Same same, but worse | 2026 FIFA World Cup

0:0033 days, 33 episodes, no off switch. From the goals and the glory to the politics and the problems of the World Cup, if you want soccer analysis from a podcast that's been over-analyzing the game for more than 20 years, then this is it. Join me, Max Rushton, and our expert team of soccer journalists every day of the tournament. Can England end 60 years of hurt, or will this be another year of falling just short? Probably. World Cup Daily, listen wherever you get your podcasts, or watch full episodes on YouTube.

0:28Luke Moore: Oh, it's happened again, everybody. Welcome to the Football Ramble. England crash out in extremely frustrating circumstances. It's Thursday, 16th of July. I'm Marcus Speller. I'm Luke Moore. And I'm Jim Campbell.

0:52Luke Moore: Ah! Yeah. Oh, it's a bad one. It is a bad one, gentlemen. It's us again, it's you again, and it's this again. It's a grueler. It's a tough one to take. It's England again. If only there was some way to have seen this coming from every tournament. Why, oh, why, Jim, did we not learn from a couple of the previous rounds? We have to go behind first. Yes, you're right. And then we at least get the glorious failure narrative. Oh, my goodness. Yeah, Argentina, obviously, but England 2-1. and this one really, really stings. 60 years of hurt, it'll go on and on. It's a big part of our national identity though, isn't it?

1:33Well, it is. It absolutely is. So we have to embrace it really. I'm not sure we'd know what to do with ourselves if we didn't have this moment. We'd have no real national identity as football fans.

1:41Luke Moore: I think it might be quite dangerous for the country. I think it might. Well, we'll never find out. Yeah, indeed, yeah. Yeah, where to begin? I mean, Argentina managed to get through the gas. I say manager, I think most people would probably agree that over the 90 or 101 minutes or whatever it was, they were probably the better side. Because England very much let them be the better side. Invited them to be, you might say. Yeah, so we'll go on, Jim. Some sort of general thoughts of the game before we start getting into it. So one of my major paranoias before any knockout game, club or country, is the old cliche of scoring too early.

2:18Luke Moore: especially against a team who you know are technically better than you in a lot of regards. And I suppose we can argue that about Argentina or not, but they've won the game and clearly we have an inferiority complex against them. And what I find so frustrating is that actually once we scored, it happened in microcosm. It shifted to that mentality of like, oh, God, we're lucky to be ahead here. So what we have to do now is compromise all of our attacking instincts and just try and just hide from football. and just get this over the line and just like we move on to the next game. We don't worry about how we play.

2:53Luke Moore: We just repel everything. And I just think it is a real symptom of how consistently in major tournaments, England massively overvalue a single goal as if you've got one goal and that is like some sort of get out of jail free card. Even the lyrics of Bindaloo say it. Yeah. We're going to score one more goal. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. Until you come back and score more than us. And what happens in that situation, if you go as defensive as England did, which we'll get into a bit more depth in a while, I'm sure, is that you put all your vindaloo in one bucket. Yeah, exactly. I mean, the thing I was boring everybody around me by repeating was, I don't know how the group of players that ended up on the pitch after those defensive substitutions are supposed to assert themselves in any sense whatsoever in an attacking regard.

3:46Luke Moore: because you know full well that there is a chance Argentina are going to score. They're not a team that you should give all that space to because you are literally inviting Enzo Fernandes to take pot shots. You're letting them choose who has the space and they're just going to let Messi stroll around and do what he wants with these two magic wands that he has for feet. So it invites absolute chaos. You know it's possible and yet you essentially kind of hobble yourself in having any real possibility of getting back into it if you need to. Mad. Luke, I'm sure you agree with that. I didn't see the game, so...

4:27Luke Moore: Lucky you. A bit embarrassing because I'm at work now. I probably should have watched it. To put a positive spin on it, mate. We've qualified for a crack at the bronze. So you missed a good game. Chance of a medal. Might get on the podium. Chance of a medal. Look, I agree broadly with a lot of what Jim said. I think that it's inconceivable that England feel like they can do that for such a long period of time and get through it, right? And I think, you know, to go back to Jim's points about substitutions and stuff, I mean, you know, England would have probably been hoping for it in the worst case scenario, getting to extra time.

5:05And what are you going to do with extra time? What are you going to do? It could have been embarrassing. So in one

5:10Luke Moore: way you got a little bit thankful that it didn't go to that stage because it's it's it could have been an awful lot worse i thought that they um it was either one it was one of two things that might have been a combination of both it was that they were rattled by how argentina approached it and right i just think we're always going to approach like that said it yesterday been saying it since the game was lined up we knew that we're going to do that the reason they're going to do that is because there's two reasons their pantomime villains is one and you can see their by the way they behaved before and after and all the shit they got up to during the game, that's fine, you've got a bit of rise above that.

5:44And England were rattled by that. Or, Tuchel thought, this worked against Mexico and it worked against Norway, I'm going to do it again. And the problem with that is, is that that's really the specific thing that Tuchel was hired to be an antidote to. I mean, totally, yeah. And so, when people got fed up of Southgate towards the end of the Euros, Tuchel comes in and he gives an interview actually ironically to Gabriel Clark on ITV and says and Gabriel Clark can ask him these pointed questions and basically gives him an opportunity to not shit all over Southgate but to basically criticise the shortcomings of what he felt like he had to fix right almost in the kind of way of like well I'm coming here to get this done because you couldn't do it and he said oh well the problem with England in tournaments is they're so terrified of going out they don't try to win right and the thing that's missing from England and you can go back and watch the interview now, I watched it this morning, is what are the things that are missing, Gabriel Clark says, and Thomas Tuchel says, excitement, excitement, excitement.

6:45Luke Moore: Yeah. Right. Tell me what was exciting about that last night. Well indeed. Tell me what was different about that last night. I would actually go as far as to say the way that England have exited last night is far worse than what Southgate ever did. It was. It was. And as a result, Tuchel should be under huge pressure because for his position, and I see some journalists, some respectable journalists by the way, have been calling for him to lose his job already. He should be under huge pressure for his job because he has directly contravened the very one thing he said he was going to do. And ultimately, we're getting the same thing for more money.

7:22It's preposterous. I think that the way that England performed as soon as they went a goal ahead was, it was almost the most inconceivable thing I've seen watching football. We all know how this goes right we all know we've been England fans long enough we'll see enough games we get it right I get that England don't win everything don't win anything I get it but the way that that that that played out was inconceivable to the point where I wasn't as a viewer and as a football fan as an England fan I wasn't sitting in front of my tv going come on push forward yeah I was thinking please just get this over with yeah this is this is actually this is actually quite shameful yeah it's quite shameful what's happening now and I don't want extra time I want to go to bed yeah

8:02Luke Moore: that's how bad it was there was no other team in the tournament that have surrendered a game like that. You could maybe go back to say Senegal, Belgium. Neverland's Japan. Neverland's Japan maybe did exactly the same thing in Cuba, didn't they? It was a group game and it was still a draw. In the knockouts, you know, Senegal played Belgium. But it's two very quick goals and Senegal didn't really sort of change the way they played. But anyway, I feel that's slightly unnecessary to do that. Talk about that. You think about the way France went out to Spain. It's a masterclass from Spain and I think Spain will prove to everybody that they're the best team in the world on Sunday.

8:33Luke Moore: But Spain were magnificent and France didn't have any ideas and it ultimately went out with a bit of a whimper, but it wasn't like last night. I think that the football watching world would have looked at that and gone, what on earth? Why were you doing? Tim Vickery summed it up brilliantly, where he just went, you basically, I'm saying this to me, mate, watching it. I was like, everything Argentina would have wanted England to do, they did. I mean, a couple of comments from, you know, you mentioned Southgate there. I mean, Mr. Robot said, indefensible game management from a coach brought in to change this exact type of mentality.

9:05Luke Moore: If Southgate rolled that out, he'd have been massacred. Mike said, worse than anything Southgate ever did, absolutely appalling from Tuchel, somehow having 11 men behind the ball, but letting Messi completely dominate the last 30 minutes. Nobody anywhere near him, time and again. And it was extraordinary. Cast your mind back to the first half, if you can. And, you know, go with me on this. That first half, the way Argentina set up, it was to disrupt England's rhythm and flow because they were worried about England's pace and power. On the transition. On the transition, exactly. And Argentina did that well.

9:35Luke Moore: England probably shaded it in that first half. You know, they had more possession and whatnot. But ultimately, it was a stalemate and it would have been quite a bad watch. Well, it was a bad watch. Oh, yeah, it was terrible. It was a ruck, wasn't it? I was on the edge of a seat, but I'm very aware that if I didn't have a dog in the fight, I would have been very bored. Totally. And I think, you know, the history of this fixture and the rivalry and so on was very, very evident from this first second of that game. and it's like, right, okay, we're in a fight here. And England, you can argue they got involved a little bit too much or did they stand up to it?

10:07I thought they stood their ground.

10:08Luke Moore: Whatever it was, whatever it was, you know, that was it. And then at halftime, and what did Anthony Barry say at halftime? He said, we need to sort of keep going and show our Premier League power. Yeah, he did, yeah. I don't know if he said pace and power, but he said he said Premier League power. He ran off like Wala Koti. Yeah, he loves that, yeah. And, you know, that was the best moment. He literally ran as fast as he could off the interview. It was the best moment of the night for me. but he was right to say that. Premier League pace and power. And that's the thing, this Argentina side, we said it before, like if you'd have said to us before the tournament, right, you'll face Argentina, this Argentina side in the semi-final, you go, we have to take it.

10:46Luke Moore: I know it's sort of a silly thing to say, but I'd rather have faced Argentina than say Spain or France. Now, obviously in hindsight, Argentina beat England. But you're not going to beat any good quality team player like that. Indeed, indeed. It doesn't matter. And so you find yourself in the situation. Into the second half, England score a good goal. And it comes from, you know... It comes from exactly the thing that Argentina are scared of. Exactly. It comes from exactly what Argentina were doing everything in the first half to stop England doing. And the thing that's baffling about it is that England, who should have been told that beforehand, which they probably were, because, I mean, whatever you think of Tuchel, he's not particularly high on my Christmas card list at the moment.

11:27he's a pretty well prepared tactically minded coach right and he would have he would have said this is how you're going to hurt them which is why I said at the time when England scored get Saka and or Rashford on ideally get them both on

11:40Luke Moore: and get them on the touchline and get them hugging and the touchline and get in Argentina to have two or three players back then you've also got to factor in that Romero and Martinez are both booked again the scenario you've got half an hour or 35 minutes you can have asked for more you can have asked for more they're both on the yellow cards ridiculous and you know Jim you said it was in microcosm is the 55th minute too early to score now do England have to basically keep it nil-nil and then how long rest alright we've got 9 minutes this is the moment isn't it in which everything Thomas Tuchel identified as being the things that need to change about England these are the moments in which you have to step up and make that a reality there's an idea isn't there that I've seen people say that Argentina were there for the taking I don't think it's quite as simple as that.

12:28Luke Moore: But the game was there to be contested. And you might lose that game. There's a very good chance England can still lose that game if they keep going and push for a second goal. And Argentina are a very good team and they lull you into forgetting how good they are by spoiling for a long time. And they might turn it on for 20 minutes. Like, oh God, they're actually very good. And that is partially what happened. But they stopped even contesting it. And that is unforgivable. It was like, we want this game to go away. And we hope we're going to close our eyes and just hope that somehow... They're hiding.

12:59Luke Moore: And what were the previous comments? Bellingham said after the Mexico game, you know, I used to watch England teams back in, you know, when he was growing up. I think he, I can't remember which, I think it was maybe 2010, 2020. He was talking about that era and he said, you know, where they didn't really sort of stand up and they kind of were a bit, you know, went out on a bit of a whim. And... You see, they went out with a whimper, didn't they? Whimper, sorry. Yes, exactly. And then they cut to the, went back to the studio because Hart and Rooney were there who were in those teams and they kind of went, yeah, fair comment.

13:27Luke Moore: Like we did. And then he's in this side. I'm not going to blame Jude Bellingham. And then what did the manager say as well? The manager said in the Croatia game, the first game of the tournament, obviously very different dynamics, the first game, it's not a semi-final. He said at halftime, guys, you're so worried about the result. Calm down. And England went out and played a good second half and he said, you know, if we lose, we lose our way. They lost playing a ridiculous way here. And I think if you look at the stats, you know, there wasn't a shot on goal for the first half an hour in that game, which is a first since 1966.

14:00Luke Moore: Sorry to say that year again, but that's when the stats started. The previous record for the longest wait for a shot was in England's previous game against Norway. England only attempted five shots in the game against Argentina, the lowest total in a single match at the tournament. Where's the excitement? Where's the attacking pedigree? Where is it? and yet England scored the first goal and then just completely shriveled. And there was a period after that where Argentina obviously thought, right, we can't just sit in now. We're going to throw a bit of caution to the wind. And they started coming forward and England started retreating.

14:36Luke Moore: And that can happen in a game of football. You can have a 10, 15 minute period where that happens. And Gonzalez came on and made a difference for Argentina. Yeah, he did. And I think it was him who had a header right before the hydration break where he probably should have scored. If we're honest, Pickford makes a good save. England get away with that. And I remember thinking, all right, we've made the hydration break because we've weathered that storm and we've often seen... Pickford was desperate for it. He kept looking at the referee. He was like, is the hydration break? Yeah, it looked like he was trying to get someone to get him a pint.

15:01You only get one and a half.

15:02Luke Moore: But you look at the momentum graphs and we've seen them change and I thought, right, England have got in. Now is the time, if you hadn't done it already, which he hadn't, to make those attacking substitutions and give Argentine, because we see where this game's going. He brings on Konza for Gordon. yeah at that moment I'm going oh no and that's where I where I shat myself Jim if I'm honest with you and I thought oh that's what we're doing now but you can't do that against this it's way too early I thought he went too early against Norway but fortunately in the Norway game it's Norway they've not got the attacking pedigree of Argentina and Erling Haaland I think was off or he was going off at the time he went there and I was just thinking bloody hell far what are we doing and the writing's on the wall McAllister has a header off the post should score as a sitter really and you're thinking all the red flags are there and he eventually brings on O 'Reilly for Rice and Byrne for James and you're thinking and I just I remember thinking at the time we're screwed here because Argentina are going to score you knew it right was on the wall you don't have to watch football for that long to know and I thought if Argentina score all the momentum is with them and it's not only that England have got so many defenders on the pitch to suddenly try and alright right we've got to snap into place best case scenario how are you going to get through 30 minutes and craft a goal from that well totally and when they score Dan Byrne up front and it actually happened when Argentina score and Fernandes has had a few sighters before he smacks it in Jude Bellingham's face when he lifts his face off the turf he looked shell-shocked yeah yeah and I thought the best what Tuchel's now hoping for is I was like make some sort of change but it was too late I thought because the dynamics are in what he's hoping for is he's hoping to get to extra time and then probably make change and I thought we're not going to get there

16:45by Quar. Running a business means you're always reachable until you're not. And the moment you miss that call, that text, that follow-up, a competitor is the one that picks it up. That's why today's episode is brought to you by Quar, spelled Q-U-O, the business phone system built so you never miss an opportunity. Quar is the number one rated business phone system on G2, trusted by over 90 ,000 businesses who rely on it to stay reachable and look professional every single day. All your calls, texts and voicemails live in one place so anyone on your team can pick up a conversation, see the full history and respond fast.

17:19You can set up in minutes on any device, keep your existing number and add teammates as you grow. No IT, no hassle. Quo integrates with the tools your team already uses like HubSpot, Zapier, Claude and more, helping you save time, stay organised and spend less time chasing information between systems. Money is on the Always say hello with Quar. Try Quar for free, plus get 20 % of your first six months when you go to quar.com slash ramble. That's q-u-o dot com slash ramble.

18:0860 years of hurt or will this be another year of falling just short? Probably. World Cup Daily, listen wherever you get your podcasts or watch full episodes on YouTube.

18:24The first thing I thought as soon as they score, which was like three minutes after the changes that were made, I thought he's going to have to take Dan Bern off again. Yeah. He's going to have to take him off again. And obviously, ultimately, he takes stones off instead of, I think, a little bit of a knock from a collision. He had a great game as well.

18:39Luke Moore: Yeah, he did. Stones only came off after Argentina get the second goal. Sure, but... You know, so when Argentina scored the second goal, on the pitch, obviously Pickford and goal, you've got Spence, Gay, Stones, Dan Byrne, Anderson, O 'Reilly, Konza, Bellingham, Rodgers and Kane. How on earth are you going to win a football match with that amount of... There's no midfield. There's no way you can tell us either that they've trained with that shape. No. It was all over the place. That's part of the plan. It's almost like... Maybe the forfeit. Yeah, right. Yeah, it's almost as if... Because the way I'd look at it is you can look at the management decisions and you look at how the players go.

19:19And I can get on board with the idea that there's something in like the England psyche that makes them retreat. And actually, if you look, and this is a bit of a stretch, but bear with me, when Argentina go 2-1 up, there's 10 minutes left, Argentina retreat. They go right back. Even start getting more of the ball, they start bombing it forward. because that's the natural order of things. Sure, sure, sure. It's a subconscious thing from a lot of players. But they knew they'd be fine. But yeah, fine. But that's not a point I'm making. That's not a point I'm making. And so if it's just the players doing that, that's one thing.

19:49But you can't excuse the substitution. No. You can't. What you're doing is you're not only encouraging England to do more of that, you're actually actively ignoring the blueprint that you've been presented with of how you scored the first goal. Everything that Argentina did, I can't emphasize this enough. It's really fucking important to emphasize this because Tuchel's going to take a lot of shit and rightly so. But the way that they embarked upon scoring was exactly what Argentina had been frightened of for three or four days. And exactly why they did the first half the way they did it. And I thought that the referee could have been harsher on them.

20:23I thought he could have showed Simeone booking earlier. I thought he could have stamped out a bit more. But ultimately, England stood their ground and they knew that's why Argentina were going to be doing that because Argentina were frightened. But then what we've done is we've almost just put our sword back in our sheaf and gone we're not fighting yeah we're just we're just going to

20:38Luke Moore: hold a shield up see if you can get through it what's interesting to me about that that period is the way Harry Kane spoke about it after the game because it suggested to me that from the players perspective like after they score and obviously this is due to the formation change and you know cons are coming on for Gordon and all that is that to them it seems like it felt like an onslaught from Argentina and that classic thing it wasn't though it was self-inflicted Well, it looks that way to us, but it's interesting to me that Kane spoke about it in the way that he did, because none of us are playing in the game.

21:11Luke Moore: We don't know what it's like to experience that. Argentina do lull you into that full sense of security of thinking they're just going to kick you and you forget how well they can actually play. Perhaps there is an element of that to it as well. But what I find, again, I can't get away from is the reaction to England scoring. Now, you know, if Fulham go 1-0 up against, let's say... Oh, Mr Cottage, I tell you. anyone absolutely anyone let's say Bournemouth let's say absolutely anybody you know they are going to fly at us now they are going to try and score very early they're going to try and do that why that is this this moment of panic for England in the semi-final of a World Cup it's crazy to me the way people kind of overthink very simple kind of normal things in these scenarios is a fascinating piece of psychology yeah well Tuchel said straight after our goal without any substitutions, we conceded way too many crosses and way too many chances so we tried to help.

22:07Luke Moore: Of course the responsibility is on the coach. If it doesn't go well it's easy to say it was wrong. Well when he says that, it's actually not, again the Gonzalez header is, you know, was a red flag but that was the chance really. Yeah, there was too many crosses coming in but they were sort of dealing with it. Because they gave Lionel Messi freedom and a pitch. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So the thinking that Tuchel's saying there is, ah, we're conceding too many crosses okay we need to put more bodies in the box it's kind of like well no actually argentina still other than that gonzalez header you know they were still kind of feeling england out and trying to stretch them and do all that kind of stuff they're going to do that and you're going to invite it on so you need to do something else i cannot believe saka never got on the pitch i was saying at halftime i'd say i really want saka to come on and have a go at tagline even as an outlet yeah totally that but that's and that's the problem when you have kane um and a tired jude bellingham as well.

22:58Luke Moore: Kane was just, he looked quite knackered. He was a passenger. They're the ones who were tucked so in. England are playing that low block where everyone is behind the ball. There's not a single outlet. And the two defenders who aren't the quickest and are both on bookings are going, everything is in front of us. That's exactly what we want. And I just, I honestly, I just can't believe how it played out. I just can't. The way I feel at the moment, I actually feel also quite angry about Harry Kane and about Drew Bellingham and about all this chat and all this kind of lionisation of them. The lionising of those two players up until a point is understandable but I just I feel like England have competed at the thick end of tournaments for a while now.

23:42Luke Moore: They have. Where is Kane? I know Lionel Messi is the greatest player to ever play the game and I do firmly believe that and on one level I'm pleased for him because it's an amazing story at his age. He's 39 and he's still I know he's a one-off right? But age does catch up with everyone. If you're going to accept all this stuff, and if you're going to say, and we understand the type of character Jude Beningham is, and I don't want to criticise him because I think the large part of what makes him so great is the character we are. He's been magnificent. And I accept that. He's had a brilliant tournament.

24:11But it feels a bit to me like, yeah, but you can do it when it's easy. You can do it when it's easy against teams that you're better than. When it comes up against teams that make it hard for you, what's your answer? He's got very little service in that game though, Kane. I think he's been a bit harsh. But think of both of them together, though. Think of both of them. The idea that, like, if England keep it tight and can defend properly, Bellingham and Kane can take the game away from people. Where were they? You don't have to take my word for it. I think it's in the last 20 minutes of the game, in arguably the biggest game of their lives, England completed two passes.

24:47Stones to Pickford and Pickford back to Stones. So there's not having service and there's not been able to make it happen and there's being on the wrong end of a bad result and all the rest of it. But what does that mean? I mean, but what can they do without the ball? That perfectly illustrates that they can't get on it. Well, Bellingham could go and find the ball and Harry Kane spent most of his time deep trying to get it. And then they stopped doing it. They stopped doing it. And they both played the whole game. You can't tell me Kane wasn't deep earlier than that. He was. He was right in there all the time.

25:09Luke Moore: Yeah, I mean, there was so much pressure on the defence. There was absolutely no relief. But I think that was, again, tactically. And I think, again, going back to Tuchel and some of the comments that we read out earlier, it is worse than anything that happened under Southgate I mean I think Southgate is harshly derided but I feel to suddenly make a defence of Southgate right now is rather silly and unnecessary it's just pointless it's just pointless we've made the point haven't we so I think England had 12 % possession after they scored exactly 12 % that is the percentage I'm not sorry go on well that's the percentage of a you know a Kairat Kairat on the Champions League or something and they go to Barcelona well when Celtic beat Barcelona yeah yeah yeah Well, Celtic won that game, by the way.

25:51Luke Moore: That's what I'm saying, yeah. It is a complete minnow. I think it was exactly 12%. Yeah, it's against... Peak Guardiola's Mount City against... That's what it is. And then only for a period, isn't it? It's a ludicrously low amount. But I'm not trying... I want to really clarify what I just said about this idea of... Because England have gone out again, right? And it happens, and it's happened in a variety of different ways. Yeah. But there are some similarities. They're very good at doing the same thing in a new way. Yeah, they are. It's quite Italian. Making us feel like shit in a different way entirely.

26:17But we understand that Messi's amazing. But what I don't think people fully appreciate is all the reasons why he's amazing. And you could apply that to actually quite a lot of this Argentina team. Because take, for example, the national anthem before the game. They look absolutely possessed. They look like they weren't going to be denied. And they knew it. And they knew it. It wasn't like they felt that they could win. It was like they thought it was their destiny to win. And I'm not defending a lot of the behavior because we know they are, as I said, pantomime villains. But the thing that separated out last night, the really good quality players all over the pitch on both sides, was when it came down to it, the belief and the desire to do it was actually there.

26:56I don't think Enzo Fernandes is a better player than Jude Bellingham. I don't think he is. I honestly don't. Even today, I don't think he is, even though he's made a difference last night. But how game was he? How much was he on the ball? How many shots did he have? Tell me. It's like that, I forget which basketball player, he said it, Larry Bird or something. I'd rather go 0-35. for shots in a game than 0-4 because if I got 0-4 it means I gave up Fernandes never did that and it's the same with Messi Messi's desperate for the ball desperate for it all the time

27:24Luke Moore: but you're right Luke and these players disappeared they disappeared but you're right Luke but the way England retreated it allowed that because again in the first half what did Enzo Fernandes or Lionel Messi do now people would say well who cares they were filling the game out I take that point and the game is over two halves famously or four quarters now but the way England were playing and I understand And, you know, game of two halves, blah, blah, blah. But the way England were playing and the game was stretched, the whole pitch was being used, or at least in theory, for the first 55 minutes of the game.

27:54Luke Moore: The reason why Messi couldn't get a foothold in the game is because it required him to run a lot more. It required him to do the things that at 39, he's not really brilliant at. You know, we know that he's strolled through a lot of this World Cup and then he picks his moments and he's been very, very good at that. In England, we thought, can England exploit that? the fact that they have a guy who's kind of almost like a luxury player at the moment. When England retreat, they basically say, all right, Messi, you can play the game at your pace. You can do what you like. You can get the ball to feet.

28:25Luke Moore: We're not going to challenge you. We're going to try and stop you crossing it. How good were his crosses though? Ridiculous. And every time he was floating them in, it was like, I thought it was a goal. And then also with Enzo Fernandes, again, you're not going to get anything. Okay, you're going to have to score from range. All right. He's very good at that. He's excellent at that. I'll have a few sighters and then bang, it's won all. It's just everything England did. It was like they were saying to Argentina, here's another helping hand and here's another helping hand. I think that's why this one, I think, you know, Phil McNulty on the BBC says, in the last 60 years, this might be the one that hurts the most.

28:58Luke Moore: Obviously, you've got the rivalry, but it's the fact that it was so self, it was such a self-harming exercise from England that they basically said to Argentina, right, now we're a goal up. Should we have a training exercise? See if you guys can score again. Oh, you have. Cross it in or have a pop from distance. Yeah, because this felt more like design rather than the other ones. The other ones you can say, well, they froze a little bit in the Euros final against Italy. Still got the penalties, though. Do you know what I mean? You can cherry pickle these ones. 2018 against Croatia. It's a good Croatia side, you can say.

29:28Luke Moore: Probably weren't ready for it. Yeah, England were at low ebb. Yeah, exactly. It was a nice surprise. You can go through it all. I mean, I would even, before we came on, and I'm going to say it again, you go back to Roy Hodgson's England in 2012 during the Euros, where it ended up with Joe Hart booting the ball up to Andy Carroll. England still got Italy to penalties. Do you know what I mean? Like that's the maddening thing about this. The fact is England looked so shoddy at the back in that last 25 minutes or whatever it was. Because it was a completely makeshift. Exactly. And I think with Tuchel, it worked against Mexico, but they had to do that against Mexico because Mexico handed them a two goal advantage really with that penalty where Gordon runs through.

30:08Luke Moore: You know, it's sopping from Mexico. So England got that advantage. And also, they were down to 10 men. So, you know, that's, again, good performance. But the circumstances dictated that. Against Norway, Norway just sort of huffed and puffed. They're not as good as Argentina. And England did that. And okay. If Thomas Tuchel has gone, it's worked for us against those two. That is crazy. Because Tuchel, again, to emphasize the point, he is brought in to win these games where England are playing equal or slightly better opposition. And he has failed to do so in spectacular fashion.

30:4433 days, 33 episodes, no off switch. From the goals and the glory to the politics and the problems of the World Cup, if you want soccer analysis from a podcast that's been overanalyzing the game for more than 20 years, then this is it. Join me, Max Rushton, and our expert team of soccer journalists every day of the tournament. Can England end 60 years of hurt, or will this be another year of falling just short? Probably. World Cup Daily, listen wherever you get your podcasts, or watch full episodes on YouTube.

31:17Luke Moore: Since Southgate took over and under Tuchel, they've won way more knockout games at tournaments than they did previously. You know, like their knockout record was shocking. Their record against top-level sides is still shocking. Really bad. It's a superiority complex. Totally. The last time they beat a top-level side was Argentina in 2002, and it was a group game. That was the last time. When England beat Mexico, you know, whenever it was a week and a half ago two weeks ago I remember saying do you know what England beating a side who I think were 10th in the world at the time it was like it's rare for England to beat a top 10 side but even then it felt like it's not a bit tokenistic almost you're really looking at previous winners as the people that England are inferior against I want to go back to Tuchel's post-match comments where he said straight after our goal without any substitutions we conceded way too many crosses and way too many chances so we tried to help cause the responsibilities on the coach and if it doesn't go well it is easy to say it was wrong And I've seen some people argue that actually the sort of match data suggests that Argentina were starting to get sort of overloads on the flanks and the overlapping fullbacks were a problem.

32:17Luke Moore: So it made a bit of sense for him to bring another defender on. But obviously England themselves dropped back in a way that wouldn't have been intended. And I just think that, yeah, the responsibility is on the coach. If you've identified those changes or those problems and made these changes to address it, it has gone so spectacularly wrong that the buck really stops with him. And I was thinking after the game about player ratings on this because I was thinking through lots of different players in the team and I think obviously you could have expected a bit more from Kane, a bit more from Bellingham.

32:48Luke Moore: Rice probably wasn't at his dominant best. Generally speaking, most of the players that started, I think they played really well. There are some hero moments in there if England go into the sort of bifurcated sliding doors scenario where they go on and win that game. Jed Spence's Bobby Moore tackle, John Stones, Pickford making some of those changes. But then I think about the substitutes. I don't think you can make the case that any of them really played well. It was so chaotic. What this could be a symptom of, and certainly is a failure of Tuchel here, is that the five substitutes era is relatively new.

33:24Luke Moore: And I don't think I've seen a worse execution of the use of those substitutes when you've got so many that you can make. Where essentially you just completely upend your own team. I also think it's frustrating to think that people at the very top level, the bleeding edge of the game, if Thomas Tuchel's a Champions League winning coach, I really highly rate it, it's a massive get for England, that he can't be looking at what Dan Byrne did against Mexico, when Mexico are aimlessly floating balls into Raul Jimenez, as being the same thing as playing against this Argentina side, where the guile and the movement and the dragon have ended around, and the quality of ball from Messi, he can't think that's the same.

34:05But yet his substitution of bringing down Burnham was like, oh yeah, that'll sort it. Don't worry, I'll just put a big lad on. And if you're gonna do that, I mean, just play Harry Maguire. You know, whatever. It's like, it doesn't make any sense. And I would also argue as well that like, it's a little bit of cold comfort, but nevertheless, you know, you take it while you can at this point, to a massive pop in the balloon of the theory, which is that, oh, it's gonna be much better against the better side. They've picked a squad for the better side. Fucking grow up. That's something that someone made up.

34:33someone made that up after the Garner game

34:37Luke Moore: right or Tuchel basically Tuchel said the bigger the game is the bigger we'll get yeah but he didn't say I've picked this squad to be better against the better teams which is what some journal I forget it was said and everyone just repeated it as groups think don't worry everyone we can't break Garner down but against the big teams we'll be great they haven't been great last night they were absolutely terrible and there's an unforgivable element to it I think I think the context and the circumstances on paper going out 2-1 to the world champions in the semi-final despite the fact they're not the team they were four years ago they are still a good team is not a disgrace but the way it happened is a disgrace it's totally shameful it's shameful they must be laughing at us we know they're laughing at us we saw them after the game they must still be laughing at us the best thing England did other than the goal was Jubelium clipping that kid around the head which I endorse and I respect it yeah I mean what else to say I prefer them to do it on the pitch What else to say?

35:33Luke Moore: I don't know. Yeah, as I said, I think this feels worse than any of the others. England will have to pick themselves up at some point. Well, I mean, they've got the bronze final on Saturday. That's what it would be like to be battered by France. Exactly. But I think it's... Look, it's really hard at this point to try to understand how anyone is going to be able to change this mentality around England in these moments because you've got the homegrown... They've basically... I don't have to go through it all because it'll be a waste of time. Everyone listening and watching knows what I'm talking about.

36:10They've done every type of manager. They've done every type of approach. They've done some good things by which I mean they've generated a lot of good players at St. George's Park. The record that England, both men's and women's team, have had since that's happened going deeper into tournaments is good. But it's almost like they've not ever really felt as far away as they are now because when it comes down to it, it's just so close yet so far. They haven't got it. Whatever you need, they haven't got it. And it's very difficult to understand why that is when you take into account all the credentials Tuchel's got, all the big team spirit kind of rebuilding from the ground up stuff Southgate did, all the players England have got.

36:53It's hard to put your finger on what's missing because yes, Tuchel exacerbated it with the substitutions and you guys are spot on with the way that England ended up. It was like finger in the air stuff. It was like stick the tail on the fucking England player stuff. It was bad. But ultimately, England's mentality was, I mean, it's baffling. You can't explain why a player like Bellingham, who seems to be so geared up to the big occasion, who seems to love it and relish it and wants to put the whole country on his back and go forward, why he just wilted. Why he was so easily intimidated by inferior players.

37:26why they didn't go and find the ball when England needed them most. And I'm not trying to be overly critical of two players in Kane and Bellingham who've had the best tournament of, arguably, you know, as good a tournament up to this point as anyone, right? But the reality of top-level sport, and I'm only saying this as an observer for a very long time, the reality of top-level sport is you're made in those moments. You're not made in the moment where you dance through Norway and put one on the bottom corner. It's great and we need it and we're very happy to have it. But what makes the difference is when it's hard, in really key moments, you are the one who does it.

38:03Because if you don't do it, you know no one else can do it. Yet these two players, they sank. They didn't swim. They wilted. They didn't grow. They were intimidated, not physically, or I'm not saying that they were scared. But in that moment, Argentina's tactics to stop them playing worked. And when it came down to it, they couldn't go and find the ball and make something happen.

38:26Luke Moore: I do take those points, Luke, but I think it's more about the collective here. You know, Spain showed you what you can do with the collective and Argentina did as well. They moved as a unit as a team. And I think the problem for England has, and Spain are the team I always hate England to play. Oh yeah, they are kryptonite for us. At least we've been spared of that. But, you know, the reason for that is because they know, lads, all we need to do is push up and push them back and we're going to get very little resistance. And that's such a simple, basic tactic that you do against England. Italy did it in the Euros final.

38:59Luke Moore: Croatia did it in the semi-final. You can reel them off the tongue. But I think we're talking across purposes because I think the system gives you the platform. Fine. Okay, fine. But your idea, though, doesn't win you the game. But your idea of bringing Saka and Rashford on when England scored the goal, that's what Tuchel needed to do. That would have helped Kane and Bredeum. It needed to be radical. England, he was brought in to make decisions where he goes, I don't give two shiny shites what anybody thinks. I'm doing it my way and we need something radical here to break this cycle. And he didn't do it.

39:30Luke Moore: In fact, he fed into that narrative more than any other English coach I've ever seen, to be quite frank. And he needed to do something because even if it's like, right, we're going to be a little bit more exposed. We know what happens here. I can see what's going on. You just need to, because I think if he does that, and again, England's kind of go out and so on, everyone goes, well, you tried, mate. Yeah, I don't think, and also I don't think, if he, and we are sitting on the sidelines, and we're not the men in the arena, and I get that, and that's our job here. But everybody knew this. Everyone's saying the same thing this morning.

40:00But I'm trying to imagine, so if in another scenario, England, Tuchel did bring on Saka and Rashford. It doesn't have to be Saka and Rashford, which means it needs to be wide forward players. Whoever it is. Yeah, Saka and Rashford I think would be the best suited in that particular situation. And England lose. The reaction, I feel like, would be, okay, we had a go and there's every chance of course the upside is that England can get another goal so there's much more chance of that and it kind of reminds me of Alex Ferguson comments Alex Ferguson did an interview with Gary Neville a number of years ago talking about the Manchester United mentality he was like, and it's different because he's a club manager and the season's longer and I get it but there's a few nuggets in there which is like we don't not go for it we never not go for it because the value of going for it over a longer period and if Tuchel's going to manage across a few tournaments or like Southgate did, it does kind of make sense.

40:49The value over a longer period is that like, it's much greater than the loss because in the situation that England are in anyway, we lose anyway. It doesn't fucking matter. So ultimately, would the reaction have been more sympathetic? I think it probably would have done because it would have been like, look, we had a go and we had to hang our hat on. Oh, what about a sack of chance? Do you remember in the 90s? Glorious failure.

41:09Luke Moore: It renders the whole endeavour pointless. Yeah, it does. That's an extreme way to look at it, but it really does. If you're going to play like that in that moment, if you're going to try and go through to the next round by not losing a game against the canniest opposition you could possibly face with the best player in history, having the red carpet rolled out for him. What is the point? What is the point? You're right, Jim. What is the point? Oh, man, yeah. I mean, we remember the 90s when you had the three tournaments. Well, the first half felt like the 90s, didn't it? Yeah, in particular. But that's it, though.

41:43Luke Moore: As I said, it used to be glorious failure. Why was it glorious failure? because England dug in, they had a go and then lose on penalties. That was what it was. That was always maybe a little bit inflated and a bit of a self-serving narrative, wasn't it? But it was certainly more prevalent there than it was here. But they never wilted though. That was the thing. And that's the picture of England nowadays. The difference between, say, if you're going to draw a comparison, the difference between 98 and 2026, England-Argentina, is Argentina did it against England in 98 because they knew England could be bullied and they bullied England.

42:10They did it in 2026 because they were fucking scared of England because they knew it's the only way to level the playing field.

42:16Luke Moore: Yeah, but even in 98. And it's a massive compliment to England the way Argentina started that game. Yeah. And we just rejected it. Yeah. We completely denied it. We didn't absorb it, take confidence from it or treat it as the compliment which it so clearly was. Or trust it. Or trust it. Yeah. Well, I think, you know, a common denominator throughout the years, you know, World Cup 2010 was the first World Cup that we covered during the Ramble. And I think we've said this pretty much every tournament England have played in. to varying degrees. Some of them have been outright disappointments. Some of them have been shocking.

42:49Luke Moore: Some of them actually we've enjoyed and we have enjoyed parts of this World Cup but ultimately it ends in very frustrating failure. But the one thing is England are not as streetwise as they should be. And I feel again there's still a bit of that in this game. But oh dear. Yeah. We've got a bronze medal match to look forward to against France. How about that? Should we live stream Pete taking this face paint off? Well we could do. We could do. I mean England have never won the bronze at the World Cup. Well, there you go. I've got a feeling that might well continue as well. Sure. I don't know because I simply will not be watching.

43:22Can he give Cobby Manu some minutes? Can he just give Cobby some minutes? But the problem with that is, giving Cobby Manu minutes, he's either going to play shit or play well and either way it's depressing. I know.

43:32Luke Moore: It doesn't matter. Anyway, thanks for joining us. Thank you very much for listening to the Football Ramble, part of the ACAST Creator Network. And thank you to everyone who's joined us live on YouTube. Myself, Jim and Pete will be back tomorrow to continue to lick our wounds but yeah so yeah England it ends in a very familiar way oh dear we got the bronze final on Saturday it's not a final it's not a final that's as it's dubbed it's a third place playoff we've also I mean let's let's cast our minds it's the best loser match yeah who could be the most glorious loser true true well I want to end on a slight little bit of hope next summer imagine the scene England are in the latter stages of the Nations League.

44:13Luke Moore: Oh, God. And Oasis are playing live again. Come on. Dare to dream, everybody. Not ready to dream. Next summer or 1997? Yeah. What are you fantasizing about here? The 90s, Jim. The 90s. This is comfort blanket, isn't it? Yeah. Oh, dear. In two years' time, we'll do the dance again at the Euros. I'm off to read loaded. Yes, indeed you are. All right, everybody. You'll see the rest of my thoughts in FHM. Lots of love. Thanks for joining us. See you tomorrow.

44:52The Football Ramble is a Stack Production and part of the Acast Creator Network.

45:0333 days, 33 episodes, no off switch. From the goals and the glory to the politics and the problems of the World Cup, if you want soccer analysis from a podcast that's been overanalyzing the game for more than 20 years, then this is it. Join me, Max Rushton, and our expert team of soccer journalists every day of the tournament. Can England end 60 years of hurt, or will this be another year of falling just short? Probably. World Cup Daily, listen wherever you get your podcasts or watch full episodes on YouTube.