I agree with Dan up to a point. We barely qualified for 2018, with a late goal in Sam Allardyce's sole game in charge getting us there. Southgate came in as a caretaker and was then given the permanent job. He healed and unified the team, and our performance in 2018 galvanised the country. Let's not forget it wasn't long ago the England camp would have a Manchester United table at dinner, a Liverpool table, Chelsea etc. For all the talent the supposed "Golden Generation" had, there were always off-field distractions, e.g. Terry & Ferdinand's feud over Terry's alleged racism to Rio's brother.
What Southgate has done off the field deserves an enormous amount of credit. And the way he has evolved the team over his tenure also shows good development - in 2018 we tried to be solid, and generally relied on set pieces, which was sensible given little preparation time and the realities of tournament play. We then developed the possession-heavy style that I and others have termed "suffer-ball". It's exasperating to watch but again, did well over the Euros tournament. And from what I've seen Vs Brazil we trying to press more and play more expansively, though I'm not sure we did it very well.
All that said, I still am left with the feeling that we could have done better. I take Dan's point about the midfield of Croatia - you can add Lovren, Vrsaljko, Rebic, Mandzukic and Perisic as all solid players would would be in contention for England if they were English. But you can look at the substitutions in that game and you could argue they came too late (equally our subs bench was fairly dire).
Likewise the Italy team had Donnarumma, Bonucci and Chiellini, but I'm not sure any of their other players would be "stars"...Veratti probably? Jorginho is obviously a very solid player. The fact we tried to play Catanaccio Vs them after getting an early goal speaks volumes, but if not for some missed penalties, the narrative would be that Southgate "did enough" and his final subs for the pens were clever.
Returning to the here and now, Kane & Bellingham are good enough to go into any team in the world. Beyond that we have several players who do well for their clubs but I think tournament play is very different, and what they are asked to do by England is very different. I'd put Rice, Foden, Saka and maybe Trent Alexander-Arnold in there; perhaps John Stones too. As much as Maguire has had an enormous amount of faith out in him, and based on club form unjustifiably so, the fact no other English centre back has made themselves the undeniable partner to Stones says a lot. We've had a revolving door of "nearly men", such as Dunk, Mings, Guehi etc. Some more than others could feel harshly done by, but it's a glaring area of weakness, alongside left back.
I hope this is Southgate's last tournament for us, but I hope it ends on a high. I don't like his coaching team's in-game strategy or management, but he has moulded the national team into what it is, from working at U21 level all the way to now. He deserves credit for that, and for fans actually having an expectation for England to be competitive and not just assume we'll be dumped out at the first knock out round.
