Qatar World Cup 2022: England will face off against France in the quarterfinal on Saturday. While both sides look to script history, Gareth Southgate has backed the Three Lions to do the same.
Former champion England is desperate to lay its hands on the coveted title again during the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar. Having progressed to the event's quarterfinals, it is set to take on defending champion France at the Al Bayt Stadium in Al Khor on Saturday. Both sides have been in deadly forms of late, and there cannot be an outright winner predicted in this tie, as both would look to script history in the contest. Meanwhile, English head coach Gareth Southgate is also desperate for his side to script the history and has called for his boys to give it all to make it happen.
Southgate articulated to the media, "We've made quite a bit of history over the last four or five years, not all of it good, but that's the great challenge. When you go back through the tournaments, you see the teams that have knocked England out. We haven't been able to do that, so that's the next test for this team."
"We have a lot of experience of these moments, and they know that they've had to win games in different ways; they've had to come from behind in big matches. What we talked about against Senegal was keeping the relentless pressure going, not sitting back when we were ahead, and ensuring that we kept our game's intensity. We've got to do that now against the world champions," added Southgate, reports FotMob.
"There have been many moments when playing with England is difficult. It's a different sort of challenge to your club. It's far more scrutiny. So you have to be able to handle that. When selecting players, we're looking at their ability to handle that mentally as much as anything else," Southgate continued.
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"The young lads that have come in are showing that. But, you never know until they are in these moments how that's going to be. We had a lot of caps on the pitch against Senegal, even the younger ones, because we've blooded them early," concluded Southgate.