[WakeyTerrier]

So the English domestic football season is over(well nearly)and we move on to a summer of international football which should last long enough to bring us around full circle and straight back into pre season.

First of all here is Roy's squad for the minimum 6games this summer

Goalkeepers: Fraser Forster, Joe Hart, Tom Heaton



Defenders: Ryan Bertrand, Gary Cahill, Nathaniel Clyne, Danny Rose, Chris Smalling, John Stones, Kyle Walker



Midfielders: Dele Alli, Ross Barkley, Fabian Delph, Eric Dier, Danny Drinkwater, Jordan Henderson, Adam Lallana, James Milner, Raheem Sterling, Andros Townsend, Jack Wilshere



Forwards: Harry Kane, Marcus Rashford, Wayne Rooney, Daniel Sturridge, Jamie Vardy


26man squad named for the friendlies, this number will be cut to 23 by 31st May for the Euro's so basically they have the Turkey and Australia games to book themselves a spot in France.
No massive surprises although Henderson and Wilshere will have to prove they are over any injury problems and Townsend will need to show better form than he has this season..

So what lies in wait for England this summer. Well to start off with we have 3 home friendlies dotted around the country, this will give Roy a chance to see all his squad in action with no doubt different starting line ups and formations to work out what Plan A,B and C are. So we'll start by looking at those fixtures

First up England v Turkey at the Etihad Stadium on Sunday 22nd May (17:15ko)

Turks to watch - Burak Yilmaz, 42caps for Turkey with an impressive return of 19 goals. Yilmaz is a striker who has now decided to earn a bucket load of cash by moving to Chinese club Beijing Guoan. He recently joined than from Galatasaray for €8million
Arda Turan, 89 caps for Turkey with 17 goals, Arda plays in midfield and captains his nation. Turan plays his club football for Barcelona having joined them from Atletico Madrid for a whopping €34million (plus €7million in add ons)
Record v Turkey- we have a fantastic record against Turkey, we have never lost a game or even conceded a goal against them. We've met on 10 occasions and have won 8 and drawn 2. 
P10 W8 D2 L0 F31 A0.
Our last meeting was 11/10/2003 where the teams played out a 0-0 draw

Our Second game is England v Australia at the Stadium of Light on Friday 27th May (19:45ko)

Aussies to watch- Mile Jedinak a poor mans Felieni in my eyes although his record says he is serving his country well. 62 Caps and 12 goals he also happens to be captain these days. Plays his club football for this years FA cup finalists Crystal Palace. Well known fact about Jedinak is he has a fear of Alan,Alan Lees elbows, if he gets writhing 5yards of him he goes down in a heap(Town fans will get that one)
Tim Cahill - yes he's still playing at the grand old age of 36. 89 Caps for the Aussies with a stunning return of 47 goals. Cahill has travelled the world to fill his passport and has played in far flung places such as England,USA and now China where he plays for  Hangzhou Greentown. Did you know Cahill played for Samoa at U20 level and the Republic tried to get him to play for them.
Record v Oz- Not a lot of history between these 2 nations and although England have the better record it was the Aussies who triumphed last time out back on 12/2/2003 when they beat us 1-3 at Upton Park. The overall record reads P6 W3 D2 L1 F6 A5

And our final game and our send off to the Euro finals is England v Portugal at Wembley on Thursday 2nd June

Players to watch
Who else but Ronaldo, probably the best player in Europe, scores goals for fun at Real Madrid and isn't too shabby at international level with 56goals for Portugal. Hopefully he'll be having a nice rest after playing in the Champions League final
Record v Portugal- Of all our warm up games Portugal are the team we've met the most and again it's no surprise that we have the upper hand although a lot of this is due to some big wins way back in the day. The last time we met was in the World Cup back in 2006 when England played out a 0-0 draw only to go out 1-3 on pens 
The overall record reads P22 W9 D8 L5 F45 A25

Ok that's the friendlies out of the way.


EURO2016

The nice people of UEFA have drawn us out in GROUP B alongside the following nations

England v Russia at the Stade Veledrome in Marseille, Saturday 11th June

Ground Capacity-67,394
Our last visit- 15/6/1998 World Cup group match
England 2 v 0 Tunisia
Shearer
Scholes
Crowd 54,587

Players to watch out for-Artyom Dzyuba who scored 8 goals in the qualifiers and has a record of 16apps and 8 international goals in total, he plays his club football at Zenit St Petersburg 
Record in Euro Finals-qualified in 96,04,08 and 12. Russia best performance was a semi final defeat in 08
Overall record v Russia- Early days in this fixture with only 2 fixtures played out between them(thanks to the break up of the Soviet Union) so the record reads as this
P2 W1 D0 L1 F4 A1
Our last fixture took place in Moscow on 17/10/2007 when Russia came out 2-1 winners


England v Wales at the Stade Bollaert-Delelis in Lens, Thursday 16th June

Ground Capacity-38,223 (you can fit the whole Towns population inside this ground
Our last visit- 26/6/1998 World Cup group match
England 2 v 0 Colombia
Anderton
Beckham
Crowd 38,100

Players to watch out for- Only one place to start, Gareth Bale...stop Gareth Bale and we should stop Wales having any chance of winning this. The only player in the Welsh squad who would get into the England team in my opinion. Bale top scored in the group qualifiers scoring 7 of the 11 goals Wales managed. Other notable player to watch from A Town point of view is Emyr Huws who spent last season  on loan to the Terriers from Wigan
Record in Euro Finals- Debut Finals
Overall Record v Wales- This will be the 102nd meeting for this fixture and too many goals for and against for me to count up so the record currently stands at P101 W66 D21 L14
Our last meeting was at Wembley on 6/9/2011 when England won by 1-0 thanks to Ashley Young


England v Slovakia at Stade Geoffroy-Guichard in St Etienne, Monday 21st June

Ground Capacity-41,965
Our last visit- 30/6/1998 World Cup Round of 16
England 2 v 2 Argentina (Argentina won 4-3 on Pens)
Shearer
Owen
Crowd 30,600

Players to watch out for- Marek Hamsik, top scorer in the qualifiers with 5 goals and vice captain. With 85 games for Slovakia he has 17 goals in total and is the 3rd highest scorer for his country in all time. Players club football for Napoli 
Slovakia are captained by Liverpools Martin Skrtel
Record in Euro Finals-debut
Overall record v Slovakia- pretty much newcomers to the international stage but we have met 3 times before, the last meeting was 23/3/2009 when England won 4-0 at Wembley
The record now stands at P3 W3 D0 L0 F8 A2

[spireitematt]

Don't understand why he's picked Delph and Wilshire. Wilshire has only played 3 games all season and he won't take Walcott because he hasn't played enough games even though he's played 2 games more than Wilshire. Should have took Defoe as he's scored 15 goals for a team who survived relegation.

Looks like we've got a strong midfield and strike force its just the defenders which look light. I bet the 3 players who will miss out will be Rashford, Townsend and Bertrand.

[theo_luddite]

It must make sense to someone that we play Wales in a stadium that holds less than 40,000 while we play Russia in one that holds nigh on 70,000. Other than it's close to Dover-Calais so they can ship the day trippers home easily it makes no sense at all. England and Wales other fixtures are both darn Sarf. Again - it makes no sense. Maybe that's why we hate the French.


We offered kindly to donate them Calais
And all they gave us back was the bidet
And now they won't let us go on holiday
That's why I hate the French
Mmm-mm, that's why I hate the French

They all wear berets and they're all called Jacques
They even steal from us the words they lack
Le weekend, le camping and cul-de-sac
That's why I hate the French
Oh-oh, that's why I hate the French.

They claim their films are the best we've ever had
Well I suppose Emmanuelle wasn't bad
Charles Aznavour is always so depressed
Wouldn't you be if oui-oui meant yes?

Sacha Distel has raindrops falling on his head
I wonder if Jean Paul Sartre knows he is dead?
What I resent is that they're so good in bed
That's why I hate the French
Oh-oh, that's why I hate the French.

They bake their bread in such a naughty shape
They brag about their wine and worship the grape
They criticise our food but then they eat crepe
That's why I hate the French
Oh-oh, that's why I hate the French.

And now they started coming here in droves
French cigarettes, French letters and French cloves
I'm sick and tired of eating all this brie
And I'll be buggered if I go to gay Paris

They're pretty cocky 'bout their games in the dark
They think with girls they light a special spark
But look what the bastards did to Joan of Arc
That's why I hate the French
Oh-oh, that's why I hate the French
Mmm-mm, that's why I hate the French

[SHEP_HTAFC]

Good thread Wakey.....

I like the look of our strikers, and apart from Delph and Henderson I like the midfield.
As spiritematt says, that defence of ours looks shaky. Stones could be world class one day, but the rest are barely prem class when it comes to defending. Going forward all the fullbacks look good, but players like Bale will relish attacking them.

Could be a complete embarrassment for us in these Euro's......or we could get to the semis.....who knows.

[WakeyTerrier]

I honestly think we can win this....if we play with the same intensity that we did in Berlin.

Defence looks weak and almost short of numbers but I'm not that concerned about the full back positions, more of a problem in the middle.
Plenty of options in midfield and upfront although he has still 3 players to cut from this squad after the Australia game on the 27th...for me that would be Rashford,Delph and probably Townsend.

I can't see us NOT qualifying for the knock out stages and then it's just a case of who we get drawn against.

Sticking my neck on the line I think we will win the group easily, after that it's a trip to Paris and a game against probably one from the following three...Romania,Poland or Croatia.
Quarter final in Lille against Portugal or Belgium/Italy
Semi final in Lille against Spain
And then the Final in Paris against Germany...what's to fear?

[theo_luddite]

Looks like une promenade dans le parc when you put it like that Wakey.

[Lord Snooty]

No reason at all why we can't win this apart from the fact that we always cock up somewhere along the line.

[SHEP_HTAFC]

I think our success or failure will really be down to the manager.
If Woy decides to be cagey and defensive, we will be annihalted.
If he decides to go for it and put two strikers on the field with all our attacking midfilders, we could do really well.
Still don't think we will win it though.......there are far more teams that are technically and tactically better than us.

[WakeyTerrier]

You could say the same thing about Leicester City and the Premier League

[WakeyTerrier]

Well game one out of the way and what a disappointment.

England 2 v 1 Turkey
Harry Kane put England in front when the linesman seemed to forget the offside rule and all was good in the England camp....it was just a matter of how many we would score against the Turks.
Then Joe Hart had a rush of blood which left a goal pretty much unattended and it was pretty much all Turkey for the rest of the half.
Second half followed the same kind of pattern as the first, England came out and had some good attacks that lead to nothing, Turkey came back strong but couldn't find the target and then Jamie Vardy was brought down for a penalty...his diving has improved quite a bit since that West Ham game at Leicester. Up steps Harry Kane who had been taking just about every set piece all game and blasts the ball wide, just clipping the outside of the post on its way. Glenn Hoddle describes it as a 'positive' penalty, I'm not sure what planet he's on but any penalty where you don't score isn't a 'positive' in my book.
Anyway not to worry as the Turkish goalkeeper and defender on the line sorted out the obligatory England home win soon after when a England corner found its way to Gary Cahill who sent a rather tame header back to towards the corner of the goal, the two Turks got in a right muddle and in each other's way just enough to let Vardy smash the ball in via the Keepers head and keeps our unbeaten run against the Turks going..11 unbeaten now.

One final note, I'm not sure what the attendance was but from my seat you could see vast empty spaces and in the stand opposite and to the right where England and Turkey fans were sharing a stand, it's a poor do and quite embarrassing that we can't sell out the Etihad when people complain about playing at Wembley all the time.