In the Euro 2016the England team gained global significance after being deleted in a surprising way in the round of 16 against the debutant Iceland, which would fall in the quarterfinals against France (organizer). Today, eight years after that bitter memory, The Three Lions They stumbled over the same stone again, since They suffered a historic 1-0 defeat in the Wembley Stadium.
The last friendly prior to the participation of England In the continental competition organized by Germany, they faced a team that was very far from reaching the event. Everything suggested a comfortable farewell for the current European runners-up (they lost the final on penalties against Italy in 2021, also in Wembley), but the team led by Gareth Southgate he went away “booed” at halftime and at the end of the game, as confirmed by the British newspaper Daily Mirror.
The goal of Jón Dagur Thorsteinsson At 12 minutes he overtook the team trained by Age Hareide and Harry Kane missed an unusual goal against the rival goalkeeper around the half-hour mark, although the most worrying fact became clear after the final whistle, since the local team recorded a single shot on goal against four of its rivals. “Iceland really should have scored at least one more goal tonight“, stated the Daily Mail. The poor performance of one of the candidates for the crown concluded that a part of the public left before closing and the newspaper, The Sunwas lapidary on its cover: “The return of the ice age”.
The English morning newspaper was one of the hardest after the fall, as it assured that the host was “humiliated”, stated that there was a “horrible repetition” of the 2016 elimination and that the team leaves for Germany “persecuted” by the “ghost of the past”. This result “ridiculed” the ideas of a team that remains excited about winning the first European Championship in its history. “The defense is naive and unbalanced, the midfield lacked spark and the forwards completely lacked composure”, they analyzed.
It had been 56 years since England had lost the last match before a major international tournament, since the last time took place in the 1-0 defeat against Germany in 1968 in the run-up to that year’s European Championship. The data provided by the account specialized in English football statistics in Twitter, OptaJoepaints in full length how he arrives to face the matches against Serbia, Denmark and Slovenia for the Group C.
All this occurs a few hours after the communication of the 26 summoned to the continental event in a list that included many important absences such as Harry Maguiredue to injury; Jadon Sancho, Jack Grealish and Marcus Rashforddue to overabundance in offensive positions.
After the end of the match, coach Southgate declared: “It was a disjointed and disappointing performance, and we didn’t show enough character, but I think it’s good for us before an international tournament. I think we have to improve without the ball. I think there are many reasons for that, and in both games we probably didn’t have our full team.”
“I have participated in many of the last matches leading up to a tournament. Inevitably, players have one eye on what lies ahead in terms of initial challenges. There are no excuses for the result, but there are many things we can correct quickly”, he told about a possible caution that the protagonists could have had given the proximity of the debut scheduled for Sunday the 16th against the Serbs in Gelsenkirchen.
On the other hand, it deactivated the alarms around John Stoneswho had had a tough encounter with a rival and there was speculation of a serious injury due to his departure at halftime: “We think it’s probably okay, but we didn’t want to take any chances given what’s coming.”.
