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England Go Again During International Break

The international break is almost upon us once again as the football world issues a collective sigh, although in truth, it does feel like the fast paced action of domestic football means that we should have a break every so often. That point of view clearly isn’t unanimous across all different corners of the game and we can understand that, but perhaps opening your mind up to the possibility of accepting the international break would ensure that you enjoy it even more in the long run. Then again, maybe a break every so often so we can focus on other things isn’t the worst idea.

We’ll be focusing on the return of England for the sake of this piece, because their two fixtures over the course of the next week or so give us cause for intrigue. Again, that won’t be universal, but the level of interest in the national team has certainly grown ever since Russia. We aren’t trying to suggest that millions upon millions will tune into any given game because that’s just an outright lie, but Gareth Southgate has definitely done a great job of uniting the country in this sense.

We aren’t telling you what to do with your international break one way or the other but you should absolutely consider watching these two games, if only to see how the squad performs. The build-up to big tournaments is long and sometimes a bit dull, so we need to find the positives where we can. Euro 2020 will be here before we know it and it’s important for England to try everything they can in order to build off of what happened in Russia, because if not, it’ll just be seen as a one off achievement and that’d be such an unbelievable shame.

England vs USA

Nobody should sit and pretend like this is about anything other than Wayne Rooney, and a lot of people will have a lot of different viewpoints on that. On the one hand it’ll be interesting to see what kind of game we get here, even though the biggest criticism of all is that it’s a friendly that just doesn’t need to happen. Perhaps if encounters like this didn’t exist then we’d have less congestion when it comes to the busy winter period – but then again, a lot of folks will choose to see that as some kind of conspiracy theory and that’s alright too.

The Americans have had a tough time of things over the last twelve months or so, after failing to qualify for the 2018 FIFA World Cup. They joined the likes of the Netherlands, Chile and Italy on the bench, which surprised a lot of folks given how common it is to see them competing on football’s biggest stage. Alas, they’re choosing to look ahead to the future and you can’t deny that they’re growing as a footballing nation, and this game will almost certainly mean more to them than it will to the English.

In terms of Rooney specifically, the criticisms can be understood – given that he’s essentially being handed another cap for the sake of it. It’s happening in a game whereby he doesn’t really need to play but the links to the MLS are there, and to be honest, it just feels like something that we all need to deal with and move on from. Yes, it’ll frustrate everyone right up to the moment that he’s gifted a penalty (you know it’s going to happen), but the only thing that we can do is look ahead to the inevitable return of domestic football once again.

In terms of the match itself it seems, and feels, like it’s going to be fairly irrelevant, although there’s almost no denying that it’s going to be entertaining. The Americans are going to come out all guns blazing in search of a big result, but you just know that they lack the quality to ever really challenge England in any way, shape or form throughout the course of 90 minutes. We think a simple yet effective 2-0 triumph is going to be on the cards, with England picking up what some would describe as much needed momentum.

England vs Croatia

Here we go again. The heartache of the 2018 FIFA World Cup semi final between these two teams will linger long into the night for England, and for good reason. They were around half an hour away from their first World Cup Final since winning the tournament back in 1966, before it all fell apart before their very eyes. Croatia, on the other hand, experienced heartbreak of their own in the form of their loss to France in the final, and it’ll be interesting to see how both respond when they go head to head in their second Nations League meeting.

This game has slightly more stakes attached to it than the United States encounter, purely because of the Nations League. It’ll be intriguing to see how they set up respectively given that there seems to have been an unofficial rivalry that has formed between the two in recent years, and especially in the last few months. Both nations will be expected to qualify for the 2020 European Championships with relative ease, but that doesn’t mean they won’t be eager to rubber stamp it, because we all know that momentum can go a long way in this game especially against a country closely linked to your own.

England have a few new faces that could pop up such as Callum Wilson, which further proves the point that many have made in regards to Gareth Southgate and the average age of the England team. Even when we aren’t talking about age, it’s just refreshing to see a manager take chances in the form of giving new players a chance to prove themselves on the international stage. It’s not something that we’ve seen consistently from the national team, and it should give everyone hope as we look ahead to the next few years.

With the game itself it should be interesting to see how things develop from the first minute until the very last, because England have been known to start quickly. We think that they’ll try and set the pace early but the overwhelming threat of the Croats’ midfield will take over, with the WC finalists taking the lead within the first 20 minutes. Then, we think England will equalise, before stretching their legs in the second half and winning the game 3-1. It sounds overly optimistic but they’re more than capable of getting the job done, and things have never looked brighter with Euro 2020 getting closer and closer.