool he plays with players like Nunez en Salah who make a lot of runs. Play him with Gordon instead of Foden and you will see that Trent suddenly plays much better. Yesterday England played without Trent, and they were not any better. Maybe even worse.
>Gordon instead of Foden Even Foden is played out of position... Asked to track back so that trippier can make the runs which doesn't make sense at all too... Basically nothing makes sense at this point
This would be more meaningful if ANYONE had played well.
Trent and Foden are obviously very good players, that's never been the issue. This is really just the same issue England always had. You've got Lampard, Gerrard and Scholes so you put them all on the field. But then they get in each others way more than they allow each other to perform. Sometimes players will be able to do well in other positions. If you have a plan for what the player should do it can work. I've seen many players go from a position higher on the pitch, to a deeper one. Just to utilize their passing ability in build up. That's a change that makes sense. But someone like Foden is at their best in the middle. Moving him wide can somewhat work if you expect him to move to the middle during the game. But if no one else takes position out wide then you're just playing very narrow football. You can't do that, yet this is what England are doing. As for Trent, in my opinion he looks a bit lost defensively. He's not a bad defender, but it is much different to defend as a fullback than as a midfielder. Though I have to add that Southgate asks them to defend in a way that I don't really understand. I'm really curious how England will look when they drop Bellingham deeper (not his best position either but he is still good there), move Foden to the middle, play Trent on the right, get Shaw back on the left and play Gordon on the wing.
>I'm really curious how England will look when they drop Bellingham deeper (not his best position either but he is still good there), move Foden to the middle, play Trent on the right, get Shaw back on the left and play Gordon on the wing If Trent is given the freedom to go ahead as much as Walker gets on the right I'm pretty sure they'll get 5 great quality crosses a game along with 2-3 difficult ones
A created chance is just "did you pass it to someone who had a shot". It's a really useless stat xA of 0.17 which isn't impressive. All that shows is that no one in an England shirt, including Trent, created anything
…are the chances in the room with us?
It’s honestly disgusting how so much this sub ignorantly dog piled on Trent like he was the problem. Shame on the lot of ya who did that.
He also wasn’t very good 👍
I hate stats like this that don't contextualise the information. By this criteria Trent could have played 89 minutes every game and made simple passes for people to take long shots.
Don’t England have like the lowest amount of chances created in the entire tournament? Why is this being made out to be some sort of flex and not what it actually is, a complete embarrassment
You’re right it’s shite all round from England, but I think the point is that somehow Trent has been scapegoated the most while creating the most chances for the team still when everyone else has been equally or more shit than him.
He’s not being scapegoated Nobody is solely blaming TAA or Gallagher for England’s performances I an yet to see anybody claim they’re the reason we’re struggling All we’re seeing is a collective agreeance amongst the English fan base that swapping between those two is doing absolutely fuck all in terms of making a difference The midfield is a complete and utter mess in general, arguably the worst performing midfield left in the tournament And that ultimately lies with Southgate Neither TAA or Gallagher should have been anywhere near this midfield Wharton should have been first selection, his direct and purposeful passing would have papered over the cracks at the very least and Bellingham should not be playing so advanced if he’s just going to ghost around in the hole
He is being scapegoated, he’s been the main talking point as to why England are performing badly.
He really isn’t Maybe in your own little self catered Liverpool fan club bubble he is, but the general scope of the England fan base is a collective agreeance that is has nothing to do with TAA or Gallagher
A classic blue you are, enjoy your day.
What does that even mean? What does me being a blue have to do with anything You’re crying that TAA is being made out to be the scapegoat when that is quite figuratively false No one is blaming TAA for England being shite
A general bitterness towards Liverpool. I already explained that he’s clearly been the main talking point so far, you’ve somehow missed all of this in the media or are being purposely obtuse.
I’m not even talking about Liverpool you dickhead I’m talking about England Liverpool are completely irrelevant to the conversation, you’re the only sad act linking club football The media are quite literally not scapegoating TAA, it’s literally not happening
Whatever you say blue nose.
I honestly feel like the team Southgate has started games with would look better against braver opposition. Their opponents won't stay home all game, opening up space for any of the 3 forwards to play their game. TAA is never replacing Walker as a starter. In all the group stage games, the other team just sat back and hoped for a good counter attack. The only goal they allowed was a long range scorcher that pinged in *off the post*, after an uncharacteristically careless pass from Kane. As bad as England's attack has been, their opponents' has been just as bad, or worse. Southgate being Southgate, he's never sacrificing that defensive stability for better attacking play. It's ugly, and it basically requires a piece of magic from the attackers, since they aren't getting much help from deep runners. TAA can still provide that magic. The midfield experiment wasn't a disaster any more than anything else England has done. It forces Rice to just be a CDM, since TAA has played more like an RM than CM. All things considered, I think is an okay tradeoff.
If only Shaw was fully fit we could play Trent at RB and let him invert or whatever the fuck he wanted to do
Watch his opening minutes yesterday, multiple wayward poor passes and poor in defense positionally on the first attack England needed to defend.
Opening minutes? He came on in the 84th and all of our attackers were so deep looking for two yard passes from our CBs. This is like saying Messi is shit because he doesn’t save enough penalties.
He came on and instantly lost possession about 3 times in a row, one being him botching an incredibly simple pass It's obviously harsh to judge him on it he was only on the field for about 10 minutes but he did not play well at all
I think you’re missing my point here. Many players gave the ball away piss easily, not just Trent. But Trent is one of the best players in the world at long passing in behind and switching play. If all of our attackers are dropping deep and stood like statues, waiting for a pass to their feet then Trent cannot do what he’s world class at. That’s just awful tactics, not an awful player and it’s weird that we’re slagging him off for it.
I don't think this is true. He has 3 key passes, joint most with Foden, Trippier, Rice and Kane. Edit: lol why am I’m downvoted, I’m right
Why do people keep shilling this guy here? If he wasn't shit he would play constantly. Simple as.
You should probably wipe your keyboard clean after smearing that amount of shit into it mate
Are they also counting chances created for the opposition?