Matt Maher: Forget the flair – the functional way is best

Germany’s Leon Goretzka might well have delivered the quote of the summer when making the above remark earlier this week.

On the one hand, his words reflected joy at how Euro 2020, with the return of supporters and even capacity crowds in some venues, has marked another step along the road to normality.

There was also, meanwhile, recognition of how few things capture the collective attention of a nation quite like an international football tournament.

In summer’s like these everyone has an opinion and is not afraid to voice it. Goretzka’s comments were in response to the outcry which had greeted German boss Joachim Low’s team selection for last Saturday’s Group F encounter with Portugal.

Prior to kick-off, social media was ablaze with armchair pundits, all venting disbelief at how Low could stick with the same starting XI and system which had flattered to deceive in defeat to France a few days earlier. A couple of hours later, with Portugal emphatically dispatched 4-2, a fair portion of humble pie was being swallowed, along with the acceptance a man who has held arguably the biggest job in international football for 15 years might occasionally know what he is doing.

Of course, you are only as good as your last performance. After Germany came close to crashing out of the tournament in midweek, the critics are back with a vengeance.

One suspects Low and several of his counterparts are envious of England’s rather unremarkable progress to the knockout stages.

As anyone who has picked up a newspaper in the last fortnight will know, that doesn’t mean Gareth Southgate has been immune from flak. Far from it.

While some of the criticism aimed at England’s rather functional approach has been fair, much of it has been a tad over-the-top, apparently based on a view of international football which doesn’t match the reality.

The most successful tournament teams, for instance, are rarely those who play the most eye-catching football or look great in the group stage. Italy, be warned.

Back at Euro 2004, the Czech Republic were a joy to behold. Yet it was unfancied Greece who ground their way to glory, a trick repeated 12 years later by Portugal.

The latter had drawn all three of their group matches and only reached the knockout rounds as one of the best third-placed finishers, before going on to beat Croatia in extra-time, Poland on penalties, Wales and then finally France, again in extra-time.

Indeed, chart the journey of every recent tournament winner and you will find unconvincing performances and results which, at the time, saw them written-off.

Germany’s route to winning the 2014 World Cup included a frenetic 2-2 draw with Ghana and a nervy, late extra-time win over Algeria. Four years later, France’s 0-0 group stage bore draw with Denmark had observers scoffing at their pre-tournament favourites tag. Yet when it came to the crunch at the semi-final stage, Didier Deschamps’ team were able to edge out a Belgium team which had produced arguably the performance of the summer to see off Brazil in the previous round.

All of which is not to say England don’t have questions to answer, or won’t need to raise their game if they are to progress deep into the competition. Merely, there is nothing wrong with having been unremarkable so far.

Having kept 15 clean sheets in their last 19 matches, Southgate’s team has a solid enough foundation. The pragmatic gameplan seen in the group stages, meanwhile, might actually work perfectly against a Germany team which, while potentially explosive in attack, is also ridden with inconsistency and vulnerable at the back.

You can expect tactics to be at the forefront of the discussion over the coming days, yet mindset is just as important, perhaps more so.

The sense England now find themselves in the “easier” side of the draw for the knockout rounds reflects the tendency, you might simply put it down to human nature, to consider the name rather than the team.

Meetings with Germany, perhaps understandably given their major tournament record against England since 1966, generally provoke feelings of dread among Three Lions supporters.

But in truth, this is not a stellar German line-up. In the past 12 months alone Low’s team have been hammered 6-0 by Spain and humbled at home by North Macedonia. They are beatable and England, past record not withstanding, will head into Tuesday night’s match as favourites.

For a nation who have typically exited tournaments the first time they encounter a major power, victory would still deliver a statement and exorcise a few demons.

It would not ease the pressure on Southgate. Quite the opposite. The prize for seeing off England’s ultimate bogey team would be raised expectations and the near assumption they would defeat either Sweden or Ukraine in the quarter-finals with relative ease. If only it worked like that.

On the flip side, defeat would provide Southgate’s critics with confirmation they had been right to question his approach all along.

England’s manager has carried an air of quiet confidence into this tournament. Rather quickly, we will find out whether that was based on clarity of thought or merely a bluff.

In the meantime, millions more of us will pick over his options and debate the strategy. None of our opinions really count, of course, but Goretzka was right, it’s much more preferable to discussing the pandemic.