Gareth Southgate admitted there was “no hiding” from England’s fitness problems at Euro 2024, acknowledging that Harry Kane couldn’t reach his top form in Germany.
England’s squad faced physical challenges even before the tournament began in June and struggled to match the sharpness of their Spanish rivals in the final.
Kane, who missed the end of Bayern Munich’s season, and Jude Bellingham, whose form dipped in the latter half of the LaLiga season, were particularly affected. Despite being named LaLiga’s player of the season, Bellingham’s performance waned, with 18 of his 23 club goals scored before January.
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In a heartfelt tweet, Kane expressed his disappointment, saying, “Heartbroken we couldn’t achieve what we worked so hard to. It was a long tough tournament and I’m so proud of the boys and staff for getting to the final. Ultimately we fell short of our target and will have to live with that but as we always do we will pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and come back stronger.”
Southgate, facing questions about his future, focused on the team’s efforts and setbacks. Speaking to ITV Sport, he said, “There’s no hiding we’ve had some issues coming into the tournament, we’ve managed to deal with most of them and got Luke [Shaw] out tonight, but we’ve just fallen short in the end. It’s probably both [a success and missed opportunity], frankly. The players have got to take enormous credit to get us to the point we did, but when you get as close as that you’ve got to take your chances.”
Jamie Carragher reflected on the situation in a tweet, noting, “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.”
Southgate highlighted the team’s resilience but pointed out their shortcomings against Spain. “The character, the resilience they’ve shown, I just think tonight we didn’t keep the ball well enough. They had more control of the game and that was probably the main difference. I just think against Spain, they press well, you have to keep the ball when you win it back. Defensively we were fine in the first half, you just have to retain the ball a little bit better. In the end, maybe that’s the bit that takes a little bit out.”
During his press conference, Southgate elaborated on the fitness issues: “So many of our players came into the camp having missed the end of the season, we’ve managed to get Luke through 90 minutes when he hasn’t played for four months. We’ve had Kobbie as a young player who’s done incredibly well, but the amount of football he’s had this year…. Jude, we were about to take off because he was cramping as well.
We had a decent period and got the equaliser, but I think the physical toll of the issues we came into the tournament with, the extra-time periods, having as little of the ball as we did tonight ultimately took a big toll and I think that was part of the reason why legs started to go and you start to make mistakes.”
On Kane’s performance, Southgate commented, “Physically, it’s been a tough period for Harry [Kane]. He came in short of games and didn’t quite get up to the level we’d all hope. We felt Ollie’s freshness would allow us to press a bit better and offer us a threat in behind. I thought they both did what we wanted.”
Kane reflected on the tournament, telling BBC Sport, “It’s been a tough tournament. We’ve had to show a lot of resilience, me personally and the team. It’s been a difficult ride and we’ve done extremely well to get here. But ultimately we’re going to be judged on this game. We wanted to do it so badly for ourselves and the fans, and everyone who’s believed in us the whole way. Right now, it’s just huge disappointment.”
Regarding his future, Southgate hinted at internal discussions: “I need to have those conversations with important people behind the scenes. I’m obviously not going to discuss that publicly first. Without a doubt, England have got some fabulous young players. Even the young ones have got a lot of experience in tournaments. Many of this squad are going to be around in two, four, six, eight years time. We have now been consistently back in the matches that matter. It’s the last step that we haven’t been able to do.”
Kane made his support for Southgate clear, saying, “We made it clear we love the manager, but that’s his decision [whether he wants to stay on]. Now’s not the time to talk about it. It’s down to him, he’ll go away and think about it. But we’re all just hurting.”
Gary Neville said, critiqued England’s strategy, stating, “I felt Ollie Watkins should come on for Harry Kane at half-time. I thought Anthony Gordon should come on down the left and Jude Bellingham should get off that lefthand side and go back into central midfield.
I felt like we needed Bukayo Saka, Gordon, and Watkins up top because we were being pushed back by a fantastic Spanish team – for England to travel box to box and carry the ball with pace and connect Watkins as quickly as possible. You have to have a counterattack when you’re playing deep. We were almost playing with a counter-attacking strategy, without a counter-attacking team. It didn’t take long for Gareth to make the changes, when he brought on Cole Palmer and Watkins. Palmer is a fantastic player and he scored the goal but I did feel like we need pace in the wide areas.”
