FIFA 2022: Gareth Southgate reveals plans against France; Promises All-out Attack and Anti-Mbappe Plans
Gareth Southgate, England’s manager, has made a statement that insists England is now ready to make their entire nation “proud” with a fearless and attacking performance upcoming against France in their quarterfinal clash.
Southgate has stated that he has no intention of letting his players go on the pitch and “just cover up on the ropes.” Instead, he wants them to fiercely attack the defending champions, France, with blazing guns.
England has scored 12 goals in their initial four matches under Southgate’s guidance, and he has stated that he has no intention of changing the ongoing mentality and that the night will belong to the English heroes.
He was asked in an interview before the battle semi-finals if he wants his attacking approach maintained against the French, to which Southgate replied, “Yeah, without a doubt. There is no point going into a game like this and just covering up and sitting on the ropes. We believe we can cause problems with the ball and intend to do that.”
South Gate a man with the plan against France
“We’ve beaten some big teams. We know we have the experience of high-pressure nights behind us, and as a team, we’ve been resilient through a lot of situations, but they all prepare you for nights like this.”
“We got to the first final for 55 years; this is a quarterfinal. We’ve won a semi-final and been to a semi-final of the World Cup before.”
“But, of course, it is a big game against a high-quality opponent. Everything that has happened in the past is history; it all comes down to Saturday night.”
“What they have been through and what they’ve learnt and the way we have gone about things in this tournament.
“They’ve understood what we have been trying to do. They’ve kept calm and shown belief in what they’ve been asked to do and shown a great mentality about the way they’ve played.”
“Always these nights are always nights that bring millions of people together…they will remember where they were and we want to give them another night to be proud of.”
The French front is the reigning world champions, who recently became the first defending champions to break the champion’s curse in the World Cup. The French have also got their hands on the best player of the next generation and currently on the planet, Kylian Mbappe, the star player of the 2018 World Cup.
With a lot of challenges from the French, Southgate is not intimidated, says he has an anti-Mbappe plan. They believe that the best solution to deal with Mbappé is to place an equally dangerous player in front of him, as to exploit his defensive limitations.
He said that England is a team full of belief and hope that they can win and bring the Cup home. They have come a long way in terms of the players’ mentality. He said,
“Belief. We’ve got to recognize that four years ago if we had played France, we could have talked a good game, but we genuinely didn’t have the evidence of big performances, experiences of big nights that could give us the faith that we could win.”
“Now we’ve had a lot of those nights, and we have a lot of those attributes. We know, of course, at this stage, they will be very evenly matched games. But we know we have the quality to win the game.”
“We’ve got to stick on the path we’ve been heading. We’ve done a lot of things very well. There are things we are going to have to do better to get a result against France. The basis of our game is good with and without the ball.”
“We need to make sure that the detail is as close to perfect. We are never gonna get perfection, but we have to get as close to that as we can.”
