Gareth Southgate has vowed that England will take the game to France tomorrow night and insists the Three Lions have no intention of “covering up and sitting on the ropes”.
In a stirring message on the eve of the World Cup quarter-final, the England manager said his side were aiming to give the country “another night to be proud of”, but admitted they would have to be close to perfect to beat the world champions.
England are the joint-top scorers in Qatar, with 12 goals from four games, and Southgate has used a front-foot approach so far at the tournament.
The manager, who has often been criticised for being overly pragmatic and conservative, refused to say if he would switch to a back three against Didier Deschamps’s side, but insisted England are aiming to cause France problems at Al Bayt Stadium.
Asked if he wanted his side to maintain their offensive approach, Southgate said: “Yes, 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 France problems, and we intend to do that. 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 going get perfection, but we have to get as close to that as we can.”
England are aiming to reach consecutive World Cup semi-finals for the first time, while they fell just short in a first major final in 55 years at last summer’s European Championship.
“We’ve beaten some big teams,” Southgate added. “We know we have the experience of high-pressure nights behind us as a team. We’ve been resilient through a lot of situations — they all prepare you for nights like this.These nights are ones that bring millions of people together, they will remember where they were, and we want to give them another night to be proud of.”
Eight different England players have scored at the finals, including captain Harry Kane and breakout star Jude Bellingham, but key to England’s hopes of staying on the offensive will be executing a plan to contain French superstar Kylian Mbappe.
“There will also be a particular plan for [Olivier] Giroud, and for [Antoine] Griezmann, and for [Ousmane] Dembele,” Southgate said, when asked how to stop Mbappe, who has already scored five times at the finals. “They’ve got a lot of very good players. We will always prepare any team we play against for certain individuals, that the detail of dealing with them is important.”
Southgate says the biggest difference between now and four years ago in Russia is the squad’s “belief”, but he played down suggestions that the game is a defining moment for his team. “We’ve got to recognise 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 really give us the faith that we could win,” he told ITV.
“Now we’ve had a lot of those nights and we’ve a lot of those attributes. We know at this stage they will be very evenly matched games, but we know we have the quality to win. We got to a first final for 55 years. This is a quarter-final, we’ve won a semi-final and have been to a semi-final of the World Cup. But it is a big game against a high-quality opponent. Everything that has happened in the past is history, it all comes down to tomorrow night.”
Southgate’s relationship with supporters was frayed during this season’s dismal Nations League campaign, which ended in relegation, and he was booed by fans at Molineux and in Milan.
The 52-year-old is under contract until after the next European Championship in 2024, but has previously said he will not “outstay my welcome” in the job. The FA would like Southgate to remain in post regardless of tomorrow night’s result, while he has been backed by senior players Kieran Trippier and Luke Shaw this week.
“I’ve got two years left on my contract, well, 18 months, and I’m thinking about France, nothing else,” Southgate said. “What has been brilliant is when very few other people wanted me to stay, [the FA] have always been very supportive, so, as a manager, you value that support.”
Asked what he would emphasise in his last word to the players before they step out tomorrow, Southgate said: “What they have been through and what they’ve learned 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.”
