Mings/Keane vs O’Connell

[Fulwood Blade]

Keane is nothing short of average - Burnley had Evertons pants down at £25m.

Mings - Eddie Howe didn't seem to think he was good enough so again B'moth had Villas pants down at £20 + £5m add ons. Same might apply about Mousset and Howe - did he see something that meant Mousset was never a regular at B'mouth.

JOC - has done nowt wrong - looks rock solid. Only question for me is pace - he'll never be Des Walker pace but appears to read the game well.

JOC is way better than the other two.

Personally I expect a bid in the summer for a few of our players - Spurs are rumoured to be interested and may test our resolve by doubling his wages.

UTB

PS: ..................but apparently JOC isn't good enough to get in the pigs team

 

[YES Blade]

Christ completely forgot about bombscare Stones, makes it all the more laughable if JOC doesn;t get called up.

Out of the ones you think GS will go for, which do you think is better than JOC?

On current form Maguire and Gomez are ahead of O'Connell, Stones hasn't been in great form, but Southgate isn't going to ditch a player with 39 caps and tournament experience for an uncapped player having played only 28 Premier League matches. Like I say, the last place is up for grabs and that could easily go to O'Connell especially if Southgate is considering playing 3 at the back. But there are other players that have made squads recently like Keane, Mings, Tomori and Tarkowski who are also in the mix.

Unless a player shows exceptional form (like Henderson), then it's going to be unlikely an England manager is going to start blooding uncapped players on the eve of a tournament. Lets not forget this is essentially a home tournament and after the World Cup, expectations are high that we could win it!

 

[Davalon]

So Mings is fashionable because he's at bottom 3 Villa and Coady isn't because he's at Nuno and Jorge inspired Europa League Wolves?

Don't get that logic.

There is no conspiracy theory whether you rate Southgate or not.

 

[Bladesway]

Cos Southgate used to play for a Villa.

Yes of course that’s how it works.

 

[Akinbiyi]

Controversial viewpoint probably, just JOC isn’t good enough to play for England.

He might be one day like, but not yet.

If he's not, who fucking is?

 

[Akinbiyi]

Mings got racially abused whilst playing for England, he's guaranteed a call up for the next few years

 

[RMBlade]

I would play 3 at the back to cover the deficiencies in midfield plus 3 of the 4 most in form centre backs play in a back 3.

JOC - Maguire - Gomez
??? - Stones - Coady

I can’t really think of another good ball playing left footer. Maybe I would put Mings in because of that but he would be well behind JOC.

 

[JackSUFC]

Coady and JOC are victims of Wolves and us playing three at the back, whereas England play with a four. I don’t know why this is such an issue for Southgate either but he must think playing in a back four is alien to them and they would suddenly turn into rocking horse shit.

Plus it’s ironic really that England got to the semi’s of the last World Cup playing with a back three.

 

[Working Class Hero]

JOC is a far better defender than Mings or Keane. He does have an annoying tendency to boot it 50 yards down the line at no one though, which doesn't happen in international football and won't impress Southgate.

 

[HoodedClaw]

Can't argue with that.

The only one on the list of potentials that could / should be in front of JOC in the queue would be Tarkowski.

Mings is poor and playing in a poor side, if they get relegated as looks likely, I wouldn't take him just not sure how it will affect him.

Tomori has played 3 times (2 of those in the FA Cup) since the start of 2020.

Keane possibly in with a shout but JOC's stats are better.

 

[JayGreen17]

Controversial viewpoint probably, just JOC isn’t good enough to play for England.

He might be one day like, but not yet.

He might not be be he’s still better than Mings.

 

[Nick Jansky]

It’s not new Woodward should have played for England but was always over looked Fuck em !

And Badger

 

[PokerBlade]

For me, it's not so much JOC getting overlooked again as it is the baffling choices picked ahead of him. Other than reputation for his big potential, I can't for the life of me see what Mings has done this season to warrant selection.

What I suspect is that by picking the big names England managers protect themselves from getting sacked for a while longer because it gives them the get out excuse of "Well, those are the best names around, what can I do about it?". It'd take a really brave character to pick a different team to what most fans and the papers expect and if it went tits up the way England always do then the manager would be gone.

If you went on current form then you'd have to look at players like Coady, JOC, or even Basham. But can you imagine an England manager picking Bash? If he didn't play phenomenally well you'd be ridiculed for it, however much sense it might make.

 

[Paulus]

On current form Maguire and Gomez are ahead of O'Connell, Stones hasn't been in great form, but Southgate isn't going to ditch a player with 39 caps and tournament experience for an uncapped player having played only 28 Premier League matches. Like I say, the last place is up for grabs and that could easily go to O'Connell especially if Southgate is considering playing 3 at the back. But there are other players that have made squads recently like Keane, Mings, Tomori and Tarkowski who are also in the mix.

Unless a player shows exceptional form (like Henderson), then it's going to be unlikely an England manager is going to start blooding uncapped players on the eve of a tournament. Lets not forget this is essentially a home tournament and after the World Cup, expectations are high that we could win it!

Gomez seems to be a shoe-in for most now but I'm still not convinced about how good he really is. Clearly it helps him to shine given the players around him at Liverpool but there are still question marks for me. He's played 19 times ( so roughly half their matches) for Liverpool this season but 10 of them have been cup games, Matip has been preferred in more PL games, although he was unfortunate with his broken leg disrupting his progress last season, there have also been a number of niggling injuries, is he a bit of a Bale? he's also relatively inexperienced as a centre back, a lot of his early appearances for Liverpool were at fullback. Now I'm not saying he doesn't deserve to be picked, he has a strong case for being included as one of the best 4 English central defenders currently but there is also the strange issue about his bust-up with Sterling last time out. The Spin from both the FA and from the players, particularly Sterling's PR advisers is that it's all water under the bridge but I bet it's not. Sterling, in particular, doesn't come across as the forgive and forget type, much more likely that his precious ego festers on grudges. Will Southgate want to take that potential squad splitter into a major tournament squad?

 

[Liaminho9]

Smalling might be a look in again after playing well for Roma.
Lewis Dunk, James Tarkowski, and Mason Holgate will be in the equation as well.

Key thing? They're all right footed.

 

[Jimbo Blade]

Southgate is a fraud. You can't declare that your selection of the national team will be based on form if you're just going to pick players based on who they play for instead of how they've played.

It sends a dangerous message to players like JOC, that they will never be picked whilst he plays for the Blades. Will just make him think about moving on.

 

[Paulus]

Trouble is, it's not dangerous for any club apart from us...

 

[Jimbo Blade]

Trouble is, it's not dangerous for any club apart from us...

I'm not sure Burnley fans would agree. Keane defo had his head turned to move to Everton. Was barely mentioned with England til he moved.

 

[Rodley]

Can’t see the Euro happening as isn’t it meant to be all over Europe with people travelling from country to country.

 

[YES Blade]

Southgate is a fraud. You can't declare that your selection of the national team will be based on form if you're just going to pick players based on who they play for instead of how they've played.

It sends a dangerous message to players like JOC, that they will never be picked whilst he plays for the Blades. Will just make him think about moving on.

Henderson was in the last squad, so that's complete bollocks.

 

[bromtom]

Henderson was in the last squad, so that's complete bollocks.

Because Heaton did his ACL

 

[YES Blade]

Because Heaton did his ACL

He was still in the squad!

Do you think he won't pick Henderson for the upcoming friendlies then? (assuming they don't get cancelled)

 

[bromtom]

He was still in the squad!

Do you think he won't pick Henderson for the upcoming friendlies then? (assuming they don't get cancelled)

No, he'll get picked. I'm just saying, he wasn't called up due to form last time, he was a replacement due to injury.

 

[YES Blade]

No, he'll get picked. I'm just saying, he wasn't called up due to form last time, he was a replacement due to injury.

Southgate could've picked Butland over Henderson, Butland was in the Nations League Finals squad after all. So Henderson moved above Butland based on form.

Southgate has picked players from Bournemouth, Burnley, Southampton, Villa, West Ham, Leicester and Stoke in the last year, it doesn't really suggest to me that he's got any prejudices against any clubs.

 

[8lade]

So last Summer, who thought we should've signed Mings?
Have to admit my principle reason for not signing him was because he was a thug with a 'stamping' problem but a lot of fans were happy to over look that.

 

[Blend-it-like-Harris]

Joe Shaw never played for England, and TC should have racked up 100 caps; I'm certainly not gonna start getting bitter about England's failures at my time o'life.

 

[blade too long]

its baffling when in an age of stats that our defence the 2nd best on stats has not one international position tied down

Yet Mings in a defence that doesn't just leak goals but gets flooded by them get selected.
They can't claim to use all the modern analysis techniques and leave themselves open to criticism

 

[Upton_Blade]

Its not that simple, JOC is ideal for Blades but Southgate since the World Cup has favoured 4-3-3 formation, completely different system to Wilders's 3-5-2 (5-3-2). That said, JOC deserves at least a try-out in a friendly.

The main reason Coady hasn't had a look in as well!

 

[VwBlade]

Jags is still better on his Zimmer frame than Mings

 

[Upton_Blade]

In a way you can't question Southgate for picking players who haven't really let him down at International level ie Pickford, Stones etc.

I may be wrong but he has never quantified his "picked on form" comments and they could quite as easily mean England form as much as club form.

I tend to agree with an earlier poster who said JOC wasn't good enough for England just yet. My counter argument to that is that JOC should be judged against his counterparts for his role not his individual ability or plety would fall under the "not good enough" banner dependant on where you set the bar.

If I was Southgate, and I'm not, then I would be looking at the defence as a whole and seeing which players offer the greatest flexibility on formation. All through qualifying we have gone with 4 at the back but, as per pretty much forever, we have absolutely flown through qualification and shown that this isn't always the best guide to how we will do at the actual tournament.

We got to the WC semi's playing with a 3 at the back. We may need to revert to this in the summer if a 4 is struggling.

With this in mind I really don't understand why you wouldn't take Jack over Mings?

The preferred pairing in a 4 will undoubtedly be Harry and Gomez but if we need to switch to a 3 then we need a left footer and Jack pisses all over Mings in this sense.