Cymru World Cup 2022 - Group B

[aberbeeg]

Dec 1, 2022 22:25:07 GMT majorraglan said:

Some of the results of the last few days have surprised a lot of people. The “smaller” less fancied teams triumphing against the bigger nations has shown there are no easy games and that nothing can be taken for granted, that said my personal belief is that Wales should have been a lot more competitive in our 3 games than we actually were. I don’t believe for 1 minute the players were just happy to be there, I think the argent should have been the round of 16. I didn't expect much from the England game and while I had no expectations of strolling to a result against the US or Iran, I expected us to be competitive and I’d never thought we’d be as poor as we were.

I’ve no idea as to what’s gone on whether it’s a case of being under prepared, over confident, unfit , poor management decisions in terms of selections, poor tactics, just not being good enough, issues within the squad etc etc or a combination of all the above, all I know is that we weren’t at the races in some of the games and it hurts, it really hurts. As the man in charge Page has to shoulder some of the responsibility.

Think you sum it up pretty well. Not once did we throw a punch in anger in any of our matches. Most smaller teams have at least “ had a go” in at least one or two matches . I can really only think of ourselves and Qatar who went out like a wet lettuce with zero fight.

No goals from open play and conceded six wasn’t really what we were hoping for was it?   

Page definitely needs to look at himself and his coaching staff because I’m convinced they could definitely have done more ( even tactics wise) 

[hooky]

Page is not going to improve. He has had a long, long time in the Wales setup and for it to result in the shambles we saw just beggars belief. I am still shocked how poor and totally 'irrelevant' we were.

[saints19]

www.bbc.co.uk/sport/av/football/63810360

Bit disappointing to hear these comments from Roberts, saying we've overachieved and have misjudged our level, it suggests a level of pessimism has filtered through to the players that isn't really useful. From a sports psychology point of view they should be believing they can get results in every game they play. It is possible as we've seen in this World Cup for anyone of a reasonably decent standard to get a result against the best teams in the world. We're not that bad and I'm not sure I'd agree we've "overachieved" - I'd say qualifying for two Euros (where the top 24 teams in Europe qualify) and one World Cup (top 13?) with this generation would be about par for the course.

If the players are this downbeat, then this is definitely something Page and the management team needs to work on ahead of the Euro 2024 campaign. It will be nip and tuck to qualify for that but it's completely realistic to expect us to challenge hard.

[hooky]

Little old Wales bullshit isn't it

We were outstanding chasing shadows against England (only because they did not concede a hatful eh Page?)

Again - I know he is a poor human being but I would so much rather have Giggs in charge. He never would have been so defeatist about things

[saints19]

Giggs is still in serious legal proceedings, the outcome of which are uncertain, and Page is on a 4 year contract. I wouldn't say Giggs's performance as manager was better or worse than Page's either tbh. His Euros campaign was only barely successful at the 11th hour and only because certain results went our way along the way, like Slovakia beating Hungary. Changing manager isn't an option at this point, Page needs the full backing of the fans. And even if we did make a change in future, unless Giggs has been fully exonerated by the trial outcome, we should go elsewhere.

[dai]

I don't understand why he says we've misjudged our level. We went into the the WC ranked around a similar level to USA and Iran but were easily outperformed by both. I don't recall any players saying 'we're shit now don't expect much' before the competition began. This negative self talk is poorly timed after all the hype leading up to the WC.

But at least he's honest and shows that the players do have an insight into our decline and situation, as opposed to Kieffer's 'can't wait to knock England out' and Sorba's 'We don't fear England' nonsense. I do agree with him that we are going to plateau as a footballing nation, but those three displays wasn't us plateauing, it was us bombing it, and badly. As proven in the past few days, the smaller, lesser nations CAN have a go - why couldn't we? 

I'm finding all the post tournament interviews with Page very negative and self depreciating too (maybe he's been reading my posts, ha), saying how fantastic the players have been, and how we shouldn't say a bad word about them, how we've done well to get here, blah blah blah. I haven't felt any real, meaningful disappointment from the camp at all, and that's strange. It's almost like they'd resigned themselves to the fact that they'd be unable to compete from the off.

I don't know anymore, I just find it all very blase and strange. 

[hooky]

Roberts was extremely poor in this tournament, on the back of his poor club form, and he can speak for himself perhaps. Most of the rest of that team played well below their level. I hate that crap mentality being around the team

[iot]

I think we need to be careful that all of this negativity doesn't have a tangible impact going forward. Thinking back to Austria, they qualified for Euro 16 with a near perfect record if I remember correctly and were seen as dark horses for the tournament. They bombed out badly, and there appeared to be a lot of negativity / apathy around them in the WC campaign, where they ended up below us, the Serbs and the Irish. They haven't been great since and they're still getting poor crowds / interest.

I hope we see much more of the type of defiance the Red Wall showed after the England game, standing there with the players and singing the anthem until the end, than the scale of negativity many on here are coming out with. More 'Yma o hyd' and less of the spoilt attitude.

[mrpicton79]

That is disappointing. Although ironically that defeatist/unambitious attitude just reflects how he played throughout the tournament, so perhaps it shouldn't be that surprising.

Looking back it was extraordinary how many players we had out on the field with a seemingly similar attitude....just walking around the pitch not looking arsed in the slightest that they were playing in a WC. If we genuinely had that many players carrying injuries/not being fit then it's more understandable but it would be nice to know.

[talyfan]

www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0dmv8wn - Feast of Football World Cup Debrief.

Good listen if you've got an hour spare.

[rushy]

Dec 2, 2022 21:55:55 GMT saints19 said:

www.bbc.co.uk/sport/av/football/63810360

Bit disappointing to hear these comments from Roberts, saying we've overachieved and have misjudged our level, it suggests a level of pessimism has filtered through to the players that isn't really useful. From a sports psychology point of view they should be believing they can get results in every game they play. It is possible as we've seen in this World Cup for anyone of a reasonably decent standard to get a result against the best teams in the world. We're not that bad and I'm not sure I'd agree we've "overachieved" - I'd say qualifying for two Euros (where the top 24 teams in Europe qualify) and one World Cup (top 13?) with this generation would be about par for the course.

If the players are this downbeat, then this is definitely something Page and the management team needs to work on ahead of the Euro 2024 campaign. It will be nip and tuck to qualify for that but it's completely realistic to expect us to challenge hard.

Just viewed this and I can't believe the defeatist attitude from Connor Roberts, those negative comments should not be made public in the manner he has shown in this interview, there is no sense of disappointment in what went wrong, just a complete acceptance of being a loser, it's absolutely shocking and shows exactly why he performed so badly .
I would drop him from the next squad with an attitude like that , but worryingly does it also show the negative mentality surrounding the rest of them during the competition, maybe there really was a "Just happy to be here" mantra .

[jbt95]

I think what Roberts means is we can’t expect every tournament to turn into 2016.

We massively over achieved in 2016. Big countries don’t even do what we did that year.

2020 / 21 was about right, got through the group in second just about.

2022 below what we expected.

Just a reminder Italy haven’t played a World Cup knock out match since 2006.

[cymro]

I think I said in a previous post, the more tournaments we qualify for, the more we see that some go well and some don't. Same applies to serial qualifiers. As alluded to above, in our 3 tournaments we've had the complete mixed bag: overachieved, about par, and underachieved. I think we just suffer from this anxiety that we never truly know when our next tournament will be, so we wish and hope each one can be memorable, and we were spoilt with the 2016 success let's face it.

I dont think there's anything wrong with players trying to lift themselves a bit when the disapointment is raw and fresh... I'm sure all the self evaluation comments about how we underachieved will come out in the build up to the next campaign starting in March.

[marsvolta]

The crazy thing is that the current squad and management team are getting more stick for poor performances in the World Cup than the previous Wales teams that didn’t qualify for all those years.

[dai]

That's only because there's been raised expectations this time. You cannot blame people for being incredibly disappointed after our performances after the success of 2016 and qualifying for the last Euro's.

[eppingblue1]

Dec 9, 2022 10:26:48 GMT marsvolta said:

The crazy thing is that the current squad and management team are getting more stick for poor performances in the World Cup than the previous Wales teams that didn’t qualify for all those years.

I agree with you. I except, I fall well and truly into the "happy to have been there camp" but the biggest disappointment for me of the last 8 years was the failure to qualify for Russia. Looking back that was a really dreadful campaign. To those with high expectations, we were 50+ plus years without qualifying for reason, you should make the best of it when we do.

One thing I would say about Qatar, the anthems apart, I thought the support we gave from the stands was poor. Seemed very flat to me.  

[allezlesrouges]

Dec 9, 2022 10:26:48 GMT marsvolta said:

The crazy thing is that the current squad and management team are getting more stick for poor performances in the World Cup than the previous Wales teams that didn’t qualify for all those years.

This is why perspective is important. It's okay to be disappointed with how we did, but in the context of us achieving history and putting our nation on the map, overall I think people should be proud that we got there and got the monkey off our back

As a nation now, we no longer have a monkey on our back for anything. We have multiple players over 100 caps, qualified for Euros & WC, qualified for back to back tournaments, made a semi final. I guess we just need to establish the transition away from the last of the 2016 lot, and beyond that continue being tournament regulars. It might feel like a flat line, but establishing ourselves like that will be an achievement if we can pull it off

[jimbo82]

Something just struck me: In our last 3 tournaments we've gone out at the Semi-final, Round of 16 and Group Stage.

Exactly the same as Germany! Just a shame we didn't get to Brazil 2014..

[cymro]

Totally understand everyone feeling disappointed. I was bitterly disappointed with how it played out but I struggle to get angry about it like some people do as this group of players have given us so much joy in recent years. We won't be the only team scratching their heads at how poorly it went - look at Denmark after their outstanding few years. Another point to make, Serbia have qualified for the last 2 world cups but have failed to qualify for the last 2 euros, which is much easier to qualify for. Figure that one out. Football campaigns rely heavily on positive momentum and we didnt have it this time round. That's football for you. If we fail to qualify for the euros then I'd agree there's a bigger problem at play within the setup but hard to come to that conclusion based on one bad finals group stage. Agree though going forward if we keep qualifying we should lower the hype slightly and act more as if it's the norm for us to be on the big stage. First world cup in 64 years though, I can forgive everyone for going a bit over the top and getting excited. World cup may well not come again for quite a while.

[jbt95]

Dec 9, 2022 10:07:00 GMT cymro said:

I think I said in a previous post, the more tournaments we qualify for, the more we see that some go well and some don't. Same applies to serial qualifiers.

Exactly that, no team keeps having great tournaments. It’s impossible. Teams must finish 3rd and 4th!

[CrackityJones]

Good to see plenty of constructive reflections on our disappointing performance now the dust has settled and the more histrionic posters have got it out of their system.

It was a massive achievement for us to qualify and to get the monkey off our back as Allez said above. Got a feeling we wont have to wait so long for the next one.

[dai]

I will also add that people were mostly disappointed by the manner of our performances rather than the actual results/failing to get out of the group. I didn't expect to get out of the group - knew the USA were much better, and Iran terribly underestimated. Even the pragmatic posters on here were highlighting Iran's recent poor results.  Failing to get out was about right imo, failing to perform wasn't.

To be called the joint worst team there (along with Qatar) makes the WC memorable for all the wrong reasons.

[insertname]

But if it was offered to you going into the play offs, would you have taken guaranteed qulaification with the caveat of then being considered the worst team at the finals? I’m pretty sure most would as this time round was mainly a chance to make sure Bale got his World Cup appearance and goal and, as said above, to reset the clock so our association with the World Cup is no longer solely 1958, an era before colour television. People can add all sorts of labels to Wales contribution to this World Cup but one thing they can’t change is that Wales we’re there deservedly after qualifying on our own merits. That’s still something to be proud of despite how it turned out.

[rushy]

Points taken, but just to be clear my disappointment has been aimed in the main at Page and his coaches who looked out of place and lacking the knowhow of how to react to situations on the pitch, the USA first half was an example when they did nothing until h/t .
However similar performances in the following two games showed that lessons were not learned as stated by Page and we were clueless, the worrying aspect coming out of the WC to be considered being the deterioration in performances and whether we take it as a glitch or something much more serious.
On a personal note, we have strived for endless years to reach a decent level in the world game which has been wonderfully achieved in recent times, to maintain that level will always be difficult, but I don't want to see us fade away into oblivion without a fight, and that is my concern for our future.

[iot]

I disagree with your analysis.

I don't think we can criticise Page for not changing things against the US until halftime. Football is a game that ebbs and flows, and teams often go through 15-20min spells where they have the momentum. If we changed things everytime things aren't going our way, we'd have to do it 5-6 times a game. Sometimes you just have to hold your nerve until momentum swings back in your favour. If you think back to the Euro 16 victory over Belgium for example, they were all over us for the first 15-20mins and should have scored 3-4 goals. We didn't change anything, but just managed to build some momentum after they eventually did score. 

You say there were similar performances in the following games where we didn't change anything, but I disagree. For example, we started to press really high against Iran which left a lot of gaps in the middle, but it was definitely a different approach to the US game. Then we went to a back 4 against England, so again a very different approach. 

Most of the changes clearly didn't work very well, but I don't think it's accurate to say that he just stubbornly stuck to his approach without making any changes.

[marsvolta]

Dec 9, 2022 11:19:38 GMT dai said:

I will also add that people were mostly disappointed by the manner of our performances rather than the actual results/failing to get out of the group. I didn't expect to get out of the group - knew the USA were much better, and Iran terribly underestimated. Even the pragmatic posters on here were highlighting Iran's recent poor results.  Failing to get out was about right imo, failing to perform wasn't.

To be called the joint worst team there (along with Qatar) makes the WC memorable for all the wrong reasons.

I don’t think anyone called us the joint worst team out there with Qatar ?

We had the same points as Denmark and Serbia and Canada, along with Qatar, had zero.

[mrpicton79]

Dec 9, 2022 15:43:35 GMT marsvolta said:

Dec 9, 2022 11:19:38 GMT dai said:

I will also add that people were mostly disappointed by the manner of our performances rather than the actual results/failing to get out of the group. I didn't expect to get out of the group - knew the USA were much better, and Iran terribly underestimated. Even the pragmatic posters on here were highlighting Iran's recent poor results.  Failing to get out was about right imo, failing to perform wasn't.

To be called the joint worst team there (along with Qatar) makes the WC memorable for all the wrong reasons.

I don’t think anyone called us the joint worst team out there with Qatar ?

We had the same points as Denmark and Serbia and Canada, along with Qatar, had zero.

Jason Cundy did, if that counts lol.

[marsvolta]

Jason Candy on Talksport? Case closed, no further discussion needed. My client has no further comments to make your honour.Mods lock this thread, haha.

[insertname]

Dec 10, 2022 15:59:10 GMT mrpicton79 said:

Dec 9, 2022 15:43:35 GMT marsvolta said:

I don’t think anyone called us the joint worst team out there with Qatar ?

We had the same points as Denmark and Serbia and Canada, along with Qatar, had zero.

Jason Cundy did, if that counts lol.

Who?

[marsvolta]

Dec 10, 2022 15:59:10 GMT mrpicton79 said:

Dec 9, 2022 15:43:35 GMT marsvolta said:

I don’t think anyone called us the joint worst team out there with Qatar ?

We had the same points as Denmark and Serbia and Canada, along with Qatar, had zero.

Jason Cundy did, if that counts lol.

Cundy with a silent ‘t’