Two major winner candidate met in the last round of the group stages. England faced with the Belgian golden generation, and the Three Lions defeated 0-1 by Belgium. Let’s see how!
As I wrote in my preview on Belgium before the tournament started, the group G will mostly about the battle of England and Belgium. If nothing vis maior/major happening, this two team will advance to the next round of the tournament. This was correct, that two teams finished at the top of the Group G, however, there was a spin in the events.
Before the World Cup, 2018 started the biggest question was who will win this group, therefore who will presumably face Germany in the quarterfinals. As we know, Germany performed poorly and knocked out early from the tournament and Brazil become the biggest threat to England and Belgium. Thus before the England-Belgium match, the battle changed and no-one would really want to win the group due to the consequences that the winner will probably meet Brazil later on.
For this reason or others, both coaches sent the team B to the pitch.
Battle of the three at the back
Both teams play with 3 defenders at the back, but while Southgate chose to form a 3-5-2, Roberto Martinez sticks to the 3-4-2-1/3-4-3 formation. Although both of them transformed into a 5-3-2 at defending phase.
Interesting fact that Southgate only came up with the idea of 3-5-2 formation right before the World Cup. He tried several structures like 4-3-2-1. but he rather chose to play with a lone holding midfielder Dier or Henderson and two players who operating in the half spaces. Lingard and Alli (or this case Delph and Loftus-Cheek) positioning high up the pitch while England in possession, but they drop when it comes to defending. Flexible and Fluid system.
This tim
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