The Three Lions crashed out of the World Cup after losing against the world champions in the quarter-finals.
Jamie Carragher believes Gareth Southgate should’ve been more “brave” with his substitutions in England’s 2-1 defeat against France.
The Three Lions managed to come back into the game with a penalty from Harry Kane after conceding the opener.
France then restored their lead through Olivier Giroud. But this time, Kane missed his penalty to end the Three Lions’ hopes of coming back into the game.
Carragher believes England’s bench was strong enough to turn the game around, but Southgate failed to properly use his options.
“That’s easy to say after the event, but I did feel before the game that England had to be brave from the bench,” the former England international said.
“I just felt that in the period between the two goals, we could have been braver from the bench.
“With five substitutions, it’s a big part of a manager’s role to try to influence or change a game. I know Gareth’s been criticised for that in the past, after the games against Croatia [in the 2018 World Cup semi-finals] and Italy [in the Euro 2020 final].
“Both those sides, if we’re being totally honest, were better than us. I don’t think France were better than us, and I felt the change should have been to try to go and win the game.
“England certainly had the strongest bench in the competition, I firmly believe that, and I just think we could have been a little bit more proactive in that period where it was 1-1 and we were playing really well.”
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