What are the problems with the England team and can they be solved? [I Love Real Football]

First of all, well done to Scotland, who played a good game and tested us in lots of ways which Croatia didn't. A test that we failed.

Its hard to see England as genuine tournament contenders based on the evidence so far. Despite a wealth of attacking talent, we have scored one goal in two games against average teams.

There is a lack of midfield fluidity, with slow passing and a lack of opinions. The long ball over the top to Sterling is effective but teams tend to suss it out early in a game.

There is also a lack of energy. England have only plated well in the first ten minutes of each half and fade after that. You can blame it on a congested fixture list: the amount of games played in Europe and the congested domestic schedule, but most of England's rivals have the same issue. Pogba and Mbappe don't play as of they are tired buy Harry Kane does. The latter has played the least games.

Kane has suffered due to lack of service but there is no getting around the fact that he himself has been poor. Rasford is not a central striker and Calvin-Lewis has nothing like the same quality so what do you do?

Maybe Southgate has overcompensated for a for defensive vulnerability by not placing enough emphasis on coaching the attack? We will get through to the next round but are we good enough to go deep in the contest?

Thoughts?

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MartinII · 70-79, M

To my mind the underlying problems are first a lack of collective drive and desire, and second a lack of individual initiative. One could write long essays trying to explain these things - too much football, too much money, too much (and/or poor) coaching, etc etc. Difficult to see how to change any of this in the middle of a tournament, but a few more imaginative managerial decisions might help. For example, it seemed absurd last night, psychologically as well as tactically, to bring Grealish on for Foden rather than for one of the deeper midfielders - unless of course England were really playing for a draw.

England might be lucky and get to the quarters, even possibly the semis, but I can’t see them as realistic winners. All that said, I’m old enough to remember (vaguely) the first two matches of the 1966 World Cup, when we were pretty dire!

Burnley123 · 41-45, M

@MartinII In tournament football, you can always win narrowly by luck. Portugal won the damn thing last time but nobody is gonna say that they were the best team in Europe. Also see Greece. In tournament football, the sample of games is tiny and anyone can have a good or bad day.

I agree that the psychology was wrong. It was obvious that Scotland were gonna raise their game against us but the team played as though they had a right to win.

I think we can turn it around and the one thing Southgate has done well is get us defensively solid. For these reasons, we can go further if we are lucky. But we should be better than this.

MartinII · 70-79, M

@Burnley123 Yes, especially in the Euros, and no doubt other regional tournaments, where there are usually only two or three really good sides. Most World Cup winners have been worthy winners, I think, though of course England needed quite a bit of help in 66.