England aren't much fun at Euro 2024 - but boy they can scrap

The obituaries were written, the tweets typed out. England were crashing out of Euro 2024 to lowly Slovakia, Gareth Southgate needed to walk and the players all needed to take a long hard look at themselves... Then Jude Bellingham did what Jude Bellingham has done so many times this year.

I had my player ratings tapped out, the headline was written, and it’ll come as no shock to you that they weren’t particularly glowing. The Three Lions had huffed and puffed against Slovakia, they’d shown some improvement in the second half but not a great deal, and frankly they deserved to be going out of the tournament to a side that had genuinely been better than them.

But Bellingham and Co. weren’t done yet. While fans necked their pints and left the pub, while they shuffled out of their seats and left that stadium in Gelsenkirchen, the players out in Germany weren’t throwing in their towel just yet. There’s always one more chance, they’ll have told themselves. And there was.

The equaliser was iconic. I’m not sure we knew it when Paul Gascoigne did his thing v Scotland or when Michael Owen scored that goal against Argentina, but like we did then, there will be youngsters around the country trying to pull off that Bellingham overhead kick in their gardens for the rest of the summer, and in 20 years time they may well be talking about it the way we spoke about those 90s moments. What happens next will decide with how much joy it is remembered.

Harry Kane’s winner wasn’t quite as aesthetically pleasing, but it was another reminder of why he was still on the pitch. Southgate could have substituted either of them, because - let’s face it - neither of England’s eventual game-winners were really at the races by their usual standards. But great players provide great moments, and those two goals at Arena AufSchalke perfectly showcased why Bellingham and Kane are so vitally important. Even on a bad day they can still turn up.

But they’re not the only ones. I’ve seen England play well and lose, I’ve seen them deserve progression only to fall by the wayside, but what I haven’t seen much of is what we saw on Sunday night... Genuine grit, an ability to grasp victory from the jaws of defeat. The England manager has his critics, and with performances in Germany it’s hard to argue against many of them, but one thing he has done is install a belief that had been missing prior to his arrival.

They fought back against Slovakia the same way they did against Denmark in the last edition, they dug deep and got the job done - it wasn’t pretty, but they’re in the quarterfinals nonetheless, and plenty of their predecessors would’ve crumbled after going behind. That’s something that they all deserve credit for.

Make no mistake, Southgate and his boys will need to be better if they’re going to go all the way, that is painfully clear to see. But after almost 60 years of hurt would it really be that bad if a major European trophy came at the cost of pretty football?