England once again had a goal correctly ruled out for a Phil Foden offside after they briefly thought they had found an equaliser in their knockout clash with Slovakia.
Gareth Southgate’s side went 1-0 down to Ivan Schranz’s strike midway through another thoroughly below-par first half for England, with Slovakia deserving their lead.
That left England with a battle on their hands to breach a stubborn Slovakian defence, and their celebrations were short-lived when Foden found the net five minutes after the break.
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England celebrations against Slovakia cut short by Phil Foden offside call
The Manchester City midfielder had been caught in an offside position after getting onto Declan Rice’s pass and putting the ball across the face of goal for Bukayo Saka to tap in in England’s last group stage game against Slovenia.
And he was again penalised after playing the finishing role this time around, needlessly drifting offside to receive Kieran Trippier’s square ball across the six yad box for Foden to tap home.
The goal was quickly ruled out, leaving England to start again in their battle to try and save their Euro 2024 campaign.
Slovakia edged through into the last 16 after beating Belgium in their opening game of the tournament and then finishing Group E on four points – just like the other three sides in their group.
But Slovakia were indisputably the underdogs for this encounter, and England fans watching both live in Gelsenkirchen and back at home were desperate to see signs that their side could spark into life having had a disappointing start to Euro 2024 – despite finishing top of their group.
Their standing among the pre-tournament favourites and their dominant group stage performances at their past two major tournaments had – quite rightly – set expectations high that they would hit the ground running out in Germany.
Instead they had struggled to find any fluency on the ball other than in fleeting moments, before the goals in their first two games and late on in their third. With a quarter-final meeting against Switzerland to play for, better was expected than England produced in another troubling first half against Slovakia.
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