England took on Hungary today at Wembley Stadium in London, in what was the 8th match out of 10 in World Cup 2022 qualification. England had already beaten Hungary 4-0 away in Budapest earlier this year, but they’re a more talented side than they appear at first and have gotten some famous results earlier this season.
The match ended 1-1, with both goals coming in the first half. Hungary took a surprising lead from the penalty spot via forward Rolland Sallai, who sent England keeper Jordan Pickford the wrong way as he slotted home. The actual penalty was earned by right back Loïc Négo, who collided with a high boot from England left back Luke Shaw just inside the box. The contact on Négo’s head was minimal, but the problem was Shaw having his boot that high up in the first place. It’s a long-established rule in football that your foot can’t be up high near the head and neck of other players, and Shaw has to know better there. He is asking for trouble with his foot that high up, and he wouldn’t have even needed to fly in like that if he was quicker to the ball. But he was lackadaisical in getting over to the bouncing loose ball, and Négo put him under pressure to make a clearance. Unfortunately, he did not clear the ball effectively.
England did get an equalizer 13 minutes later, having put their foot fully down on the gas pedal after the Hungary goal. The tying goal was courtesy of three Manchester City players – Jack Grealish, Phil Foden, and John Stones. Grealish was probably England’s best attacking player the whole match, and he won a foul in the right channel after some of his trademark nifty dribbling. Foden stood over the dead ball and delivered a very dangerous diagonal cross into the box. It was met at the far post by Stones, who simply stuck his foot out and the ball bounced off him and into the net. Wembley erupted in celebration, and it was great to see England scoring from a set piece.
The Three Lions had the better of the chances and the majority of the possession for the rest of the half and indeed the rest of the game, but they could not put the ball past Hungarian keeper Péter Gulácsi. He made several fine saves on Raheem Sterling, but overall the credit must go to Hungary manager Marco Rossi for his tactical set-up. They were in a 5-3-2 and set up very compact, making it hard to break them down. They also pressed England at precisely the right times, and England admittedly lacked ideas in terms of creating chances. I applaud Gareth Southgate for realizing that his initial tactical set-up was wrong and actually making substitutions, but today the problem was that he made the wrong substitution. Bringing on Bukayo Saka for Grealish was mystifying when both Sterling and Harry Kane were far more ineffective. Saka needed to come on, but not for Grealish. He was the only one really running at the Hungary back line, so to take him off almost did them a favor. It was just an overall disappointing performance on the pitch, but credit to the Hungarians for playing well and forcing England to stumble slightly on their path to World Cup 2022.
England are still atop Group I, but their lead has narrowed to 3 points after Poland’s victory over Albania. England have a massive game against Albania in a month, and the last one is against minnows San Marino. Win either of those, England are virtually in. Ideally they would take 3 points in both games, and they will indeed need to be better than they were today against a highly-motivated Albanian team.
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Unfortunately, the first 10-15 minutes of this match were marred by clashes between the London Metropolitan Police and some of the Hungarian supporters inside the stadium. I normally am not one to defend the police, but there is a section of the Hungarian supporters that are absolute knobheads. They held up a banner protesting the England players kneeling before the opening whistle, and were jeering loudly when one of England’s Black players touched the ball. Absolute racist bastards and the images of them throwing punches at the police were disgusting to watch. It seems the police eventually got the situation under control and at least one arrest was made, but I couldn’t believe just how brazen the actions were of those few dozen supporters. I know for a fact that not all Hungarians are racist hooligans, but that loud minority of them is very loud indeed.
Which begs the question: where is UEFA on this? Why has the Hungarian FA even been allotted tickets for their supporters at this match? There is supposed to be a ban on fan attendance at their home matches for this exact sort of behavior the last time England played Hungary, so why are they allowed in our stadium? It’s this sort of thing that makes the whole “Say No to Racism” campaign feel hollow and frankly fake. When actual racist incidents happen, UEFA does nothing about them and leaves it up to the local authorities to sort out the shitheads. Hey UEFA, fucking punish this kind of conduct! Lifetime bans for fans who engage in racist conduct. Points deductions from teams if fans engage in racist conduct. I understand that England is not free from sin in this department, so these rules would apply to our fans as well. The fans also must self-police more effectively and call out racist conduct when they see it! I’m fed up with this behavior and it needs to stop.
4-4-2 