Euro 2024: The End
Spain are champions. And England should make a change.
And with that, the curtain comes down on Euro 2024.
Spain have been crowned champions. Deservedly so.
In the end, the best team of the tournament did for a team that had relied on its brilliant players to produce moments of brilliance, one positive performance in the semi-finals aside.
Spain, all the way through Euro 2024, looked like a team performing to a plan — not one that was overly complicated or rigid — but a plan nevertheless.
For England, it had frankly been the opposite. And when Gareth Southgate did let the shackles off, the Three Lions’ players seemed to be too fearful to really go for it for any sustained amount of time.
That didn’t matter when they scored twice in quick succession in the last 16 against Slovakia. Nor did it matter when they beat the Netherlands thanks to Ollie Watkins’ last-gasp strike.
But on Sunday in Berlin, with 17 minutes of normal time remaining when Cole Palmer found the bottom-left corner from the edge of the area, it did matter.
England, though, went back into their shells. For whatever reason — fatigue, tactics or fear, combined with Spain’s quality — the Three Lions cowered, rather than roared.
Despite the elation of Palmer’s equaliser, despite Southgate’s sprinkling of bravery having worked, when the Chelsea man replaced Kobbie Mainoo following Watkins’ introduction for Kane, and despite Rodri, the official Player of the Tournament, England did not look to press on.
Flashback to three years ago — it was the same story, only on that occasion, England took the lead against Italy at a buoyant Wembley with only two minutes on the clock. The Azzurri were on the ropes, but England couldn’t take advantage.
Flashback three years prior to that: Kieran Trippier has curled in a fantastic free-kick against Croatia. Again, England can’t add a second. Again, they go on to cede control. Again, they lose.
And that, unfortunately, will almost certainly forever be the story for Southgate: He’s the nearly man. A wonderful human being, who deserves all the “love” he craves and all the respect he has earned. He has done wonders for English football; he has turned a team that was a laughing stock, that many fans — including this writer — had no particular positive feeling for, into a squad that sums up everything that is great about the country.
The multiculturalism, the work rate and the grit and desire to keep going. He has given youth a chance. He has nurtured players through dark moments and stood by those who have served him so well.
For the most part, they have repaid him. Jordan Pickford was a man mountain in yet another Euros final, as he was in 2021. He didn’t deserve to be on the losing team. Harry Kane was poor, but scored three crucial goals through the tournament. Bukayo Saka, a victim of horrific, disgusting abuse in the wake of his penalty miss in the Euro 2020 final, was arguably England’s best outfielder. Mainoo, Palmer, Watkins and Ivan Toney took their chances to impress when they came. Some others, bizarrely perhaps, weren’t given much of a look-in.
But truly, this time, it all just seemed too much for Southgate. In 2018, it was a genuine shock to see England go so far. At Euro 2020, the novelty of reaching a final showed that there really was something here, and that next time could be better. In 2022, one lapse in concentration from Kane was all that separated the Three Lions and the eventual runners-up, France. But this time, England had the best squad. They were made the favourites not through some deluded sense of entitlement, but because they were, well, the best team in Europe.
Ultimately, that level of expectation perhaps proved too much. But, for all that, they were close. So close.
And losing to this Spain team should be no shame, though it is just a reminder that you cannot continue on a path of conservatism and pragmatism forever.
Luis de la Fuente has shrugged off the possession obsession of the Luis Enrique era and introduced a fresh way of playing. Sure, Spain can still control a match, with Fabian Ruiz dovetailing wonderfully with Rodri, and Pedri, prior to his injury, in midfield, but this is not the death-by-a-thousand passes approach employed by his predecessor.
Lamine Yamal and Nico Williams provided the spark with their direct approach — their pace and skill and immense talent. Dani Olmo, a super-sub until Pedri’s tournament-ending injury — proved how Spanish football has moved on from just producing silky playmakers: Sure, the RB Leipzig man can pick a pass, but he is robust and lanky and nippy, too. He’d be a joy to watch in the Premier League.
Spain deserved it, and they made history — they are the first team to be crowned champions of Europe four times.
Southgate, on the other hand, has to take this decision out of the FA’s hands. They want him to carry on, but it’s fair on nobody. It’s time for him to step aside and for another manager to build on the foundations he has so tirelessly built.