It was rather good.
I’m increasingly starting to believe that the whole purpose of last night was to make the first team feel better about themselves. Shrood tactics if so.
My favourite bit is England fans saying ‘We’ll be back with our first team whilst apparently failing to note that Belgium left Hazard and De Bruyne on the bench :hehe:
Careful, our genius, foreign ex-manager was only just the other day waxing prophetic on Dier. I must say, I have never seen anything from the lad that makes me think he is anything other than average on his best days when played in the correct position.
I like Pickford, does some things very well and the things he doesn't seem very correctable. Dangerous game slating young keepers, they have a tendency to get better with age.
May we discuss goalkeepers in general, though?
I appreciate that I am very old, but back in my day, goalkeepers used to have this bizarre and amazing trick.
They used to catch the ball. Just like that. Come for a cross, catch the ball. Dive for a shot, catch the ball.
We used to laugh at foreign (scotch) goalies who did ridiculous things like punching the ball. Why would you want potentially to give the ball back to the opposition, when you can just catch it and have solid phase one possession?
I spend about 10% of my football watching screaming 'JUST CATCH THE FÚCKING BALL!' :shrug:
It was always a criticism of Pat Jennings - that he would sometimes save with his feet, meaning the ball went back into play rather than to safety. Of course he was also known for coming a catching crosses with one hand.
Shilton, Clemence, Corrigan - those boys knew how to catch a ball.
I think he is a talented lad, but I think it is quite justifiable to point out that a 30 million pound keeper who is England's No 1 has a massive flaw in his game regardless of his age. He did this countless times last season - in the first half of our game at Goodison alone he did it four times. It's quite a basic skill for a keeper, I don't understand why it hasn't been addressed