Declan Rice

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Do people watching England Vs Croatia still think we should be spending £60-70m on Rice?

Croatia have dominated midfield since the England players realised you can't run around at high pace all game, especially in this sunshine.

He's so limited. If our goal is to play out from the back I just don't see how he makes it happen.
 

Bebestation

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He is always blocking the central area.

Croatia have no ability to get past him and have to play out wide all the time.

I think he is amazing
 

dutchred

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I haven't seen enough of either of them but on today's showing Phillips looks a better all round player
 

hobbers

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Rice is limited on the ball and carrying it forwards. Same as Lindelof. Same as AWB. Same as McTominay and Fred.

He's the sort of midfielder you can only play if you play top quality ball-carrying midfielders either side of him. Getting Rice without a system like that isn't going to solve our obvious issues.
 

golden_blunder

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On today’s showing I wouldn’t take him

but he’s obviously been asked to play like this because it’s not his usual game

so don’t judge him on this one
 

Bebestation

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Rice is limited on the ball and carrying it forwards. Same as Lindelof. Same as AWB. Same as McTominay and Fred.

He's the sort of midfielder you can only play if you play top quality ball-carrying midfielders either side of him. Getting Rice without a system like that isn't going to solve our obvious issues.
It works because Rice allows you to play another attacker.

Look how forward Philips is he to because Rice protects his central area.
 

SoCross

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Care to elaborate? My post genuinely wasn’t criticising the player. Like I said he’s a solid presence protecting his CBs. Stays central as much as possible even at the cost of offering a passing angle.

No doubt he has been asked to play this role. How is it like at West Ham?

Edit: him being so focused on his role allowed Phillips to be more forward thinking.
 

criticalanalysis

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These last 20mins is Rice's chance to prove he's better than this. I think Philipps and the team in general is tiring.

He can't just happily sit in front of the back four and play it smart positionally. Reminds me of Lindelof.

Needs to do more individually.
 

golden_blunder

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Care to elaborate? My post genuinely wasn’t criticising the player. Like I said he’s a solid presence protecting his CBs. Stays central as much as possible even at the cost of offering a passing angle.

No doubt he has been asked to play this role. How is it like at West Ham?

Edit: him being so focused on his role allowed Phillips to be more forward thinking.
Sorry I was just answering your question

he is playing like a shadow of himself, it’s obvious that he’s been given instructions
 

bosnian_red

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These last 20mins is Rice's chance to prove he's better than this. I think Philipps and the team in general is tiring.

He can't just happily sit in front of the back four and play it smart positionally. Reminds me of Lindelof.

Needs to do more individually.
Hes played a part in Croatia literally doing nothing offensively apart from trying to get down the wings? Take him out and the midfield is way more open to be bypassed. Mings and Stones are horrendous but haven't been tested in large part because of Rice just closing down good spaces.
 

SoCross

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Sorry I was just answering your question

he is playing like a shadow of himself, it’s obvious that he’s been given instructions
No worries. Would take over from Matic if he came here, no one else in the squad with his qualities.
 

Tarrou

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Do people watching England Vs Croatia still think we should be spending £60-70m on Rice?

Croatia have dominated midfield since the England players realised you can't run around at high pace all game, especially in this sunshine.

He's so limited. If our goal is to play out from the back I just don't see how he makes it happen.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks we should spend that much on him
 

DWelbz19

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It’s always been the case — whatever he offers from midfield isn’t something that shouldn’t be readily available from other holding midfielders across Europe’s bigger leagues.
 

Bebestation

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He is always in the most dangerous areas before Croatia geet there.

He may be out at LB at one moment which allows for the CBS to stay in position.

Absolutely nothing has come from Croatia centrally.

I would love to have him as an option in our squad.
 

sullydnl

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He's being used as the more defensive of the midfield two with Phillips, there to screen the defence and protect what is a weak CB pairing. A conservative role in what was a conservative team selection. And he has done it well enough, being a large part of why Croatia haven't been able to play through the centre, or expose the CBs.

I have no idea if he's the right fit for our team or whether there are better cheaper options out there across Europe but criticising him for not doing things he isn't expected to do in this particular England team seems strange. "He can't just happily sit in front of the back four" doesn't make sense when his job is literally to sit in front of the back four. If he were to stop doing that, then he should be criticised.
 

Zoo

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Showed intelligent positioning just to put out some potential fires. Did well.
 

Zoo

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Yep Rio Ferdinand just called him superb. He knows the game.
 

theklr

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Obvious the guy is a very good positionally defensive footballer. Negates so
much room for Croatia.
 

RedRonaldo

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Nothing special today, but decent overall. I am more impress with Phillips though.
 

bosnian_red

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Do people watching England Vs Croatia still think we should be spending £60-70m on Rice?

Croatia have dominated midfield since the England players realised you can't run around at high pace all game, especially in this sunshine.

He's so limited. If our goal is to play out from the back I just don't see how he makes it happen.
Don't care about the money, I think what we lack in midfield is a DM. Our midfield gets bypassed so often and our CBs look vulnerable as a result. Rice makes everything so solid, even with Lindelof at CB. Rice is decent enough on the ball that he can keep it safe and help shield and let Pogba and Bruno dominate the game. That's what we need.
 

#07

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Don't care about the money, I think what we lack in midfield is a DM. Our midfield gets bypassed so often and our CBs look vulnerable as a result. Rice makes everything so solid, even with Lindelof at CB. Rice is decent enough on the ball that he can keep it safe and help shield and let Pogba and Bruno dominate the game. That's what we need.
I have questions about our back line being able to work the ball to our attackers with a #6 like Rice.

In our recent loss to Liverpool, they boxed off our back line with a high press and left our attackers stranded. Is Rice going to play through that kind of pressure? I don't see it.

Feels like a replacement for Matic, when what we need is a replacement for Carrick.
 

RedRonaldo

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Nothing special about Trippier today. I am more impressed with Mount though.
Which isn't wrong.
Whoscored give Phillips the highest rating today with 7.7, Mount got 7, Trippier got 6.85 and Rice got 6.65. Which I kind of agree with.
 

theklr

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I have questions about our back line being able to work the ball to our attackers with a #6 like Rice.

In our recent loss to Liverpool, they boxed off our back line with a high press and left our attackers stranded. Is Rice going to play through that kind of pressure? I don't see it.

Feels like a replacement for Matic, when what we need is a replacement for Carrick.
With Maguire and Torres or Varane, he wouldnt need to very much
 

lex talionis

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I hope we don’t break the bank for Rice. He’d walk into our starting XI but he’s nowhere close to being the special player the British hype machine would have us believe.

If after Sancho and a CB we have 50m for Rice, sure.
 

OrcaFat

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He was utterly, utterly unspectacular today. But his positional play was outstanding.

Sure, you’d like to think you get a more expansive contribution but he proved he has the discipline and understanding of the game to play no.6. He was marked pretty persistently when our CBs had the ball which gave our CBs loads of space (Maguire would exploit that very well). When Croatia went to close down the CBs Rice then gave us easy out balls. He kept his passing very simple but was accurate and composed.

Phillips played very well but in a totally different role.

Looking forward to see Rice against the other two group opponents, and expect his game to expand a bit to suit the game situations. Let’s see how he does there but solid, intelligent and mature today.
 
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Bebestation

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Hes played a part in Croatia literally doing nothing offensively apart from trying to get down the wings? Take him out and the midfield is way more open to be bypassed. Mings and Stones are horrendous but haven't been tested in large part because of Rice just closing down good spaces.
Exactly a midfield of Phillips, mount and Ward Prowse would be energetically going around everywhere leaving modric and kovacic spaces to try and pass through.

Rice is just positionally a step ahead of everyone for the benefit Ofn his team.

You can feel that England has an additional attacker due to his ability to play the CDM.

Phillips was up the pitch a lot of the game with mount.

The only time the ball went past Rice was when Croatia made crossed field passes.
 

BlahRules

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May look he did nothing but he kept Croatia tro quite and didn't let them dictate the game. Philips will look better on the eye as he was allowed to go forward which can only happen because of Rice.
 
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