LIVE World Cup Thread

Lashing rain in Toronto and about 18 degrees and we're going to have hydration breaks. What a farce.

Amazed in went to Barcelona, I watched him closely during times of fantasy football, and there were loads of times he barely got on the ball at all for Newcastle, anonymous like today. Then he went on a run of getting a load of handy penalties later in the season.

This is Englands best chance as they have a manager now unlike the previous 3.

Although squad wise I’d probably agree with you.

It's only 1 game. They can still build momentum.

All the teams winning are building momentum.

the narrative seems to be that England were weak defensively yesterday. Can’t say I saw that. I thought Croatia just scored two brilliant goals.

It’ll be on Kane to be the creator and the goal scorer. A big burden but hes probably the best or close to the best player I’ve seen play for England so he may be up to it. The other forward players can run for days and good runs make great passes.

No it's not the same. They hadn't made 2 Euros finals (one of which they were far superior except for their sht coach) back in the day when most of us started watching.

Those over hyped teams used to scrape through qualifying like they were Ireland. This team is hyped not overhyped.

Also total bollix to say the Irish buy into it. We are usually falling around laughing at them and their wild expectations.

Those over hyped teams used to scrape through qualifying

Sorry what? England scraping through qualifying? When did that ever happen?

Here are their qualifying groups from 2010 to 2024… not seeing much scraping there!!

The closest anyone brought them was Ukraine in 2014, and the last time they didn't qualify was for Euro 2008, but since then they won every group, easily…

I happened to see the England team that lost in the 2018 world cup semi final.

Maguire, Henderson, Trippier, Jesse Lingard, Dele Ali, Ashley Young, Rose, Dier, Vardy, all featured. The likes of Fabien Delph, Phil Jones, Loftus Cheek and Butland on the bench.

That was a world cup semi final, but the step up from Henderson, Ali and Lingard to Rice, Saka and Bellingham is very real.

They still can't hold a ball in midfield but this is still a very good England team.

England were excellent for the first 20 minute of the second half but look far from the finished article.

Their absolute reliance on physicality will get them so far, but there are teams that can match them in that respect and have shown a bit more nous. Aside from the obvious like France, I could see teams like Morocco and Senegal causing them all sorts of problems.

Why are you bringing up 2020 or under Tuchel. I clearly said they were a very good team then.