Southgate reveals the 2 areas England fell brief in dismal draw

Gareth Southgate shouldered the blame for England’s abysmal performance as they were booed off following their Euro 2024 draw against Denmark on Thursday night.

Prince William, who attended the game, spoke to the players in the dressing room after the final whistle as Southgate’s side came to terms with their latest below-par performance here in Germany.

Having taken the lead through Harry Kane, England were dominated for large parts of the game as Denmark equalised through Morten Hjulmand.

England’s players were jeered off by their own fans and Southgate accepted responsibility for his team’s dismal display.

‘The team didn’t function today. That’s my responsibility, I’m in control of that,’ he said. 

Gareth Southgate admitted England were poor at pressing and keeping possession against Denmark 

Prince William spoke to England’s players after the game as they came to terms with the draw

‘I have to find solutions to that. The players are giving absolutely everything they have, if anything they show they care too much and it’s for me to find better solutions than we’ve shown.

‘We have to accept that to talk about today, we didn’t press the ball with enough intensity and we kept conceding possession too cheaply and when you do those two things it is hard to have control.

‘It led to an anxious performance the longer the game went on and we understand that has to be better if we want to progress to the stages of the tournament everyone is expecting.

‘We are falling a bit short and ultimately that is my responsibility I am the manager. To achieve extraordinary things you have to go through some difficult moments.

‘The challenge is to do something that has never been done before so it couldn’t be any bigger.

‘We know we have had a lot of issues but we are where we are now and we have to find the best way forward. I have to lead the group in the right way, make intelligent decisions and to be better without the ball so we are not needing to defend for periods of the game like at the moment.’

On the boos Southgate said: ‘I think we have to accept this is the environment we are in, we are in the environment of winning on the biggest stage and if we don’t hit the level we have to accept what comes our way.

‘We need the fans, they have been brilliant in the stadiums and I can understand their frustration with the way we played but these boys aren’t lacking effort.

‘The players are giving absolutely everything they have, if anything they show they care too much’

Southgate took the blame for the performance after those in the crowd booed the team off 

‘We have to find a better way of playing and more quality. I don’t think anyone would look at them and say we don’t care.’

Southgate has indicated he is set to ring the changes for Tuesday’s game versus Slovenia.

‘We need to look clearly. We are disappointed with the level of the two performances we have had.

‘We have to analyse that in depth and find some solutions to address the issues we have and over the next couple of days we will spend a lot of time doing that. We know the level has to be higher and can be higher.

‘Maybe the biggest thing is we have to accept the environment around us.’