2 months ago
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LONDON: England manager Gareth Southgate praised his players for holding steady and seeing their way through a gritty, though not always pretty, 2-1 win over top-ranked Belgium in the Nations League at Wembley on Sunday.
“It was a brilliant test, it was just the test we needed,” he told reporters.
Southgate made nine changes to the side that beat Wales 3-0 in a friendly at Wembley on Thursday, and raised questions particularly by leaving out that game’s man of the match, creative midfielder Jack Grealish.
But the move paid off, with a five-man defence, including three right backs – Kieran Trippier playing on the left, Kyle Walker as a central defender and Trent Alexander-Arnold in his usual spot – largely keeping Belgium at bay.
“They caused us a lot of problems down the sides of our defensive block with overloading the wide areas, and we knew that would happen. But resolving those issues in real time, live, was difficult for the players, so it was a huge test to come through that,” Southgate said.
Walker was also pleased with how the defence had held up, and said Southgate’s words at halftime helped lift the England players against the top team in the FIFA world rankings.
“We defended well and stuck in, and I think that’s what you've got to do against top teams. They caused us problems in the first half, but Gareth gave a great team talk at halftime and we’ve gone out and gave a good performance to get us a victory,” he told the BBC.
Southgate acknowledged that sometimes teams have to grind out victories.
“Defensively you’ve got to be spot on, you can’t be loose in any way, shape or form, and the players took that on board,” he said.
“They showed tremendous composure, the whole team. Every time a player got beaten, there was a man there to tidy up.”
An own goal by Runar Mar Sigurjonsson and superb strikes by Christian Eriksen and Robert Skov gave Denmark a deserved 3-0 win over Iceland in their UEFA Nations League clash in Reykjavik on Sunday.
With the home side seemingly content to sit back and hit on the break, the Danes dominated possession in the first half, and their opening goal came from the last of the nine corners they forced before the interval.
Central defender Simon Kjaer rose highest to head the ball on target and Hannes Halldorsson batted it away, but it bounced off Sigurjonsson and crept over the line, with the referee awarding the goal despite protests from the Iceland keeper.
Sigurjonsson’s evening went from bad to worse early in the second half as his side pushed up to try to exploit a long throw.
Despite having his whole team in front of him, the midfielder tried a shot from distance that cannoned off a Danish player and bounced favourably for Eriksen, who snapped up the rebound.
Running from inside his own half, the Danish playmaker outpaced the Icelandic defence before calmly slotting the ball past Halldorsson to double his side’s advantage.
The best goal of the night was scored by winger Skov on the hour mark as he kept his balance long enough to curl a brilliant right-foot shot into the top corner to make it 3-0.
The result put Denmark third in Group 2 on four points, three behind leaders England.
Iceland are bottom of the group with no points after three games, having scored only once and conceded nine goals. – Reuters
English (United States)