Like most things in the age of social and mass media, the reputations of footballers and their abilities are front and centre for those of us who deal with the ups and downs of the beautiful game. Moreover, this same phenomenon that entraps our fascination can often be the cause of our ire and determine our mood for the rest of the day and in some cases, the week. I digress, what we need to speak about more is the overestimation of players ability due to social media and how its algorithm actively and vigorously works to entrench us into separate warring tribes. This same algorithm then typically lands us in an echo chamber that only work to reinforce our predetermined beliefs or ideas.
Hence why the case of Southgate’s England’s Euro 2024 team is the perfect team to wrestle with the idea of the social media player. There is no doubt, whatsoever, that this England team overall is the best team to put on the 3 Lions in the last 15 – 20 years. Furthermore, there is also nothing to suggest they could not have won July’s final on grit and talent alone. Although, like the old cliché, it must be asked – is this England side and squad as good as people believe? And if so, was the full 26-man selection of players too good?
Alex Ferguson is believed to have once said, “give me Zidane and 10 pieces of stick and I will win you a Champions League”. Naturally, one must assume that Ferguson was talking in tongue and cheek was solely aiming to praise Zizou’. However, after watching this England team at the Euros, Fergie was not too far wrong in his analysis of football.
England started the Euros trying to fit in Bellingham, Foden, and Saka across the attacking three with Trent and Rice behind them, with Kane leading the line. Although much has been said of Southgate’s tactics, the fact there was at times four players, Saka, Kane, Jude, and Foden all either cutting in and sitting back to get a shot away or get more involved in the game does indeed show wither a stubbornness that we’ve seen before from Southgate or, something many would consider much worse in the modern system based game, pigeonholing your best players into the 11. I believe this happened at least in the first couple of games with starting Trent in midfield, believing a player can be a competent centre midfielder simply because they can pass, is tactical naivety at its finest and to say that Foden, Bellingham, and Saka did not deserve to play would be wrong too – each of them had seasons to remember. But choosing personnel over system certainly caused England to play beneath their best, despite the fatigued players across all teams we saw at this Euros. But are they, and the England squad more generally, as good as social media would have us believe?
The furore within and without the English camp after James McClean had the audacity to call out Declan Rice’s below par performances was something to behold. It was reminiscent of when Guardiola stated Wilshere was nothing special and that there were many of his quality and ilk in the Barcelona reserve side. But often, and what is underrepresented in football commentary is the over estimation of players simply because of social media and FT (Football Twitter/X*) more generally. A typical account may have the name of @DeccersTekkers or @FantasticFoden, which only attracts other likeminded England or City fans who would tend to agree with the page owner’s stance on their ‘idolo’ being as good as they think due to the tendency of the algorithm to create vacuous vacuum chambers. So, in hindsight, Pep was right (again), and one can make this point simply by when Rodri went off injured, which was met with much elation by the English commentary teams on both ITV and BBC. What should have been a game changing moment, turned out to be a mere fleeting moment in an overall entertaining final. Rodri’s replacement, Zubimendi did not cost £100 million and plays for the sixth best team in the Spanish League. Yet, he made Rice look far from the player British pundits and social media would have you believe him to be. Which goes back to the premise of Guardiola’s comment, there seems to be many Declan Rice standard players in Spain who are selling for far less than £100 million and are underrepresented in the hellscape of football debates on X. One person mentioned to me how people view Declan Rice, and other overly expensive players, is akin to how lads of a certain demographic and often fellow footballers view ugly designer clothes; just because they are expensive, they believe it to make players and the clothes better or more attractive than they truly are.
Even if these English players are not as good as social media would have you believe, there is no doubting their clear talent and capability. And it could be further argued that the players themselves do not decide their price tag, however one must question their mentality – considering how Rice responded to McClean in his subsequent interview. Perhaps Rice and England more generally should have been focused on the next game and improving their performance rather than external but fair and honest criticism. Declan Rice is the embodiment of the issues within and without English football – hence why I have dedicated a large swathe of this article to him. Overpriced, above average at best, and mentally weak from the evidence of the last two Euros and the run in for Arsenal in the 23/24 season. Another issue is the hype that surrounds other key English players – such as Bellingham, Foden, and Kyle Walker.
Walker, usually dependant in the system created by Pep at Man City was arguably England’s worst player at the Euros, the worst of a bad three or four talented players who just seemed not to have turned up. Often, people will mention Walker in the conversations of the best right back in Premier League history. Going on titles and accolades, it would be hard not to accede to this remark, however, as is the case in the modern game, often the eye test tells more than stats and trophies won. Would somebody say that Anderson was a better footballer than say Gerrard or Lampard because he has more PL medals? I am sure there would be some who would, but that statement is as accurate as Ronaldo’s freekicks at European Championships. Walker was at fault for several key goals against England – including Oyarzabal’s winner. Naturally, if this mistake were a solitary mishap made in the last 10 minutes of a long and arduous season, a fatigued Walker could – not by the social medica or the media – be forgiven. But the right back made the similar mistakes against Netherlands and Slovenia. He is certainly ‘more than pace’ but to rank him as the best right back in the world and in the last 35 years in England would be a fallacy – no matter what @WalkerzWonderz on X may say.
Perhaps the hype is real for some of these English players, perhaps those several fleeting moments after Bellingham scored the header in the first game and the last-minute overhead, the advertisement campaign, the leadership group promotion, the Hey Jude Adidas ‘saviour of the nation’ campaign was all worth it. However, apart from the moments of genius, there was truly little to justify how Jude Bellingham was heralded before the tournament. On X, most football fans were recognising the flaws in Bellingham’s game – with one X user writing – “Jude Bellingham has mastered the art of looking busy on a football pitch. The casuals love it, the analytics guys love it, I see through it. He is not elite in any sense of the word, closer to a McTominay than a Pedri or a Musiala. A 6/10 on his best day. Overrated.” Of course, the replies to this tweet erupted into a sparring match between people who love to argue on the internet with people they have never met and never will.
Someone who Bellingham had the pleasure of seeing constantly, both on and off the pitch, was Phil Foden, who started on the left but forever found himself and Jude competing for the same space in the central attacking areas – that’s without Kane dropping deep and Saka trying to cut in and shoot. Saka is no Arjen Robben and Kane is not Wayne Rooney, although if you listened to some of the commentary before the tournament and an offbeat remark by Rooney himself, you would be led to believe that Kane is a superior player to Rooney – again, another fallacy and remark which has fallen victim to social media tacticos and, Youtubers and analytic guys. Regardless of Kane and his shortcomings, all throughout the tournament, the debate raged on about who should start in the ten. Should have Southgate started Bellingham in the eight and Foden in the ten rather than on the left? In the final, Bellingham found himself on the left and Foden was in his alleged preferred position of just behind Kane, or often, beside him. But Foden, a player who benefits from Guardiola’s system at City went missing, as he often does for England, which again begs the question, is this England squad and certain individuals as good as the media would make out? One would have to say, perhaps not.To sum up, England squads consistently fail to live up the hype. The media are blamed, however, in 2024, we need to look closer to home and how social media accounts do the heavy lifting for average players. Not just for England but across the board – considering we still have X accounts dedicated to Anthony Martial in 2024. If England are to win anything going forward, there must be a realisation of what standard the players are at, when that happens, as well as playing the best team rather than the best eleven, the chances of winning a tournament will increase 5-fold.
