The 3-Lions this evening sailed into their first semi-finals since 1990 after winning Sweden 2:0. The two goals which came off a Maguire header in the 30 minute and a Dele Ali header in the 59th minute were enough to ensure their win.
Speaking after the match, the English coach, Gareth Southgate said “It’s an incredible privilege to be the England manager anyway, so to be able to take the team this far and knowing the people who have done it in the past, they are people I hold in such high esteem. Before the game, we wanted to be here another week. It’s up to us now which games we play in. I’m so proud of what all of the staff and players have done. We played an opponent whose identity is clear and whose togetherness has at times been too much for us to handle over the years.
“To come off the back of a game where we’ve had to go to the depths emotionally and physically, it was a real sign of resilience for a young team who are maturing in front of our eyes. We are a team who are still improving, we know where we are. We’re having success because everybody is working so hard, on the field. We’re also in this position because people who are in the squad like Cahill, Jones, Welbeck, Pope, Butland have been excellent in their mentality, their attitude to support the team. Even if they’ve not had as much game time as they would have liked they’re one of the reasons we are where we are.”
Janne Andersson, the Swedish coach acknowledged the strength of the English team, saying they were good enough to win the World Cup. He said “I’m not sure anything went wrong as such. We were faced with a really good opponent and we didn’t reach peak performance. The margins are quite small. It’s difficult to create opportunities against a team that is playing a five-man defence.
“There were very few openings generally from the English side. We were faced with a good team, England were the best team today. It’s not always something goes wrong, sometimes your opponent is better. I have the greatest respect for them, and congratulations to England.
“Yes I definitely believe England are good enough to win the World Cup. They are forceful, well-organised. I want to pay tribute to the team and the coach. They are a good football side and they don’t give a lot away. I believe that they are perfectly able to go all the way.”
England will now take on the winner between Russia and Croatia in the semi-finals.