Italy’s Lorenzo Insigne sinks England in Under-21 Championship opener
The crucial blow came late but it was no more than Italy, and in particular Lorenzo Insigne, deserved on a balmy night authentic canada goose outlet online best canada goose jacket for women in Tel Aviv, one which ended with England making the worst possible start to these finals. Outplayed for almost the entire match, they succumbed to a free-kick from the best player on the pitch, leaving them bottom of Group A and facing elimination if they lose to Norway – who drew 2-2 with Israel earlier in the evening – on Saturday.
It was berlin film festival ends canada goose jacket sponsorship amid the first goal England Under-21s have conceded in 889 minutes of football and brought an end to a nine-match winning run. Questions will be asked about whether Jack Butland should have can you wash a canada goose parka been beaten at his near post and also if the wall did its job but England could have no complaints about the outcome.
Inspired by Insigne, who was been a regular in the Napoli side and on this evidence will soon be a permanent fixture in the senior team, Italy exposed all too familiar weaknesses in an England team that looked painfully short tactically and technically.
Unable to keep the ball and string together coherent passing moves, they were powerless to stem the Italian tide. One statistic sums up how miserable a cgjo night this was for Stuart Pearce’s side. Marco Verratti, the accomplished Paris St-Germain midfielder, made 120 passes, which was 76 more than any England player. In other words England spent much of the match chasing shadows and trying canada goose coat 1000 bulbs to soak up pressure, which brings back uncomfortable memories of the Euro 2012 quarter-final between these two nations last summer, canada goose coat – victoria when Italy buy canada goose parka ottawa triumphed on penalties after dominating the previous buy a canada goose jacket online 120 minutes.
England did have a goal disallowed in strange circumstances early in the second half, when Craig Dawson’s header was ruled out after Antony Gautier, the French referee, belatedly penalised Steven Caulker for a foul, but Pearce knew better than to bemoan that incident. Italy, as the England manager admitted, had been denied a clear penalty towards buy canada goose jacket nyc the end of the first half, when Jack Robinson, deputising for the suspended Danny Rose at left-back, brought down Alessandro Florenzi.
For Pearce, who 24 hours earlier had said that he wants to stay on as Under-21 manager in the long term, this was a chastening evening. “We were awful in the first half,” he said. “I thought the performance was very poor, I thought the best team won the game. Once Dawson scored we thought we got our noses in front, which would have given us a touch more confidence, but I think overall on the night it was a poor performance, which is unlike us.”
Asked what disappointed him most, Pearce replied: “Probably one or two of our bigger players didn’t perform for whatever reason. I felt we could have caused the Italians a problem if we had just been a are there any canada goose outlet stores bit more cultured with our final pass, which just wasn’t good enough to hurt the opposition. As always, I’ll give you an honest assessment of what I saw. It wasn’t good enough from us and the players know that.”
Pearce gave some praise to Nathan Redmond, who showed flashes of promise on his Under-21 debut, but it was hard to pick out anyone else in an England shirt who emerged with credit. Tom Ince, who was suspended, will be available for the Norway match and will bring some much needed creativity to the team, but there is no indication that Wilfried Zaha, the most gifted player in the squad, will have recovered from the ankle problem that prevented him from featuring.
Italy, in truth, were superior in every department and the only surprise was that they took so long to score. The wonderfully named Ciro Immobile shot wide, Insigne wasted a couple of decent chances and Butland denied Fabio Borino, before Nathaniel Clyne committed the foul that led to the goal. Insigne, who shimmered with menace on the left, curled a fine free-kick inside the near post.
England came close to pilfering an equaliser with the last kick of the game, when Jordan Henderson’s free-kick was beaten away by Francesco Bardi, but that would have only papered over the cracks on a hugely underwhelming night. “The way I look at it we’re probably in a three-team group, us Norway and Israel, and they’ve got the march on us because of the point they’ve both got,” Pearce said. “I think probably we’ll have to win both games but that’s tournament football.”