The final
England fail again.
This is Editor’s Take: during EURO2024, home of the SCOUTED team’s quick-fire thoughts on the tournament as it happens.
It’s 22:45pm. In the adjoining room, my housemate Harry is playing Daniel Powter’s ‘Bad Day’ on full volume. He’s wearing a Paul Gascoigne shirt and hiding in a corner. If rainclouds could open indoors, they would have.
It’s a joke, obviously. But also we are both quite upset. England lose, again. Ha. Most of the footballing world rejoices tonight at English misery, and fair enough.
I’ve decided to sit at my desk and type whatever comes into my head as Harry’s sad times playlist rolls into Coldplay’s ‘Yellow’. My instinct is to try and dig the emotional thematic from the final, to try and wrap up my evening and my friend’s evening and a nation’s evening into something meaningful. Something bigger than the sum of its parts. And make no mistake: there is something special about evenings like this. So rarely are we truly together. For a few hours you feel part of something much larger than yourself. Flags pave the streets and whip past the window of an Uber ride. Scan a Lime Bike (it plays a sad, tiny goaaaal soundbite as you do) and slalom past couples in white and red under a dying sun. Magic. I will remember tonight forever. We all want to feel part of something.
But then some football happened, apparently, and now that feeling has faded - for the English, at least. And I think it’d be a disservice to write about this final through the prism of my limited experience. I drank, I sang, so what? So did millions of Spaniards in Madrid, Seville, Barcelona, Andalusia, Bilbao - okay, perhaps they didn’t all sing there. But those joyful, drinking Spaniards have, once again, watched their La Roja romp to victory. And for the moment at least, I want to hand the floor to them.
Not of gracious defeat, but jealousy. Any other result tonight would have felt wrong. Once again Spain can lay claim to one of the all-time great European sides. Perhaps this victory was not accomplished with the awe-inspiring culture of 2008 and 2012, but it was great all the same. At its heart, Rodri can now lay undisputed claim to the heavyweight title of Greatest Player in the World. The man simply doesn’t know how to lose. Fabián Ruiz might not have played were Gavi fit, but he did and he was astonishing. I don’t have anything interesting or novel to say about Lamine Yamal, a child already among the best football players on the planet. Nico Williams is about to have a cohort of billionaire superpowers at his feet, squabbling for a scrap of his supreme talent. They won every game. They beat France, Italy, Germany and England. The best side in the tournament has its hands on the silverware, that cannot be in doubt.
Watching those victorious Spanish sides of yesteryear, we all felt like we were witnessing history; Luis de la Fuente’s team has mostly offered a sumptuous vision of the future. Yamal is 17, Williams 22, Pedri 21, Dani Olmo 26, Marc Cucurella 25. Gavi is 19 and his Barcelona teammate Pau Cubarsí two years younger - they weren’t even here. Questions might soon be asked at centre-forward, right-back, whatever. But this is a nation just getting started - again.
My jealousy is not because of Spain’s supreme collection of talent. Yeah sure, these players are fucking amazing. But Jude Bellingham just spent a year skipping past all of them. Harry Kane scored 44 goals this season. Phil Foden is twelve months out from a treble. Declan Rice just went bar-for-bar with Rodri over 38 games. Put your hand on your heart - can you honestly tell me Nico Williams is more talented than Bukayo Saka?
The point, obviously, is as we applaud yet another generation of wonderful Spanish talent, we must ask why their mirror, arguably the most talented collection of English players ever assembled - argue amongst yourselves - have again fallen short.
Using that phrase feels disingenuous. England didn’t fail by a whisker. They didn’t give it everything and lose to a dodgy bounce. The tournament is dead and gone, so let’s not pull any punches: England collated an attacking force of individuals who have each, in their own ways, brutalised the continent’s best defences this year, and together created 0.55 xG. Dreadful.
England’s EURO 2024 story is a patchwork of many miserable hours punctuated by a few exhilarating moments. The many will remember the Watkins angle, the Saka screamer, the Bellingham bailout, and they should - but the few must hold that misery close. A team this good should not conjure such suffering. It’s time to face that.
In 2010, England lost because Germany produced a generation of sublime quality. A grassroots revolution followed. In 2024, England lost because Spain knew how to set their talent free. A similar evaluation must now begin.
Gareth Southgate’s legacy is totally and irrevocably assured. He will always be, to England, the man who made us dream again. What a staggering, historic achievement. His waistcoats and warmth will be remembered for generations. Stories about the summers he gave us will be passed down to children and grandchildren. He has totally redefined what it means to play football for England, and by extension, what it means to love those who do. And it is, I understand, difficult and painful and a little gross to frame back-to-back finals as failure. I don’t think it needs to be so binary: this was another summer of beautiful moments, yes, but produced by a team playing well within themselves. Both things can be true.
Southgate’s superpower - the culture, feeling and unity he’s instilled in England - should endure well past his tenure. He has set the foundations for whatever comes next. But how a football team presses on the pitch really matters. How genuine superstars combine in the attacking third matters. Attacking through an entire tournament while ignoring one half of the pitch matters. 6.1 xG in seven games - that matters. Call me a nerd if you want. I’m already sad. I can take it.
Replacing Southgate with a brighter tactical mind could be a total disaster. Julian Nagelsmann did not reach a final this summer. Improvement is never guaranteed. There is no simple fix, no switch that Southgate forgot to turn on. Unpacking and reflecting on this tournament is a gargantuan task - a million micro-decisions have stitched this tapestry over many months. But England’s collective failures on the pitch have been so blindingly obvious I can’t help but crave a new journey.
The work to fix 2010’s embarrassment has been done. England will now, almost certainly, produce players at a breadth and quality unmatched by anyone for the next decade, save France. Now, as with France, it’s time to fix the other gaping hole in this nation’s identity. It’s time for something new. Progressive, modern ideas for our progressive, modern players. Collectivism, not individuals. Systems, not heroball. That doesn’t mean all-out-attack, sexy fluid football, handbrake off. It doesn’t mean we should throw England’s defensive heritage in the bin. It means Spain had less of the ball than Croatia and battered them. Good coaching is good coaching. It means a team that plays together, not apart.
Southgate has conjured that togetherness, in fleeting moments every other summer, for a fractured nation. Watching England meant misery and now it means joy. I look forward to every tournament. So does my roommate and so do millions of others. The idea of risking that makes me feel sick. But, to me, heroball has run its course. The margins are too fine. If Jude Bellingham swings his leg over his head a fraction too late, England lose. Ollie Watkins never finds his angle. Bukayo Saka doesn’t get his moment. Trent Alexander-Arnold never boots his winning ball into the crowd. And we, at home, lose all the perfect evenings that followed, the moments we spent together.
This tightrope is of England’s own making. I would rather stand on more solid ground. And yes, maybe it means Harry will be back in his corner in two years and the sad playlist will come back out and I’ll be sat here again, older and regretful and still listening to Coldplay, for god’s sake. But I firmly believe that England’s superstars should be impossible to deny. Maybe next time, with a little change, they will be.
Thank you for reading my nonsense across EURO 2024. It’s been a joy to write, and read your reactions. If you’re sick of me, good news - the tournament’s over. Proper analysis returns to SCOUTED from here on out.
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