I think Jack embarrassed Southgate by coming on (when finally allowed to) and immediately showing the kind of quality that made it clear he should have started, when Southgate had left him out for his pet, Mount. So Southgate was scrabbling around for something to justify his own poor decision-making and came up with that utter bollocks. Southgate just ended up embarrassing himself more.
As alluded to earlier in this thread, Southgate clearly has something personal against Jack, because every time Jack gets on the pitch for England he performs well. The amount of times he's been left out of the starting lineup only for Southgate to have to bring him on at 70 minutes to try and rescue something (which he manages to do, more often than not), I've lost count.
This England team is winning nothing with Southgate in charge. Jack's best hope of being fairly treated for England is a new manager who'll give him a fair shake.
Something most people can agree on: the man is not international standard - and never will be. He showed his lack of awareness last night with Jack on the bench at kick-off. Fair enough, I have my Blue spec's on, but just what was he hoping to achieve with that particular line-up?
Southgate seems incapable of seeing what most football fans can see - MagLiar is a complete and utter buffoon. For comedic value he's fabulous, for competitive football he's not even Championship level. He's clumsy, inept, totally unable to read the game and gets away with so much handling of opponents he reminds me of Mick McManus.
I don't say this because he's a rag, I say it because I genuinely believe it.
And I'd best not get started on Pickford. Jesus! Does he not know to distribute the ball intelligently? I'm not talking about pinpoint precision, I'm talking about launching the ball as near to a teammate as is humanly possible. But no, not this overrated no-mark. Pick the ball up and just hoof it anywhere, as far away as possible. Goal kicks, exactly the same. No finesse, no trying to find a colleague and start an attack, just wallop the fucking thing over the horizon. Job done.
I used to watch my country with unbridled enthusiasm: of course I did, I'm English through and through. It's not perfect as countries go, but I am unashamedly pride of it, as most people are about their own countries. So when I see players like Slabhead in an England shirt and I think back to the days of watching the England greats of yesteryear I visibly cringe with embarrassment.
