One Step too far for Southgate
England fans didn’t get the result they had dreamed of, but the England team captured the hearts of millions in a match that will be remembered for a long time, well for another four years at least.
When Luke Shaw opened the scoring after two minutes with his first goal for England Wembley and the nation erupted, even they didn’t see that one coming. For the first 30 minutes England dominated the ball, being pushed on by 60,000 at Wembley they couldn’t add to their lead.
Italy’s experience in the big international games was clear to see with Bonucci and Chiellini willing their team towards an equaliser which came just after the hour mark. Jordan Pickford pulled off another world class save to deny Veratti for the ball only to fall to the feet of Leonardo Bonucci to poke the ball in from 3 yards, making him the oldest scorer at 34 years and 71 days old to score in a European Championship Final. Wembley was stunned, and you had to feel that England’s best chance for a major tournament win was fading.
Once again Southgate left it late to allow his substitutes to make an impact. Saka was introduced at 70 minutes, Jordan Henderson followed 4 minutes later. With Mancini introducing Italy’s substitutes at regular intervals throughout it was easy to see where the game could have been lost.
Perhaps Southgate could have relied on his substitutes more over the senior players, Raheem Sterling struggled to impact a game that could have benefitted from the drive and ambition of younger players like Marcus Rashford or Jadon Sancho. Instead the two were introduced with penalties in mind. Harry Kane struggled too, but as England captain and with penalties on the horizon he was always likely to play the 120 minutes.
The biggest debate of the tournament has been whether or not to start Jack Grealish and when to introduce him. Nothing changed in the final, with him being introduced too late to impact the game well in to Extra Time.
Unsurprisingly, the Italian’s had five players booked, the stand out fouls had to be Chiellini’s pull back on Saka mirroring a rugby tackle. Jorginho is a lucky guy with his high tackle on Grealish surely resembling violent conduct and fans are still wondering why VAR didn’t at least have a look.
As the game went to extra time, England mounted one last push and had more possession than they had managed in the previous 60 minutes, but ultimately the game went the distance.
At this point, it’s a lottery we all knew that, but England’s record at penalties is clearly well documented and the Italian’s were surely favourites even taking into account the age of the England team. Southgate picked the five players according to what they had done in training, and it started so well with Kane and Maguire converting their penalties and with Pickford saving Belotti’s this could have been our time.
Well it just wasn’t meant to be but for players such as Saka, Sancho and Rashford to step up at such a young age is incredible, with the hopes of the nation on their shoulders, this surely won’t be the last time they appear in a major final for England.
From the highest of highs to the lowest of lows, plenty of positives can be taken from Euro 2020. The World Cup is 16 months away and where that will be a different tournament entirely, Gareth will clearly look to take the same group of players to Qatar. Players such as Luke Shaw, Kalvin Phillips, Bukayo Saka most likely wouldn’t have featured if the Euro’s hadn’t been postponed but these three along with the team have accomplished things nobody has in a generation.
The world will surely take note of what Southgate and his team have achieved.