It's flying garden chair day - England v Croatia

[Eggchaser]

Kane crashes into the post.

Looked very painful.

[RobW]

Foden getting a yellow there makes me think he is capable of getting a stupid red at some point in the tournament.

Was never a yellow card.

[Discordant Resonance]

Croatia have rather run out of steam in the last 10 minutes.

[anton pulisov]

Croatia look like a shadow of their former selves.

They had already peaked in 2018 but managed to make the final anyway. Played Portugal off the pitch in 2016 and somehow lost. Were defeated by home referee in Brazil 2014. And in 2012 they were in the same group as the finalists, and were as good as them.

Peak Modric and Rakitic together was a sight to behold.

[anton pulisov]

"football's coming home" is starting to break out

[Snake Plissken]

Was never a yellow card.

Foden? Absolutely was. He knew what he was doing.

[longeared]

James Anderson made his Test debut before Jude Bellingham was born.

[Sean of the Shed]

No way was Vida ever going to win that ball. That's fucking dangerous play.

[Gangster Octopus]

And now to Paris.

[anton pulisov]

Apparently it's hypothetically possible that England could play six matches in Wembley?

What a shite format

[Foot of Astaire's]

Great win. Good performance. I'll take that.

[Discordant Resonance]

Nothing for Scotland to be particularly frightened about from either team.

[CY_Boaby]

Nothing for Scotland to be particularly frightened about from either team.

I'm sure England & Croatia will be saying the same about us after tomorrow's game.

[Sean of the Shed]

That roof camera is no Azteca spider.

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Ironically winning Group D means an immediate last 16 tie against Germany, France, Portugal or Hungary, whereas the runners-up get the runners-up of the Spain/Poland/Slovakia/Sweden group. And scraping through in 3rd place probably means meeting the winners of the Holland/Ukraine/Austria/Macedonia group.

Stupid tournament format.

[Sixmartletsandaseagull]

Decent opening game performance and a good start to the tournament with a win over the presumed (time will tell) biggest challengers in the group. Both sides wilted more than a bit in the sunshine.

[Sean of the Shed]

Ironically winning Group D means an immediate last 16 tie against Germany, France, Portugal or Hungary, whereas the runners-up get the runners-up of the Spain/Poland/Slovakia/Sweden group. And scraping through in 3rd place probably means meeting the winners of the Holland/Ukraine/Austria/Macedonia group.

Stupid tournament format.

Second place may get an easier last 16 tie, but then the quarter final would likely mean facing the winner of the France/Germany/Portugal/Hungary group.
And obviously 3rd place could also mean elimination.

[ChrisJ]

Some decent aspects to that performance, but I nearly nodded off a few times. Wembley is a furnace on hot days. Well done Phillips. Could see France or Germany blowing either of these two away.

Mainly, I thought Rogin deserved a bit of love for his thread title.

[Sean of the Shed]

Could see France or Germany blowing either of these two away.

France, maybe, but not so much Germany right now.

[Artificial Hipster]

I watched it in a neighbour's garden so it wasn't that easy to follow but the booing being drowned out by applause and Sterling with the winner is as good a result as I had hoped for.

[Bizarre Löw Triangle]

Well quite. Ludicrous piece of writing. There's something particularly special, I think, about football "writing" and the circumlocutions and synonyms and morbid fear of using a word or a name more than once.

I think they should use "the Croatian soccer ace"

[statto99]

Apres Kalvin, it's Gianni Time...

[Bizarre Löw Triangle]

the manager is a lovely guy who I would like to see do well

i don't get this at all. three/four years ago the england setup was clearly institutionally racist and like only one person got booted out. and now without anything really changing it gets a complete pass from everyone. i dunno how directly responsible Southgate was in that but he was publicly supportive of both Mark Sampson and Dan Ashworth who were directly responsible.

i am card-carrying AEB tho

[scratchmonkey]

Considering that first games are often pretty wobbly affairs, that was pretty good from England. Should have scored early on, when Croatia came back into the game, they kept them at arm's length, and then saw the game out decently after the goal without dropping too deep and inviting pressure. I'm sure a bunch of pundits, armchair and otherwise, were giving Southgate crap for picking both Rice and Phillips and they both went and had excellent games -- Rice playing much deeper than he does for West Ham and spending most of the game tracking Modric around the field and them allowing Mings and Stones to split when in possession, Phillips providing some much-needed verticality and dynamism, although I was especially impressed with his control in tight spaces, including right before the goal. Although Kane overall had a poor game, it was his lateral run that opened up the space for Sterling to run into space. They did well to see the game out after as well -- obviously that Croatian core has aged, they didn't have the legs to really have a go.

[Ray de Galles]

Croatia look like a shadow of their former selves.

They had already peaked in 2018 but managed to make the final anyway. Played Portugal off the pitch in 2016 and somehow lost. Were defeated by home referee in Brazil 2014. And in 2012 they were in the same group as the finalists, and were as good as them.

Peak Modric and Rakitic together was a sight to behold.

I agree that they, predictably, look a side way past their peak.

The tendency for every Croatian player on receiving the ball to look where Modric was and try to give it to him has now become exaggerated to a comic degree.

None of them offering anything when Modric did have the ball exacerbated that. Gvardiol got time and space on countless occasions but seemed hopeless at doing anything with it.

All that said, the stats (possession, shots, shots on target) all had England and Croatia exactly level - though that doesn't quite do England's slight upper hand in the game justice and the goal was from the best non-Modric pass of the match.

It was pretty bearable being there, an awful lot of total whoppers present clearly but nothing outright offensive apart from the booing for taking the knee which was quite comfortably drowned out by applause where we were.

My boy's happy, too.