Former Liverpool and England defender Jamie Carragher has hit out at some of the big names in the national team who didn’t turn up at Euro 2024 this summer.
Much of the focus has been on England manager Gareth Southgate after last night’s 2-1 defeat to Spain in the final of the European Championships, but Carragher has defended Southgate by commenting on how it always seems to be the manager’s fault, even though so many big-name players keep failing to perform at their best at major tournaments.
See below for Carragher’s post on X, formerly Twitter, as he took aim at the England stars who weren’t at their best at the Euros…
Sven played 442, Fabio was too strict, Gareth is too defensive!
Funny how it’s always on the manager isn’t it?!!
The fact is our big players didn’t turn up in this tournament. And other tournaments going back years.— Jamie Carragher (@Carra23) July 14, 2024
It’s fair to say that players like Harry Kane and Phil Foden were well below their usual level at Euro 2024, but then fans will perhaps rightly question Southgate for continuing to play them instead of being a bit more brave with his team selection.
Cole Palmer made a great impact off the bench yesterday as he scored the equaliser for England, while Ollie Watkins was also the hero off the bench in the semi-final as he scored that late winner against the Netherlands.
The truth is that it’s probably a bit of both, with Southgate doing well to instil more belief in this England team than previous generations, with two Euros finals in a row surely not a fluke, even if the manager perhaps also deserves some criticism for failing to get this talented group to perform as well as they do at club level.
Kane and Foden were probably the biggest disappointments, but it’s also easy to imagine that we could see more from the likes of Jude Bellingham, Declan Rice and Bukayo Saka if the general style of play was better and the tactics were a bit more sophisticated.
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